chicago wildernes s · times the proc esm ayb hrd, v np iful.mk g hard choices, however, is what we...

BAMBI, BEAVERS AND BOB • BIRD COUNTERS

ChicagoWILDERNESS

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E X P L O R I N G N A T U R E & C U L T U R E

What is ChicagoWilderness?

Chicago Wilderness is some of

the finest and most significant

nature in the temperate world, with

roughly 200,000 acres of protected

natural lands harboring native

plant and animal communities that

are more rare—and their survival

more globally threatened—than the

tropical rain forests.

C H I C A G O W I L D E R N E S S

is an unprecedented alliance of 98

public and private organizations

working together to study and

restore, protect and manage the

precious natural resources of the

Chicago region for the benefit of the

public. www.chicagowilderness.org

ChicagoWILDERNESS is a quarterly

magazine that celebrates the rich

natural heritage of this region and

tells the inspiring stories of the

people and organizations working

to heal and protect local nature.

D e b r a S h o r e

E D I T O R

C H I C A G O W I L D E R N E S SA Reg i ona l Na ture Re s e rv e

OPPOSITE: Frosted rosehip by Glenn Jahnke/Root Resources

Bambi, Beavers and Bob

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Who among us doesn’t feel a thrill at the sightof deer? We come upon them in ChicagoWilderness, heads lifted, suddenly alert from

grazing in the woods, or emerging at the edges of subur-ban lawns. Unlike amushroom or a butter-fly, they’re flesh andblood like us. We’reneighbors.Who among us

doesn’t feel delight andyearning at the howlof a coyote or the slapof a beaver tail? Thesebig mammals force usagain and again into a collision betweenscience and sensibility. A photo out a friend’swindow in North-brook shows oneneighbor’s air condi-tioner and a four-legged neighbor gawk-ing at the camera. On the first day our friend moved in, neighbor Bob

told him that the whole street had essentially aban-doned gardening and otherwise suffered grievously whenthe deer population exploded. And, with an ironiclaugh, he said he also puts out bushels of apples to helpthe deer through the winter. Talk about a love-hate rela-tionship!Chicago WILDERNESS invited a quintet of land

managers, advocates, and policy makers from around theregion to talk about deer. In a candid, wide-ranging dis-cussion (page 4), these folks described the dilemma ofdeer—namely, how can we incorporate our love for par-ticular animals with the desire and need to provide forhealthy habitat for many species, not one alone?

Let’s be frank. Treating deer as sacrosanct means anunacceptable trampling on the lives of countless othercreatures. By now the scientific evidence is beyond dis-pute: overpopulations of deer are causing widespread

damage to the ecosys-tem. Unless we agreeon ways to controltheir numbers, deerwill progressivelywreck some of theregion’s best habitats. So, those of us who

care about nature facea challenge: can welove beaver, lovedeer, even love themtenderly, and stillaccommodate a carefor the people andother creatures whoselives they may dis-rupt? Can we developwise hearts and auniquely humancapacity to under-

stand—and to feel affection for—the greatercommunity, and not its individuals?Often eyebrows are raised when the U.S. Army

Corps of Engineers proposes to build a dam. When theC.W. Army Corps of Beavers go to work, the results areoften controversial as well. Such controversy is not tobe avoided. If we want to have healthy habitat for deerand butterflies, for flowers and frogs, beaver and birds,then we must make decisions and implement them. Attimes the process may be hard, even painful. Makinghard choices, however, is what we humans do. As par-ents, as voters, as friends, we make our best choices andlive the results. At least in the case of deer and beavers,we seem to be getting better at it.

C O N T E N T S

F E A T U R E SDEER AND THE ECOSYSTEM by Jill Riddell . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .4

Can smart and decent people resolve the dilemma of deer? Land managers and advocates talk it out.

THE CHRISTMAS BIRD COUNTby Judy Pollock . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .10

100 Years and Counting: citizen scientists have fun while tracking the fortunes of feathered friends.

THE MINGLED DESTINIES OF BEAVER AND PEOPLEby Jack MacRae . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .12

These furry engineers change the world. They flood out some neighbors—and make homes for others. What a story!

D EPAR TMENT SInto the Wild . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .15

Where to ski cross the country, follow animal tracks, enjoy winter.Natural Events Calendar: Skating on thin ice; owls hanging out; deep diving old squaws; the otter limits.

Meet Your Neighbors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .23 Mighty Acorns. Palos Park Tree Body. Snow bunting. White-footedmouse.

Family Quiz Game . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .27Test your local nature knowledge.

Marsh Under Moonlight . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .28 by Miles Lowry

News from Chicago Wilderness . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .30Pennies for the Prairie. Forest preserves for sale? Wreckless abandon. The news of nature and nature’s people.

Reading Pictures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .36Three Clues.

BOARD OF DIRECTORS:President: Dr. George RabbVice-President: Dan GriffinSecretary: Laura GatesTreasurer: Barbara Whitney Carr Jerry Adelmann, Laura Hohnhold, John Rogner, Ron Wolk

EDITOR . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Debra ShoreSENIOR EDITOR . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Stephen PackardASSISTANT EDITORS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Sheryl De Vore

Chris Howes

NEWS EDITORS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Alison Carney BrownElizabeth Sanders

ART DIRECTOR . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Terri WymoreEDITORIAL CONSULTANT . . . . . . . . . Bill Aldrich

Chicago WILDERNESS is published quarterly. Subscriptions are $14/yr. Please address all subscription correspondence to Chicago WILDERNESS, P.O. Box 268,Downers Grove, IL 60515-0268. (630) 963-8010. Please direct editorial inquiries and correspondence to Editor, Chicago WILDERNESS, 9232 Avers Ave,Evanston, IL 60203. (847) 677-2470. e-mail: [email protected] Unsolicited manuscripts cannot be returned without a self-addressed stamped envelope. Chicago WILDERNESS isprinted on recycled paper and should be passed aroundfrom friend to friend. Chicago WILDERNESS is endorsedby the Chicago Region Biodiversity Council. The opinionsexpressed in these pages, however, are the authors’ own. © by Chicago Wilderness Magazine, Inc.

ISSN 1097-8917. Postmaster, address service requested toChicago WILDERNESS, PO Box 268, Downers Grove, IL60515-0268.

All rights reserved.

Photo:Rob Curtis Photo:Kim

Karpeles/Life Through the Lens

ChicagoWILDERNESS

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26

Volume III, Number 2

Photo:Jim Flynn/Root Resources

ABOVE: Felling great trees—just to eat the bark—beavers challenge our views of benign and changelessnature. Photo by Mike MacDonald.OPPOSITE: Cook County’s Black Partridge Woods. Photo by Mike MacDonald.COVER: Wind, water, winter light. Photo by Willard Clay.

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There’s something about deer that epitomizes thewild. Even though next door may be a shoppingmall complete with Gap and Starbucks, a deer ina forest preserve transports a visitor away from all

of that—from all that is tame, from all that is ordinary.Yet can there be too much of a good animal? In Chicago

Wilderness, white-tailed deer have become so prolific thatlarge herds threaten healthy natural ecosystems. ChicagoWILDERNESS invited five people with expertise on deerto consider where we and the deer now stand. Some partic-ipants, originally opposed to deer control, have becomeconvinced that reducing deer numbers is necessary to pre-serve entire ecosystems. Others, who once regarded deerpolicy only as a professional question, have come to respectthe strong feelings deer evoke for many people.

PARTICIPANTSTom Anderson is director of the Save The Dunes

Council, a nonprofit organization in northwest Indiana.His involvement in the issue dates back eight years whenIndiana’s Department of Natural Resources was consideringreducing deer herds in state parks, including the IndianaDunes State Park. Initially, Save The Dunes Councilopposed the reduction, but after an in-depth study demon-strated that serious damage was being done to the park’sflora, the Council decided to support deer reduction. Steve Barg is director of education for Lake Forest Open

Lands. Previously he was director of the Heller NatureCenter in Highland Park and a member of the City ofHighland Park’s task force on white-tailed deer.Marty Jones is in charge of the urban deer project for

the Illinois Department of Natural Resources. He startedworking on the issue in 1983, conducting an urban deerstudy for the Illinois Natural History Survey.Dan Ludwig is the animal ecologist for the DuPage

County Forest Preserve District. He first became involvedwith urban deer in Illinois in 1985, when he rode along onaerial counts to assess relative abundance of deer in north-eastern Illinois. After examining data on deer populationgathered between 1985 and 1990, the Forest PreserveDistrict decided to set up a study measuring the impact ofdeer on vegetation. John Oldenburg, a forest ecologist, was hired in 1992 by

Deer and theEcosystem

by Jill Riddell

Prey without a predator

the DuPage County Forest Preserve District to administerseveral natural resource programs, including the deer control program. He believes that, through research, “wegained a lot of insight into what happens to deer and howthey move. We believe that we’re approaching a level ofdensity that we feel is more in balance with the ecosystem,[where] deer can live in balance with the other organisms.”Jill Riddell is a freelance writer who worked previously

as communications director for both Openlands Projectand for the Illinois Nature Conservancy. She served asmoderator for the discussion.

