Middletown Nature Gardens in Middletown, Connecticut, is a protected open space off Randolph Road that the city bought in 1995 to preserve habitat for local plants and animals. Its trails are designed for quiet walking, with a main loop and side paths winding through mixed vegetation. Native trees and shrubs along the way include red cedar, flowering dogwood, highbush blueberry, white pine, and speckled alder. Community volunteers help maintain the park and support wildlife with bluebird boxes and bat houses. Vernal pools in the southeast corner shelter breeding salamanders and wood frogs, and a 200-year-old sugar maple known as the bee tree houses a large bee colony.