BETHEL – The Mahoosuc Land Trust will present the first of its “Local Knowledge Series” at 7 p.m. Wednesday, Jan. 16, at Trustees Auditorium, McLaughlin Science Building, Gould Academy.

The featured speakers will be Kevin Slater and Polly Mahoney and they will discuss “Native Cree and Inuit Guides of the North.”

Both speakers have their own dog sled teams – a total of three dozen dogs. Mahoney, a native Mainer, lived a subsistence lifestyle in the bush of the Yukon Territory and became the director of a daycare center there. She and her huskies were featured in the movie, “Never Cry Wolf.”

Mahoney has EMT training as a wilderness first responder and is a registered Maine Master Guide.

Slater, also a registered Maine Master Guide, taught at the University of Maine, builds his own dog sleds and canoes for wilderness trips and is a former program director for Outward Bound.

Both have been featured in periodicals such as Mushing, Canadian Geographic, Downeast and a film for National Geographic Explorers Journal and for PBS “Made in Maine.”

They were featured in the “Outdoors” section of the Maine Sunday Telegram on Dec. 23, 2007. The Mahoosuc Guide Service, which they run out of Newry, is committed to working with Native communities of the north to develop cultural tourism.