BACKGROUND Marty: In Illinois, deer were gone by the turn of the century. Deer were given complete protection from markethunting in 1901. After that, there were even attempts totry and reintroduce deer. In the absence of predators andwith complete protection from hunting their numbersrebounded dramatically—so much so that hunting seasons were opened up beginning in 1956. Today you see estimates for deer numbers in Illinois up to 500,000.Steve:When I was a child I never saw deer, and I grew upin a rural area. And when I did see a deer, it was usually up

Photo: Rob Curtis

Photo: Lou Nettlehorst

6 C H I C A G O W I L D E R N E S S

in the north woods of Wisconsin. To me, it symbolized thatI was in the wilderness. It was great. We’d all celebrate.How many of us had that experience? Most of us probably.Even today, I love seeing deer in preserves. It still rings

of that feeling, “Oh, we’re in the wilderness now.” Here is alarge grazing mammal that still inhabits the same placesthat we inhabit. What a wonderful thing!Jill: I would imagine everybody here had similar experi-ences, and that’s part of why you became interested enoughin nature to make it your career. But then things changed? Steve: In Highland Park, we used to show people a photo-graph from Ryerson Conservation area in south LakeCounty. Ryerson put up an eight- or ten-foot wire fence in1987 called an exclosure that allows movement of a lot ofplant-eating mammals but that excludes deer. Anyone canstand there in mid-May and see a marked difference. Insidethe exclosure where the deer can’t get to it, you’ll see lotsof flowering plants—larger plants, and a greater variety ofspecies often times. Outside, you see very few flowers or noflowers at all, much smaller plants and less biodiversity. It’slike looking at a garden next to a gravel road.Tom: The impact of deer has been very substantial onspring wildflowers at Indiana Dunes State Park, wherethere are something like 30 or 40 rare and threatenedspecies. There is one endangered shinleaf that was reducedfrom a [fairly large] area down to literally a couple of indi-vidual plants.

ECOSYSTEM IMPACTThe issue of whether to cull deer is sometimes falsely

described as an argument between “plant people” and “animal lovers. In fact, the heavy grazing of an overly large population of deer affects much more than plant populations.Tom: Deer don’t have an impact just on plants. By devour-ing many plant species, deer cause other damage to theecosystem—to the songbirds, numbers of bird species,ground nesting birds, small mammals, amphibians, on andon. It is important to look at the whole ecosystem, becauseas we got into the public debate, some people attempted topolarize the debate—to say “You are either for the plants oryou’re for deer.”Steve:We had people coming to us saying, “Why don’t youjust go out and spray all your trillium with Deer Away?”Even if Deer Away is an effective repellent, the idea thatwe would be able to spray every plant that might be browsedby deer—they didn’t understand that this wasn’t a garden. One of the other things that managers of public land

have to talk about that’s different than private landownersis that natural areas are under a tremendous amount ofpressure. You’ve got invasive species, changes in water flowsand levels, fragmented habitat. You have all these pressuresalready that you are trying to eliminate if you want tomaintain a healthy natural area. And in terms of managingthe preserve I was responsible for, even though deer arenaturally found there, they were putting as much or morepressure on the ecosystem as an invasive shrub like buck-thorn does.Tom: The animal people most come to see at the state parkturns out to be deer. The public perception of deer is a lotdifferent than the public perception of buckthorn. I don’tthink anyone would have stopped to say, “You shouldn’t cutbuckthorn.” There were certainly people on the deer task force in

Indiana who didn’t care what the impacts on the ecosystemwere. To them, having more deer was an even higher value,no matter what the impact.

DENSITY OF DEERHow do we know how many deer are too many? Or is it

more helpful to measure the health of the ecosystem thanto count the deer?John: A homeowner may like plants, he likes his hyacinths,but he’s willing to accept 30 deer per square mile and fig-ures he’ll just plant more hyacinths because he knows thedeer will eat some of them. His tolerance for lots of deer isgoing to be higher than the land manager who says we canonly deal with six to 10 deer per square mile because of theimpacts that were demonstrated in our preserves. And thehunter may like 40 per square mile.Jill: John, has your goal of the forest preserve’s carryingcapacity* changed over time?

Trillium blooms inside a deer exclosure fence on the right sideof this photo. Outside the fence, trilliums and many otherspecies of plants and animals are declining or gone.

Photo: Frank Drummond/Lake County Forest Preserves

*Carrying capacity refers to the density of deer that can be sustained by a tract of land.

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR?

Do you have thoughts about deer? Or, for that matter,about alien invasions, suburban sprawl, prescribed fire,or the best way to teach kids about nature? If you canpresent a perspective or describe an experience thatwould be valued by Chicago WILDERNESS readers, thenwe’d like to print it. Send letters to: Editor, ChicagoWILDERNESS, 9232 Avers Avenue, Evanston, IL 60203.

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John: During the reduction phase we were moving downtoward a particular density goal. But now that we are start-ing to see a recovery in populations of various plantspecies, we’re starting to ask more intricate questions aboutwhat’s going on. We want to know whether the populationis in balance, what is the sex ratio, what is the age struc-ture, what is the density for a particular type of prairieversus a savanna. Marty: I have been emphasizing the point for years thatthe focus of management programs is not on the deer num-bers so much as on healthy habitat. What we’re actuallytrying to accomplish on these sites is to restore the habitat. John: It was never our idea to put a number to this. Whenthe health of the ecosystem recovers, that’s the density atwhich we would like to sustain the deer population.Tom: The numbers game was played during our experiencetoo. It was said that we needed to have a number, and wecan’t do anything until we know the exact number. Asanyone knows, it is not an easy task to do a census. It costsmoney. And it is the ecosystem impact that you’re tryingto manage for, not necessarily an artificial number. Steve:We surveyed neighbors; we did surveys in the citynewsletter; we made individual phone calls to neighbors;we took a lot of information in.We had neighbors on two sides of the driveway coming

into our preserve. One would call us and complain, “Whatare you going to do about your deer eating my expensivelandscape material?” The other neighbor would say, “Howcan you consider getting rid of deer?” He fed the deer froma 300-pound corn feeding thing in his backyard. Jill: Is it fair to say that in your experiences on your vari-ous preserves that the public needs to have some kind of avoice in what that carrying capacity is going to be at agiven preserve?

Tom: One of the failures of our state agency was that theyrecognized the problem but they were reluctant to sharethat information or to go to the public. To have the publicbe part of the decision-making before decisions were madewould have gone a long way toward public acceptance.Instead, they basically made the announcement. Theopposition formed. They used this lack of public input orinvolvement to show how uncaring the DNR was. Themedia said, “Wow, if this was such an important thing whydidn’t they come out and tell anyone?”It took a number of months to undo what was mishan-

dled to begin with. The more information the publicunderstands, the more the public will support sound decisions. The more that the public is cut out of a sounddecision, it creates antagonism that doesn’t do the issueany good.Steve: My experience in Highland Park was different thanthat. We did do a lot of education. We had a lot of publicinformation out ahead of time. We had a deer task forceassigned. We had public input. And I think I would speak

for almost every person on the deer task force that whenthat group was dismantled there was more polarization thanwhen we started it three years before.Jill: Do people who believe in the rights of individual ani-mals respond to the argument that there are other animalsdying because of the very high deer population? Tom: Trying to see the macro picture is difficult sometimes.Dan: You can try to explain that as a land managingagency our statutory responsibility is to preserve, restore,and restock native flora and fauna. We’re not doing ourjobs if we let these densities of deer build up at the expenseof everything else. Steve: The common argument is, Why don’t we just letnature take its course? I don’t know how many times we’veall heard that. And the reality is that we’ve manipulatedthe environment. We can’t let nature take its course. Weare part of the natural world.Jill: How has that argument gone for you, has that beenpersuasive?Dan: Certain individuals accept it. But some people arenever going to accept it. Because, as Steve said, you arekilling an animal. Bottom line.Steve: There’s not a person here today that would want togo out and take any animal unnecessarily, even a wasp nest.No one is blaming the deer. The deer are just doing what

The focus of management programs

is not on the deer numbers so much

as on healthy habitat.

