Visitor Center

The Visitor Center is your gateway to Bowman's Hill Wildflower Preserve. A friendly volunteer or staff member in the Twinleaf Book & Gift Shop will welcome you to the Preserve and tell you about seasonal highlights. Using our map, they can suggest the best trails for you based on your time, interests and abilities. They can also help you sign up for an educational program or help you become a member.

Twinleaf Book & Gift Shop

Conveniently located in our Visitor Center, the Twinleaf Book & Gift Shop offers an exceptional selection of books plus a variety of nature and botanical gifts, clothing, cards and more. Members receive a 10 percent discount on books, apparel, novelties and plants. All purchases help support the Preserve and its mission.

Looking for a gift card? Redeemable for admission, Shop and Nursery purchases only.

Cash, checks, credit cards and Tap to Pay are accepted.

Restrooms are located outside the Visitor Center, and a water bottle refilling station is located in the shop.

Auditorium Bird Observatory

Inside the Visitor Center’s auditorium, an enormous wall of windows overlooks the forest canopy, the Pidcock Creek Valley and Bowman's Hill. The Bird Observatory offers an unrestricted view of several feeders, where birds can be closely observed feeding on seeds and suet.

Depending on the season, you might see chickadees, titmice, nuthatches, house finches, goldfinches, grosbeaks, cardinals, juncos, sparrows, doves, thrushes or woodpeckers. If you're lucky, you may catch a glimpse of a hawk, a turkey, a pileated woodpecker, or other woodland creatures.

Happy birding!

Visitor Center Idea Garden

Just outside the Visitor Center is our native plant Idea Garden, where you can discover more than 130 native plant species in a cultivated and easily accessible setting. As our garden demonstrates, native plants are not just suited for wild spaces; they also thrive in home gardens and flower beds. In fact, because they are adapted to our local environmental conditions, native plants actually require less maintenance than non-native garden plants and benefit the local ecosystem.

Our garden is full of flowers that bloom in all seasons, so it is always vibrant and constantly changing. In the early spring, our shooting stars (Dodecatheon meadia) steal the show. Mid-season, our fire-pinks (Silene virginica) are major stunners. And among our many aster species blooming in late summer, the New England aster (Symphotrichum novae-angliae) is a magnet for butterflies and other pollinators.