Almost a year into a collaboration that allows people to borrow outdoors gear from the Keene Public Library, organizers say more than 130 residents have used the new service.

Keene Public Library and the Monadnock Outdoors Association created the Monadnock Region’s first outdoor “Gear Library” to reduce barriers to camping, fishing and other recreational activities. The gear library allows residents to check out free tents, life vests, kayaks and other expensive gear for an outdoor adventure, then return the equipment so others can use it.

“There are a lot of community members who are interested in enjoying the amazing outdoor spaces that we have access to in this region, but really the gear was a huge hurdle in accessing those resources and getting to spend that valuable time outdoors,” said Benée Hershon, the community engagement director of the Cheshire County Conservation District, one of the member organizations to help with the creation of the library.

The service is open to anyone with a Keene Public Library Card, as well as Cheshire County Special Borrowers. The library is equipped with roughly $7,000 worth of gear in the Keene Public Library’s basement and people can borrow the equipment for up to one week. In addition to smaller items, like camping chairs, hammocks and lanterns, it holds larger items, like folding kayaks and a paddleboard that can be checked out online through the library website.

The loan program began after a Monadnock Outdoors Association survey of the community discovered that people couldn’t participate in some outdoor activities for lack of equipment.

“The response that we got from that survey was just overwhelming, and it became really clear that there was a need for [the Gear Library],” Hershon said.

Similar initiatives exist throughout New Hampshire and in Vermont, but the one at Keene Public Library is the only outdoor gear library in the Monadnock Region.

“That really further affirmed the fact that we needed a resource like that specifically for the Monadnock Region,” she said.

The conservation district, which also works with farmers and residents to preserve the natural resources of the county, heads the Monadnock Outdoors Association. The outdoors association was formed in 2021 and has representatives from a number of municipalities, schools, businesses, nonprofits, coalitions, faith and civic groups working together to promote engagement with the outdoors.

“We’ve got some things that we just don’t even bother putting back into storage … because they’re constantly being rotated out,” Keene Public Library Director Marti Fiske said of the program’s popularity this summer.

“[In] about April, May, things started taking off with the camping gear, and it’s going gangbusters,” she said.

The most popular items have been the two folding kayaks. “It’s going out constantly,” Fiske noted.

When the group was purchasing gear, the funds for which came from a Cheshire Medical Center grant, portability was an important factor in its choices. “We worked with Monadnock Outdoors to choose things that would be very easily portable. You don’t have to have a truck or a rooftop rack. You can get a kayak that is the size of a small suitcase and it goes in your back seat,” Fiske explained.

While the loan program features a robust summer stock, Fiske said next steps include preparing for the winter.

“Right now, the only thing we have for the winter season is snowshoes,” she said.

But the loan program isn’t well-suited to loan the necessary equipment for other popular winter sports, like skiing.

“The problem is having something that we don’t have to keep lots of. We know we’re not going to be able to do skis, for example, because we can’t stock enough sizes of shoes and proper ski lengths and all of that,” she said.

“So it has to be something that is easy to be used by anyone of any size.”