At top: This grazed-out, shaded-out forest preserve in Wheelinghas little food for deer or most other species. Bottom: SommeWoods in Northbrook has benefited from years of deer controland restoration. Deer and other wildlife are thriving in balance.

Photo: Forest Preserve District of Cook CountyPhoto: Stephen Packard


they do naturally. But we also have to ‘fess up to say wehumans have created this problem. We eliminated preda-tors. We’ve taken hunting out of the mix. And then to sayjust let nature take its course? We’ve created the problem.We need to deal with the problem.

TRANSLOCATIONMoving deer from one location to another is a solution

that has been tried in the Chicago Wilderness region. Howwell has it worked?Steve: The solution that was proposed and adopted inHighland Park in 1995 and again in 1997 was transloca-tion—capturing some of the deer and moving themsomewhere else. It was more costly than lethal removal, butthe people of Highland Park were willing to pay for it. Inthe end we did transfer 20 deer from Highland Park to aprivate wildlife reserve.

Out of the 20 deer transferred, 19 made it to the transfersite. That was an extremely high percentage compared toother translocations we were aware of. That part of theprocess went well. Everyone was excited. But within a year and a half, there were only eight deer

surviving. I talked to the manager of this park, and hesaid—I’ll never forget this—he said, “Steve, someone whoknows nothing about deer, who has absolutely never seen adeer before, could come and sit on our observation platformand look at the Highland Park deer and look at our residentherd and say, “What’s wrong with those deer over there?”He said they looked unhealthy; they were gangly; they

were thin. They never mixed in with the resident herd.Coyotes had gotten in under the fence of this wildlife pre-serve and had taken eight deer, all of them Highland Park

deer. Not one from the resident herd.Jill: Because the predator will take the weaker animals?Steve: Yes. The Highland Park deer were isolated from theother herd animals. Then the rest of the deer fell to a virus.Of the 20 deer that were moved, four years later none aresurviving.Jill:What’s a deer’s normal life span?Marty: Does can live up to 16 to 18 years. We’ve docu-mented that locally.Steve: Most of these animals were younger deer that wereeasily trapped. Marty: Their survival is so low because you are essentiallyturning them into an area they are not familiar with. [Infree-range situations] you would be dumping these animalsout in an area that’s already occupied by deer. They are justgoing to get bumped along by the resident animals thathave already set up territories.Steve: There should be an understanding that transloca-tion of deer as a viable option to protect an animal’s rightsisn’t really happening. You’re not protecting an animal’srights by putting it in a completely foreign area understress, removed from family or herd. It’s not what we wouldconsider a humane option.

IMMUNOCONTRACEPTION Injecting does with some form of birth control is one

option that is often recommended. The participants dis-cussed the current state of knowledge and technology ofwild deer immunocontraception. Steve: There was a park in Columbus, Ohio, called SharonWoods. They had a little bit different situation from ours inHighland Park in that they had a pen set up on-site as atemporary holding area for the deer. At the time, there wasa two-shot immunization, and the shots had to take placewithin a week or two of each other. And so the most effi-cient way to do that was to actually capture the deer,inoculate them once and hold them for a week or 10 days,inoculate them again, tag them and release them. But itwas not successful. The Sharon Woods information that wegot back was that even among the ones that were success-fully inoculated, 50 percent of them had twins thefollowing year.There were questions of whether the inoculation was

delivered correctly. And then the other problem was justthe mechanics involved of capturing deer, holding them,inoculating them twice, releasing them, and having to dothat every year. The labor involved was enormous.Marty: They have been working with bio-bullets, whichare essentially a plastic bullet that you shoot into the ani-mal that would have a compound implanted in the bullet,and it would slowly dissolve over time in the animal’s tis-sues. The dose would be released over time so managerswouldn’t have to give a booster shot every year. But onceagain, it’s really experimental. John: There’s some hope along the lines of immunocontra-ceptives, but it’s a long way off from its practicalapplication and maintenance.

Touhy Avenue in Chicago, at the Edens Expressway overpass. For automobiles to be the only functioning predator is no kindness to the deer.

Photo: Stephen Packard

Of the 20 deer that were moved, four

years later none are surviving.

W I N T E R 2 0 0 0 9

LETHAL REMOVALKilling deer has proved the only

viable solution so far to reducingexcess populations of deer. Themajority of the programs that harvestdeer donate the meat to foodpantries.John:When you’re in a reductionphase, the idea is to get the popula-tion down. We wanted to be able tosurgically shoot an animal to incurrapid death.Jill: Is there any way to turn theshooting of the deer into a positivecultural experience? In many parts of the state, deer hunt-ing is a rite of passage for young men and to some extentyoung women. It’s part of the culture.John: There’s no sense of community to the earth anymore.You see the problem in the schools—if you have talked toteachers, the kids think they get their cereal from a store.Everything comes from the store. That’s part of the educa-tional challenge we have.

Jill: Maybe there would be an opportunity down the line torestore that. It’s not so much introducing hunting as sportas it is introducing ritual. Death is a part of life. And takinga deer’s life honorably and with respect is different fromsome people’s image of deer hunting.John: During the reduction phases you really have to ques-tion the efficacy of that choice, because what we’re doing isnot hunting. It is a clear reduction of the number of animals,and it’s not a hunting situation at all. You would be hard-pressed to hunt Waterfall Glen in DuPage County down tothe level of deer the ecosystem can sustain. We’d still besitting on the explosive side of birth rate at this point.

ENCOURAGING AND REINTRODUCINGNATURAL PREDATORSDeer have swung out of balance with respect to the rest

of the ecosystem because human beings have eliminatedthe wolves, wild cats, and bears that would once have keptthe population in balance. The group discussed the role ofnatural predators.Marty: The phenomenon of increasing coyote numbersseems to be a regional phenomenon. We get more and morereports from different municipalities along the North Shoreseeing more and more coyotes.I’ve heard reports about some of the Cook County pre-

serves, that they feel they are not seeing as many fawns insome of the areas. We have also had instances in munici-palities where deer have been taken down by coyotes inpeople’s yards.John: Some of the recent studies on DuPage forest pre-serves indicate a predation by coyotes on pre-weaned fawnsanywhere from 20 percent to even 80 percent.

We’re interested in any type ofnatural predator/prey relationshipthat does occur, because it wouldweigh heavily into the model thatwe put together with respect to howmany deer need to be culled.Dan: The coyote is another oppor-tunity to educate the urban public.Not everybody’s enchanted with the

idea of coyotes in their backyards.And I wouldn’t anticipate a drastic decrease in deer,

because even if there’s, say, 15 percent fawn mortality, youstill got 85 percent, and you still have an increase in thepopulation.Jill: Are there any other predators that would help reducethe number of deer?Tom: Mountain lions, but that’s not realistic.Marty: Reintroduction of predators is probably not a viableoption.

PROPOSAL FOR A REGION-WIDE APPROACHTo date, scores of towns, counties, and other govern-

ments have had to struggle alone with the deer issue. Thisdiscussion proposes that a unified approach could helpfacilitate consensus and wise solutions.Marty:We’ve gone through the litany of alternatives timeand time again. It boils down to essentially a couple ofoptions, both of which are lethal. We can hunt deer in ourparks and preserves in a controlled fashion or use a sharp-shooting program.Jill: Is there any way we can come to some sort of a region-wide solution to this problem instead of everybody havingto go through an identical kind of process of wrestling withtheir individual deer problems? Is there any way for abroader solution so that somebody in St. Charles isn’t goingto have to go through the same thing that Highland Parkhas already gone through?Dan: I would hope Chicago Wilderness would take the lead.Somebody has to pull it all together and set a standard pro-tocol for a program like this. Then when a land manager ata village board meeting is asked, “Who approves?” We cananswer, “The Chicago Wilderness partners approve of it.These people have all done it, and here’s how it’s set up.”This leadership, whoever assumes it, can also articulate thereasons for deer control. It needs to be clear why it’s impor-tant from an ecosystem perspective, from a land manager’sperspective, and from a homeowner’s perspective.Tom: Utilize the expertise. Don’t let there be another com-munity where they have to start from scratch and bringpeople in and spend the money when you have the exper-tise available here and people have been through it.Valuing other people’s personal perspectives is important,

even if you may not agree with them. With this issue, people are really concerned about some-

thing. They’re concerned about nature. You build on thatcaring and find common ground.

Deer can be aggressive to each other. In spring, the does will set up breedingterritories and exclude all other femalesincluding their own daughters.

Photo: Phyllis Cerny

With this issue, people are really

concerned about nature. You build on

that caring and find common ground.


This year marks the 100th anniversary of theChristmas Bird Count. The tradition of venturingforth in the cold to count birds began in the earlydays of the conservation movement. Frank

Chapman, an eminent ornithologist and founder and editorof Bird-Lore (precursor to Audubon magazine), had the ideaof holding a bird count to replace the then-popular holidaytradition of a Christmas bird hunt. Participants in the birdhunt competed to see who could shoot the most birds, ofany species; none were then protected. The first count was held on Christmas Day, 1900. Ninety

birds were counted by 25 “groups” of birders, most of whichhad only one or two observers. The only Illinois count wasin Glen Ellyn, with these results: Crow 17 Chickadee 19Prairie hen 8 Bluejay 7Downy woodpecker 2 Tree sparrow 1White-breasted nuthatch 1

“Prairie hen” presumably refers to the prairie-chicken, aonce-plentiful bird that is now endangered in most statesdue to the destruction of its grassland habitat. Browsingthrough the early counts gives a glimpse of local bird lifeat a time when there was much more open space—20“prairie hens” in Chicago in 1906, and hundreds of birds ofopen country throughout the region—Lapland andMcCown’s longspurs, horned larks, and “snowflakes” (snowbuntings). Christmas count data from the last 99 years is now avail-

able on BirdSource (at http://birdsource.org). According toJohn Fitzpatrick, director of the Cornell Laboratory ofOrnithology, the second hundred years of the count may bedramatically different from the first: “The new technologywe are developing will revolutionize the way we useChristmas count data. We hope to allow any user to per-form his or her own sophisticated analyses of populationtrends and bird movements through our website. The workof the citizen scientist will contribute to a powerful andimmediate tool for bird conservation.”For many, the chief reward from participating in the

count is the countdown dinner. At the end of the day, coldand weary birders file into a warm and friendly place—arestaurant or home of a bird club member—to tell their sto-ries. All gather after dinner, as the compiler goes throughthe list of birds, from the most common to the least, addsup the counts of the parties, and compares the total to pre-vious years. At the end of the evening, the greatest prizesare revealed—a golden eagle, perhaps, or a yellow-breastedchat—birds that have rarely, or never, been recorded inthat count circle. Here are some stories from local Christmas counters, in

honor of the 100th count:

by Judy Pollock

100 Years ofCounting

100 Years ofCounting

Photo: Rob Curtis

Common goldeneye

Snowy owl

W I N T E R 2 0 0 0 11

Chuck Westcott, compiler for theBarrington count from its inceptionin 1964 until 1995: “Cold winter weather is, of course,

anticipated, but three years were par-ticularly brutal. January 1, 1969,December 17, 1979, and December19, 1983, all brought sub-zero temper-atures. In 1969, the 15-20 mph windslowered the effective temperature toaround minus 40˚…tears runningdown cheeks actually froze and theonly ones with warm feet were thosewearing electric socks. I’ve been asked,‘Why go out in the winter’s bitter coldto count birds?’ For me it’s the chal-lenge of pitting one’s self against theelements.”

David Johnson, a member of theIllinois Ornithological RecordsCommitee and a participant inabout 100 counts:“Perhaps my favorite CBC season

ever was in ‘77-78 when pine gros-beaks invaded Illinois. In CookCounty at the Dam #1 Woods, while

Photo: Rob Curtis

Photo: Joe Nowak

Photo: Rob CurtisPhoto: Jim

Flynn/Root Resources

Photo: Alan G. Nelson/Root Resources

Photo: Art Morris/Birds As Art

Photo: Rob Curtis

participating in the Evanston NorthShore count, John Hockman and Iwatched two pine grosbeaks eating ashseeds along the Des Plaines River. Ihave NEVER seen a pine grosbeak inCook County since. That year Ichased down two Bohemian waxwingsin Lake Forest that were reported onthe Evanston count. I saw one, andthat was my Illinois lifer!”

Al Stokie of Park Ridge recalls hismost memorable count:“December 25, 1991 started off like

any other Christmas Day. For me, thatmeans driving to Chicago’s MontroseHarbor to take part in the annuallakefront Christmas count. My groupconsisted of Kanae Hirabayashi, JeffSanders, Eric Walters, and me. Jeff andEric went to view the gulls in the har-bor while Kanae and I walked alongthe rocks bordering Lake Michiganhoping to add a duck species or two.While walking, we noticed a strangewhite bird standing on the rocks. “Itshead sort of looks like a pigeon,” said

Kanae. It was a first winter ivory gull.Still, I wondered. I called out to Ericand Jeff, who hurried over andshouted, ‘It’s an ivory gull!’ The gulldisappeared over the lake, but went onto become a celebrity when RichardBiss rediscovered it at BurnhamHarbor on the Sunday afterChristmas. Hundreds of people fromall over got to see the gull. It even hada feature role in at least two newspa-per articles and several short segmentson Chicago television stations.”

Sheryl DeVore, assistant editor of Chicago WILDERNESS and editorof Meadowlark:“1988 marked my first Christmas

Bird Count, and I had no idea what toexpect. I spent the first hour climbingunder and over bushes, dodging thornsand having near collisions with trees,looking for a northern saw-whet owlthat never appeared.“I found cedar waxwings, a tufted

titmouse, and even a rough-leggedhawk that day.”

CardinalLong-eared owl

Pine grosbeak Common redpoll Cedar waxwing

by Jack MacRae

The Mingled Destiniesof Beavers and People

Photo: Don and Pat Valenti/Root Resources

W I N T E R 2 0 0 0 13

Photo: Richard E. Witkiew

icz

Above: Beavers eat mostly bark. They cut trees at night and drag limbs to the safety of water, where they can eat in peace. Facing page: A child learns that destruction of trees by beaver is a part of healthy nature.

Itrust beavers need no introduction. They are big,brown, bucktoothed rodents that chew down treesand construct dams. They have been sharing the landand waters of the Chicago Wilderness for the last10,000 years or so with the human species. For a

short period in the 17th and 18th centuries, their relativeimportance rose considerably when the fashion of the daydictated that ladies and gentlemen could only be properlydressed if they wore a felt hat, manufactured from thepressed fur of the beaver. The demand for beaver pelts wasso great that, by the end of the 19th century, the beavershad been trapped out, essentially extirpated from Illinois.For most of the 20th century, beavers were missing from

the biodiversity of our region. People interested in seeinglocal beavers would have to be satisfied with captivebeavers in zoos or with mounted specimens in museums.That is, until a 1950s project to reintroduce the beaverswas initiated by the Forest Preserve District of CookCounty. (Earlier attempts to establish colonies of beavershad been successful elsewhere. The Fish and WildlifeService had released several pairs of beaver into Jo DaviessCounty in the 1920s and ’30s.)As rodents are wont to do, the Cook County beavers

reproduced rapidly. Within 20 years, beavers found theirway across the Chicago Wilderness. The Des Plaines River,the Fox River, the DuPage River, and their many tribu-taries all became home to thousands of beavers. Thewildlife that depends on beaver ponds had a great resur-gence. Lovers of wildlife were thrilled that this appealinganimal had been restored. Thrilled, that is, until thebeavers started to disperse into, ahem, certain sensitiveareas. To wit: On the southside of Chicago, in the historicJackson Park Lagoon is the Paul Douglas Nature Sanctuary,affectionately known as Wooded Island. It is one of thepremier sites in Chicago for birding; dozens of species can

be spotted in a relatively short time. This island is alsohome to a small colony of beavers, who until recently havemaintained a fairly benign presence. But lately, the beavershave been taking more than their fair share: 75 large treeshave been gnawed down, causing consternation among thebirding crowd. The solution? Chain link fence has beenwrapped around 60 or so trees, and on the advice of theUS Fish and Wildlife Service, several hundred trees havebeen painted with a sand-impregnated varnish to deterchewing.In Lake Calumet, within the “Big Marsh,” a rookery of

black-crowned night herons has been established in a largestand of common reed. These state-endangered birds nestcommunally, typically in trees, but in this instance theirnests were located amongst the emergent vegetation.During the winter of 1998-99, however, a drainage culvertbecame plugged, disrupting the outflow of water, thusflooding the stand of common reed, effectively forcing theherons to search for new living quarters. The ChicagoDepartment of Environment, with the help of variousagencies, removed 30 truckloads of debris. The waterreceded for a while, then stopped. The reason? Beavers haddammed up the open culvert. This began a battle betweencity workers tearing up the dams, and the beavers rebuild-ing them. Fortunately for the herons, the common reed hasregenerated and is expected to provide good nesting habi-tat for the year 2000 nesting season—weather, and beaver,permitting.Poplar Creek is a little, meandering, spring-fed creek in

the northwest corner of Cook County. The flowing watersprovide excellent habitat for such uncommon fish speciesas the fantail darter and rainbow darter. It’s also home to acolony of beavers who are doing their best to dam thecreek to create a beaver pond. The problem is, a beaverpond would ruin the darters’ spawning grounds, as slower

moving water would allow silt to cover the gravel bed.Thus, in order to protect certain species, the beaver damsare removed on a regular basis, allowing the creek dwellingfish to procreate their species.In DuPage County’s Fullerton Park, resident beavers had

created a pond through their damming activities. Shortlythereafter, the shore of this pond sprung to life withnumerous wetland and wet prairie plants, as the buckthornand box elder thickets became drowned out. The volunteersite steward recalls a huge increase in shore birds visitingthe preserve. Unfortunately, the pond also affected an adja-cent field, earmarked for future development. So, a devicereferred to as a beaver pipe was installed and the wetlandswere effectively drained.Along the border between Indiana and

Illinois, vigilant members of the localAudubon Society alerted authorities tobeaver activity at Wolf Lake. It seemsbeavers were gnawing into trees foundgrowing along the slag banks of the lake.Birders were concerned that these trees, iflost to the beavers, could not be replaced,due to the current conditions of the shore-line. The authorities, however, told thebirders (and the press) they planned to do nothing about the beavers, saying theywere reluctant to raise the ire of the animal rights activists.Lastly, one day several years ago, an

Evanston firefighter named Jim arrived forhis scheduled shift at the Central StreetFire Station #3 next to the North Shorechannel. He parked his pride and joy, ashiny Volvo station wagon, in a seeminglysafe parking spot. Unbeknownst toFirefighter Jim, the trees he parked underhad been targeted by a hungry beaver. I’msure you can guess what happened. Noword on the insurance claim.Of course beavers have a profound

impact on their surroundings; they alwayshave! But beaver activity cannot belabeled as good or bad, it’s just who theyare. While studies show plant diversityincreases through their feeding habits,beavers have, in isolated areas, removedevery tree in a park. The occasional flood-ing caused by beaver activity assists in anatural and important disruption inhydrology. In short, beaver activity helpssome species, and hurts others.In this day and age, the proverbial

collision between nature and people iscommonplace. Should beavers, like white-tail deer and cherry trees, be controlledwhen they threaten other species? Onemust remember, controlling beavers, likenearly all aspects of natural area manage-ment, is not achieved through a vaccine.It is not something that can be appliedonce and then never again.

Blaming beavers for flooding, loss of suitable bird habi-tat, and siltation of our waterways is wrong headed andstupid. Human development of our landscape is a fargreater threat to the natural areas and systems than anyrodent. In a natural setting, with natural processes in place,beavers are merely another interesting addition to a region’sfauna. But, in a highly artificial landscape such as ours,with only fragmented islands of nature remaining, beaverscan spell trouble for certain plants, animals and, of course,firefighters.

Jack MacRae claims he was born at an early age in the midst of theChicago Wilderness. He has had a 20 year career as an interpreter of natural and cultural history and is currently employed as a Naturalist with the Forest Preserve District of DuPage County.

A beaver checks out a break in her dam. Soon she will repair it. Beaver ponds are a major habitat for other wildlife, from ducks to dragonflies.

In 1961 Chuck Westcott (at left) and other Cook County Forest Preserve staff releasebeaver to restore and restock an important part of the natural ecosystem.

Photo: Forest Preserve District of Cook CountyPhoto: Anthony M

ercieca/Root Resources


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Maps: Lynda Wallis

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1 L A K E W O O D F O R E S T P R E S E R V E—Lake County

2 B U R N I D G E F O R E S T P R E S E R V E—Kane County

C R O S S C O U N T R Y S K I I I N G I N C O O K C O U N T Y3 Camp Sagawau4 Palos/Sag/Swallow Cliff Woods5 Bemis Woods6 Deer Grove

7 H E R R I C K L A K E F O R E S T P R E S E R V E—DuPage County

Into the WildO U R G U I D E T O T H E W I L D S I D E

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Photo: Kim

Karpe

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C A L E N D A RC A L E N D A RHere’s what’s debuting on nature’s stage in Chicago Wilderness by Jack MacRae

W I N T E R 19 9 9 – 2 0 0 0

N a t u r a l E v e n t s

JANUARY

Long-Eared OwlsA man was recently arrested

for killing and eating a long-eared owl. (This is not a truestory.) His defense was that hewas starving and only commit-ted the crime to feed his family.A sympathetic judge acquittedthe defendant, but questionedthe man on what long-earedowls taste like. “Just like short-eared owls,” the man replied.

Long-eared owls are hangingout in our area. These large darkowls spend their days sitting qui-etly in groves of conifers. Theyare the most nocturnal of ourowls; rarely venturing out untilwell after dark. During theannual Christmas Bird Count,long-eared owls have been seenacross the Chicago Wilderness,occasionally as solitary individu-als, but usually in small groups.Late last winter, a veteran birderin DuPage County spotted agroup of long-ears at SpringbrookPrairie and spent several hourscrawling on his belly to capturethem on film. Now, that’s what Icall dedication.

Old SquawsThe winter sunrise over Lake

Michigan is a beautiful thing tosee. Our local great lake is alsoa wonderful place to seelarge, loose flocks of seaducks, a type ofwaterfowl thatspend their win-ters paddlingabout ourarea. One of our

visiting sea ducks, the oldsquaw, holds the Guinness worldrecord for deep diving by a fly-ing bird. In the late 19th centu-ry, commercial fisherman work-ing in southern Lake Michiganfrequently snagged old squawsat depths of 180 feet below thesurface. They are swimming thisdeep in search of fresh watercrustaceans. There is dangerunder the water for these ducks,however. During a two-monthperiod in 1946, one LakeMichigan fisherman tragicallycaught an astounding 27,000old squaws in his nets!

A fantastic place to see seaducks is along the North Shore.There is a beautiful lakesidepark in Lake Bluff—appropriate-ly named Sunrise Park—whereyou can sit with a thermos ofstrong coffee (I take mineblack, please) and enjoy thespectacle of sea ducks throughyour binoculars.

The Lichen in WinterA colleague of mine—a very

bright, eloquent guy—once toldme, “When I think of winter, Ithink of lichens.” I thought thisto be arather

odd thing to say, but as Iadmire this guy’s work so much,I thought I should do someinvestigation into lichens inwinter. He is correct! Lichensflourish from the melting snowand general damp conditions ofour warm winter days. Winter isa great time for us to examinethese beautiful and intricategrowths on our rocks and trees.Lichens around here are apalette of grays, greens,oranges, and reds. They’re foundin many of our natural areas—on tree bark, rocks, and oldwooden buildings.

My favorite lichens are theBritish Soldiers, tiny one-inchspikes with a small red top.They can be seen growing inparks and forest preserves, oftenon the roofs of old woodenstructures, such as those won-derful Civilian ConservationCorps shelters that were builtduring the great depression.

FEBRUARY

Visiting ShrikesWinter is the time for a few

northern shrikes to visit theChicago

Wilderness. These marvelousbirds spend the warmer monthsnear the Arctic Circle, venturinginto our area after the snowflies. They can be seen (rarely,mind you) perched at the top ofbare, exposed trees. Look for agray, stocky, robin-sized bird,with a black mask across theireyes. Crabtree Forest Preservenear Barrington and Thorn CreekForest Preserve in Will Countyhave had visits from northernshrike in recent years.

Both the northern shrike andthe loggerhead shrike are preda-tory songbirds. They possessheavy hooked bills, but lack thestrong talons of most birds ofprey. To compensate for theirinability to grasp their food,shrikes are known to impaletheir victims on sharp thorns.After the northern shrikes haveleft for their northern breedinggrounds in the early spring, theloggerheads move in, lookingfor protected areas to raise theirfamilies.

Skating on Thin IceAs a youth, my friends and I

would play ice hockey on thefrozen waters of Baker’s Lake,on the southern edge of theVillage of Barrington. After thegames, we would skate for

hours through the shallowmarshy areas, jumping

over muskrat dens andthe ubiquitous,

frozen, dried cat-tail leaves thatdot the land-scape. For my

money, skating is

Long-eared owl displaying defensive attitude. Illustration by Robert Gillmor from Owls-Their natural and unnatural history, Taplinger Publishing Company, 1970.

a more enjoyable way to travelthan cross-country skiing.Perhaps it’s because of thespeed (I can skate faster than Ican ski) and there are certainlyfewer hills on a frozen pond!So, if you like that invigoratingcombination of peaceful winternature and speed, lace up yourskates and head to out to anearby frozen wetland. I’m sureyou’ll enjoy it.

MARCH

Tora! Tora! Tora!I really don’t want to sound

uncaring or overly macho, butfor those of us who like ournature “red in fang and tooth”,the sight of a Cooper’s hawkattacking a bird feeder is apretty cool thing. Swooping in with a low approach, thismedium-sized bird of prey slamsinto its victim feet first, send-ing an explosion of feathersinto the air. Wow!

Cooper’s hawks specialize ina diet of songbirds. With longtails and rather stubby wings,these accipiters are designedfor maneuverability and quickaerial movements. They favoropen woodlands for nestingsites and have benefited fromthe removal of buckthorn fromour natural areas. A true suc-cess story is that Cooper’shawks have so increased inpopulation that they have beenremoved from the endangeredspecies list in Illinois. Way togo! The Old School Grove inLake County, Illinois, with itsstands of mature oaks along

the Des Plaines River, providesperfect habitat for these feath-ered hunters.

KingfishersDuring the late winter, our

resident male kingfishers arecurrently staking a claim totheir parcel of real estate alonglocal rivers and streams. Theywon’t tolerate interlopers andwill establish firm boundariesbetween their neighbors, whichthey guard with great zeal.Seasonally monogamous, maleand females will pair up as soonas their province has beenestablished. Once the springthaw begins in earnest, homebuilding will commence. Themale initiates construction,with the female sitting closeand offering words of encour-agement. Soon both male andfemale will take turns excavat-ing a long (several feet), narrow(several inches), horizontal tun-

nel into the soggy stream bank,using their strong beaks andfeet to loosen the earth. A nestchamber to contain the eggswill be located at the end ofthe tunnel.

Canoeists in our area shouldhave little difficulty in locatingkingfishers and determiningtheir home range. Watch asthese stocky birds fly ahead tothe far border of their territory,and then loop back overhead,clacking noisily. While there areno known pre-copulatory dis-plays, after mating the malewill celebrate by performing anacrobatic aerial display soaringclose to the water.

The Otter LimitsLet’s hope there are some

Chicago Wilderness river ottersin the family way, although thiscondition in river otters can beconfusing. Males and femaleswill mate in the late winter, but

their offspring may not appearfor nearly a year. It seems thatimplantation of the embryo intothe uterus is delayed for severalmonths. Re-mating betweenotter couples occurs very soonafter giving birth, leading toanother yearlong period of pregnancy.

The wonderful KishwaukeeRiver system in McHenry Countycontains suitable otter habitat;it has a bed of smooth cobble-stones and gently slopingbanks. An adult male riverotter—a likely victim of anautomobile accident—wasfound two years ago, along thenorth branch of the Kishwaukeebetween the towns of Harvardand Woodstock. The McHenryCounty Conservation District’sfine team of restoration ecolo-gists positively identified him.

More recently, wildlife biolo-gists in Lake County found

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W I N T E R 2 0 0 0 17


Lakewood ForestPreserve is a greatwinter sports desti-

nation with a sled hill, anice skating pond, andthree miles of trail forcross-country skiers. Atmore than 2,000 acres,Lakewood is also the largestforest preserve in LakeCounty, home to 17 endan-gered species, a bat colony,one of the best spots in thecounty for migratory birds, anine-mile horse path, and,for some reason, an archivehousing the largest public

L A K E W O O D F O R E S T P R E S E R V E—Lake County, IL

collection of postcards inNorth America.

At first glance, the entiresite resembles a quaintrural estate owned by awealthy farmer of simpletaste. Set between twocornfields, a driveway leadsto a cluster of buildings allpainted white: a barn, abrick silo, a museum, and asmall two-story cottage.Further out, open fieldsgive the impression of apark atmosphere. But outalong the trails—used byhikers, horseback riders,

cross-country skiers, andsnowmobilers—pockets ofoak woodland and ever-green groves mix liberallywith wetlands and openfields. Along the westernedge is the Wauconda BogNature Preserve, designateda National NaturalLandmark in 1974. Guardednaturally by poison sumac,this 67-acre bog harborsmore than 100 plant speciesand attracts many birds.(Note: the wet, unstablesoil makes trekking hereproblematic. Contact theLake County Forest Preservebefore visiting.)

In the early to mid-1800s, this site was ownedby local prairie farmers whoharvested firewood andlumber. Later, in the mid-1900s, it became LakeCounty’s largest farm, complete with livestock,orchards, gardens, andcrops. In the early 1960s,it became a dairy farm and,in 1968, began to beacquired by the County.

For a little indoor educa-tion followed by some out-door fun at Lakewood,check out the Coyote Howlon January 29 or the KneeHigh Naturalist program onJanuary 28 (for ages 4 and5). Prepayment is requiredand more information isavailable at Ryerson Woods,(847) 948-7750.

Admission to the LakeCounty Museum is $2.50 foradults; $1 if under 17; freeon Tuesday. Museum hoursare 11am-4:30pm Mon-Sat.;1pm-4:30pm Sunday. Wintersports area hours: 6:30 am-7pm when conditions allow.Winter sports hotline: (847) 367-3676 x165.

DIRECTIONS: Take Rte. 12north to Rte. 176. FollowRte. 176 east and turnright into the preserveentrance.

—Christopher Percy Collier

W O R K P A R T I E S

Work Parties are for anyoneinterested in helping ournatural areas. No experience

is necessary. Volunteers are trained todo the restoration necessary to main-tain and restore our native ecosys-tems. Typical activities include brushclearing, weed pulling, seed collect-ing, and seed spreading. Long pantsand sturdy shoes are recommended.Call the contact people before theworkday to confirm times and direc-tions. Also, all county Forest PreserveDistricts have many other workdays.Contact them for a complete listing.

LAKE COUNTYGrant Woods (Lake Villa):Dec 18, Jan 15, Feb 19, 9 a.m. - Noon.Call for meeting place.Contact Tom Smith, ConservationVolunteer Coordinator, Lake CountyForest Preserves: (847) 948-7753, ext. 212.

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Route 176 Lake County Museum

RangerStation

Archives Fairfield Road

Ivanho

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Route 12Milt

on Road

Hiking TrailHorse Trail

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B U R N I D G E F O R E S T P R E S E R V E— Kane County

Curse a Windy Citywinter all youwant. Venture

forth into the wild thistime of year and you’llthank goodness you livein Chicago Wilderness.With autumn leaves longgone and spring floranowhere in sight, the gold-en grasslands at BurnidgeForest Preserve churn like astorm on the high sea—even if it is the dead ofwinter.

Turning off Big TimberRoad in Elgin, I enterBurnidge, the largest forestpreserve in Kane County.Soon I’m smacked in theeye with royal blue waterwrapped in the bronzy openroll of classic Midwesternprairie. Traversing a wood-planked bridge along a 12-mile tangle of mowed grasshedges, my imaginationwanders. I find myself inthe midst of a grassyimpressionisticvignette, a mosaiccomposed of many pin-thick stalks. A patch ofblonde Indian grass beamsas bright as the silky hairof tow-headed child. Alight rusty swath of bigbluestem fades away intothe horizon. While anentire hill of prairiedropseed seizes up like agiant wave on the openwater, great clumps ofprairie grass come flush-


LAKE COUNTY (CONT.)Illinois Beach State Park(Waukegan):2nd Saturday every month, 9 a.m. -Noon. Call for meeting place.Contact Don Wilson: (847) 872-8404(home), (847) 937-2583 (work).

Ryerson Conservation Area(Riverwoods):Jan 22, Feb 26, 9 a.m.- Noon.Call for meeting place.Contact Tom Smith, ConservationVolunteer Coordinator, Lake CountyForest Preserves: (847) 948-7750, ext. 212.

KANE COUNTYAurora West (Aurora):Jan 16, Feb 13, 1 p.m. - 3:30 p.m.Call for meeting place.Contact Doug Kullen: (630) 896-9375

Ferson Creek Fen (St. Charles):4th Saturday every month, 9 a.m. -Noon. East side on Rte. 31, north ofSt. Charles. Contact MaryOchsenschlager: (630) 513-3338

Trout Park (Elgin):2nd and 4th Saturday every month, 9a.m. - Noon. Take Rte. 25 to north endof Elgin. Turn west on Trout Park Blvd.Parking lot on right by ball field.Contact Sue Bohne: (847) 697-4929

ing down, one afteranother, as though thewind were conducting itsown earthy concerto—allheard in the soft speak ofwhisper.

Also tucked away withinBurnidge’s 500 acres is thePaul Wolff Campground, oneof only three camping areasin the Kane County forestpreserves and clearly themost popular. (The othersare Bliss Woods and BuffaloPark.) In the western sec-tion, you’ll find 48 trailersites complete with elec-tricity and water. In theeastern section, way off inwoods, are 19 sites forcampers yearning to getfurther away from civiliza-tion. Before leavingBurnidge, I make a solemnvow to return come springtoting a tent, sleeping bag,and every camera lens Iown. Camping is permittedfrom May 1–Oct 31;advance reservations can be

made by calling (847) 695-8410. Rates range from $5for primitive sites to $10for luxe.

In 1991, the US Fish andWildlife Service and theKane-DuPage Soil Districtmade a joint agreement todevelop wetland habitathere. As agricultural fieldtiles were removed andentire areas re-seeded, aseries of watersheds nowfilter into Tyler Creek andtwo wetland acres havegrown into almost 20.Prescribed burns are sched-uled every other year andinterpretive programs areorchestrated by ValerieDePrez on a regular basis.For further informationabout programs and volun-teer opportunities, call(847) 741-9924.

DIRECTIONS: Take I-90 toRte. 31. Take Rte. 31 southto Big Timber Rd. Turn weston Big Timber Rd. PaulWolff entrance is on left.

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Big Timber Road

Coom

bs Road

Highland Avenue

Tyrrell

C R O S S - C O U N T R Y S K I I N G I N C O O K C O U N T Y

For beginners andadvanced skiersalike, there’s no bet-

ter place to start than atCamp Sagawau. Pendingsnow conditions, SagawauNordic is open 9:30 am tosunset every day starting inlate December and runningthrough early March wherenearly 4 miles of groomedtrail at every skill levelawait. Rent skis, poles, andboots for $10, take a lessonfor another $10, or do bothfor $18. Register as soon as


MCHENRY COUNTY Alden Sedge Meadow (Alden):Dec 11, Jan 1, Feb 5, 9 a.m. - Noon.Call for meeting place.Contact Dan Wilson: (815) 648-2389

Cary Hillside Prairie (Cary):Jan 29, Feb 12, Mar 11, 10 a.m. -12:30 p.m. Call for meeting place.Contact Mark Neiweem: (847) 639-8294

Not far from theBrookfield Zoo,along the back-

woods of a few charmingsuburban communities,you’ll find a five-mileweb of interconnectingtrails working their wayalong the path of a smallcreek through a maze ofshort but steep ascents.

A compass and map areessential, unless you don’tmind getting lost for a littlewhile. Though following thepath left behind by anothermay prove fruitful, it’s easyto lose the trail and findyourself bushwhacking backto wider, more well-traveledpaths. Bemis Woods is chal-lenging, but not daunting.

DIRECTIONS: Take Rte. 290to 17th Ave. Follow 17thAve. south to 31st St. Take31st west to Wolf Rd. TakeWolf Rd. south to entranceon right.

—Christopher Percy Collier

the Monday morning imme-diately preceding a week-end lesson and, as long asthe official temperature atO’Hare Airport stays above-10˚ F, you’re good to go.If you’ve got your own gearand you’re ready to glide,just sign in for a free trailpass and hit the trail. Trailsat Camp Sagawau consistof two loops both startingnext to the old farmhouse.An easy 2.5-mile loopbrings beginners through apredominantly open prairie,

while steep hills runthrough a more difficult 3-mile jaunt amid oak andmaple. Also within CampSagawau, you’ll find CookCounty’s only rock canyon.

Every Sunday, betweenJanuary 16 and February27, a free ski nature tourstarts at 1:30 pm. Call(630) 257-2045 for details.

DIRECTIONS: Take Rte. 55east to Rte. 83. FollowRte. 83 south, then west.The entrance is on the left.

CAMP SAGAWAU

BEMIS WOODS

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Entrance

Sag Quarries

Camp Sag

Creek

111th Street

Calumet Sag ChannelRoute 83

Camp Sagawau


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C R O S S - C O U N T R Y S K I I N G I N C O O K C O U N T Y


WILL COUNTY Hickory Creek Barrens (Mokena):Jan 22, 8 a.m. - Noon.From Wolf Rd., turn west on Kluth(intersection is one mile north of Rte.30) and proceed to South Brightway.Turn west and meet at the cul-de-sac. Contact Volunteer Office, ForestPreserve District of Will County: (708) 479-2255

Raccoon Grove (Monee):Jan 29, 8 a.m. - Noon.On Pauling Rd., just east of Rte. 50(Governors Hwy.), one mile south ofMonee. Contact Volunteer Office,Forest Preserve District of Will County:(708) 479-2255

Romeoville Prairie (Romeoville):Feb 12, 8 a.m. - Noon.East of Rte. 53 on 135th St.Contact Volunteer Office, ForestPreserve District of Will County: (708) 479-2255

Lockport Prairie (Lockport):Feb 26, 8 a.m. - Noon.East of Rte. 53 on Division St.Contact Volunteer Office, ForestPreserve District of Will County: (708) 479-2255

In the summer months,this 1,000-acre pre-serve is one of the

more popular places tomountain bike in CookCounty. So expect hills. Inthe western section, acrossQuentin Rd., find the startof an 8.3-mile multi-use

trail ranging anywhere from2 to 10 feet wide just offthe north parking lot.Though much of the westernsection is wooded, the east-ern side has some openprairie where it’s notuncommon to spot deerprancing across the fields.

DIRECTIONS: From the east,take I-90 west to Rte. 53.Take Rte. 53 north toDundee Rd. Follow DundeeRd. west to Hicks Rd. Turnleft into preserve and rightto the north parking lot.

DEER GROVE

After honing yourskills at CampSagawau, you may

want to head out intomulti-use trails withinthe Palos Preserves. Thereare 18 miles of multi-usetrails north of the Cal-SagChannel and another 17miles in the southern sec-tion. This is also the primemountain bike destinationin Cook County. In fact, it

was getting a little out ofhand until the Districtstarted shutting down trailsdue to erosion. There are6.2 miles of groomed trailsin the Swallow Cliff Woodsarea and, if things get tootiring, you can always skiover to the toboggan runfor some hot chocolate or a ride down one of its sixslides.

DIRECTIONS: From theeast, take I-55 west to Rte.83. Take Rte. 83 south toSwallow Cliff TobogganSlide entrance on right.

PALOS/SAG/SWALLOW CLIFF WOODS

NLake Cook Road

Hillside Road

Dundee Road

NW

HGWY

C & NW RR Paved Trails

Unpaved Bike Trails

Quentin Road

Hicks Road

Rand Road

Smith

Road

Ela Road

Deer Grove


H E R R I C K L A K E F O R E S T P R E S E R V E— DuPage County


Winter boring? Notwith the activi-ties available at

Herrick Lake ForestPreserve, located in cen-tral DuPage County. HerrickLake offers year-roundactivities for anyone whoenjoys the outdoors, but itreally comes into its own inthe winter.

When Chicagoland’s capri-cious snowfall finally arrivesin sufficient quantity, cross-country skiers have miles ofgroomed trails available tothem when Arrowhead GolfCourse becomes ArrowheadCross Country SkiingHeadquarters during thewinter.

When the trails of HerrickLake are combined withthose of adjacent ArrowheadGolf Course and contiguousDanada Forest Preserve, theForest Preserve andWheaton Park District per-sonnel prepare groomedcross-country ski trails forpublic use.

DUPAGE COUNTY Eggerman Woods (Naperville):Dec 18, 9 a.m - Noon.Call for meeting place.Contact Forest Preserve District ofDuPage County: (630) 876-5929

Mayslake (Oak Brook):Jan 15, 1 p.m. - 4 p.m.Call for meeting place.Contact Forest Preserve District ofDuPage County: (630) 876-5929

Green Valley, ThunderbirdWoods (Woodridge): Feb 5, 9 a.m - Noon.Call for meeting place.Contact Forest Preserve District ofDuPage County: (630) 876-5929

St. Stephen Cemetery PrairieFeb 12, Mar 11, 9 a.m.Call for meeting place.Contact Bill Gunderson: (630) 665-5183

The area is well known asa local place for easier,more family and group-ori-ented outings such as theMoonlight Skis, followed bya chili supper, scheduledfor January 15th andFebruary 12th. Call (630)653-5800 for informationon snow conditions, hours,and special events. Hoursvary daily not only due tosnow conditions, but alsoto allow some night skiingduring the week as well assome weekends.

Herrick Lake is an ideallocation for those whohave considered cross-country skiing, but nevertried the sport. Lessons forbeginners of all ages areavailable on weekendsthrough Arrowhead and skisare available for rent at $7for children and $9 foradults.

The trails in this areaoffer a variety of woodedand open vistas while tra-versing a basically flat ter-rain that is not too chal-lenging for a beginner butwith enough distance to

still offer a good outing formore experienced skiers.The curving trails throughthe gently rolling areamake people disappear fromview and offer moments ofsolitude.

When the surface ofHerrick Lake becomes safe,ice fisherman and skatersappear. The Forest PreserveDistrict does not maintainthe ice or clear the snow,but this does not mean thatwinter lovers are not pre-sent in abundance. Thesame good fishing that wasthere all summer is there inthe winter and fishermanknow it.

Other hardy souls bringshovels to clear the ice forhockey games and the plea-sure skaters follow suit.Many of the area’s residentslearned to skate and playhockey on Herrick Lake’sfrozen surface.

Visitors even find winterhiking opportunities. Thewoods provide a break fromthe wind and the openareas offer the same won-derful views of marshes andfields that take on anentirely new look duringwinter, especially after afresh snowfall when deer,raccoons, and other smallanimals leave their tracks.

No matter what the day’sactivity, if it shouldbecome too much winter,Arrowhead Golf Course’s proshop is an easy stroll fromthe main Herrick Lake park-ing lot and offers not onlyheat, but also a concessionstand, restaurant, and barto salvage—or complete—the day.

DIRECTIONS: The mainentrance to Herrick LakeForest Preserve is on thesouth side of ButterfieldRd., west of Naperville Rd.and just east of Herrick Rd.,in Wheaton.

—Kandee Haertel

N

Warrenville Road

Butterfield Road (Rte. 56)

Herrick Road

DanadaForestPreserve

It’s a sunny day in March, and a freshlayer of snow blankets the rolling

landscape in North Chicago’sGreenbelt Forest Preserve. The woodsare quiet on this late winter morning,their silence broken only by the occa-sional twitter of a bird—and theshrieks of a group of 5th-graders on afield trip from nearby Lyon MagnetSchool.

“We saw a deer!” yells 11-year-oldKevin Womack as he runs into aclearing with three breathless class-mates. “We were exploring,” he gasps,“and we saw deer tracks, so we fol-lowed their footprints, and we foundfour deer!”

Kevin is a Mighty Acorn, one of5,000 students in Chicago-areaschools learning to explore and restorenatural areas in their own communi-ties. Launched in 1993 by The NatureConservancy in collaboration with theCook County Forest Preserve District,the Mighty Acorns program wasexpanded last year by several ChicagoWilderness partners with a grant fromthe Grand Victoria Foundation.Today, 55 schools in six Chicagolandcounties participate in the program.

While Kevin was off exploring thewoods with an adult leader, the otherhalf of his class was gathered in a tightsemi-circle around Jan Ward, YouthStewardship Coordinator for the Lake

Mighty Acorns: school-of-the-woods

Mee t your neighbors

County Forest Preserves. Ward, apetite blond with bright eyes and apixie cut, is on her knees in the snowwith a bow saw in one hand and agiant pair of loppers in the other.

“Always hold your tools facingdown,” she shouts to the students. “Idon’t want anyone cutting off eachother’s fingers.”

What Ward wants them to cut off,instead, are branches of buckthorn andhoneysuckle—non-native plants thathave spread like wildfire in the 518-acre forest preserve, blocking sunlightand preventing the growth of oak treesand native flowers.

“We’re making space for the plantsthat are supposed to be here, and get-ting out the ones that aren’t,” saysWaukegan resident Alfredo Mazon,11, as he tosses a buckthorn branchonto a growing pile of brush.

Three times a year—in the fall,winter, and spring—nine MightyAcorns classes from Waukegan andNorth Chicago schools spend twohours at the Greenbelt ForestPreserve. They begin with a groupactivity that illustrates a key ecolog-ical concept. Then they split up: halfthe students work on stewardshipactivities; the other half explore thearea with field instruments like binoc-ulars, tweezers, magnifying glasses, andcollection boxes. After an hour, the

groups switch.By visiting the same location

throughout the year, Mighty Acornscan observe seasonal changes and seethe results of their stewardship.

“Last year, a class removed non-native plants from a small area in thefall and winter,” says Ward. “Whenthey came back in the spring, theground was just covered with shootingstars. They were so excited.”

“This program has given the forestpreserve a whole new meaning for me;it’s not just a place to have a picnic,”says Waukegan resident and parent vol-unteer Lindsay Shepard, pausing for amoment from branch-cutting with hisdaughter, Lindsay. He thinks the pro-gram has helped her “learn how torespect nature and that everything is animportant part of the ecosystem here.”

When their work is finished, twolarge brush piles demonstrate to theclass how much they can accomplishin a relatively short time.

“Every little bit helps,” says DawnSzweda, a Lake County Forest Preservevolunteer. “Even if the students cleararound one oak, next year a littleacorn could fall and grow into a newtree because the sunlight can nowreach it.”

That’s what one Mighty Acorn cando.

—Caroline Arden Malkin

W I N T E R 2 0 0 0 23

Photos: Kim Karpeles/Life Through the Lens



Nobody likes it whenCommonwealth Edison trims

trees. Certainly not the residents ofPalos Park in southwestern CookCounty. Palos Park is a small villagewith a small budget, but lots of big,majestic trees. So when ComEd crewstrimmed aggressively in 1993 to pro-tect power lines, the residentsresponded with an uproar.

Restrained by a tiny tax base, how-ever, Palos Park was simply unable tocreate a fully funded forestry depart-ment. So the village established PalosPark Tree Body. The name is suitablyinformal, even ambiguous, for anentity expected to use volunteers andcreativity when its limited budget andlack of any full-time staff come upshort.

The Tree Body name also capturesthe essence of Palos Park—an areastill framed by the oak-dominatedwoodlands among which cottages werefirst set when University of Chicagoprofessors sought a place of tranquilretreat in the late 1800s.

In the 1990s, that woodland frameis failing. A tree survey revealed thatmaintaining the health of the village’sparkway trees would require 20 timesthe Tree Body’s annual budget. At thesame time, many trees on privateproperty were in danger as few ownersunderstood the value of the oaks ontheir properties. One man, forexample, purchased a woodland lotand promptly began to cut every tree

in sight before he had even thoughtabout where his future house wouldgo. “My wife,” he said in explanation,“loves grass.”

One of the Tree Body’s first majorefforts was a campaign to pass an ordi-nance providing protection to trees onpublic and private property. Whenthis struggle came to an unhappy end,some members quit. The 1996 surveymade even more clear the paucity ofthe Tree Body’s resources. Exhaustedand disheartened, more members left.After a while, only Linda Johnson, thecurrent chairman, and Carol Vander-velde remained.

The next year was like GeorgeWashington’s winter at Valley Forge—a grim, dark time with renewal justbeyond the horizon. In fact, LindaJohnson says, “This (period) was agood thing because it made us lookaround for expertise.” Area expertsand institutions, many of them mem-bers of Chicago Wilderness, gladlyshared their knowledge.

What Linda and Carol learnedbroadened their vision. “We saw it’snot just trees,” says Linda. “This isbiodiversity. This is ecosystem man-agement.”

Linda Johnson remembers theessence of consultant Paul Petan’schallenging words: “…the problemwith your group is you’re not thinkingbig enough. You have to dream!”

Two years later, the Tree Bodystands re-invigorated even as its chal-

In winter, snow buntings dine on knotweed seeds, sedge species seeds, and dropseed grass seeds, among others, plus the seeds of bulrush and panicgrass. They also will eat fly larvae, caterpillars, beetles, and, occasionally, crustaceans, such as sand fleas.

Palos Park Tree Body: protecting trees, restoring the forest

Photo: Erica Benson

Pictured here clockwise from back/left:Betty Anderson, Linda Johnson, KeithWolma, Marifran Peckenpaugh, PatriciaMonson, and Carol Vandervelde.

lenges remain daunting. What haschanged are attitude and presentation.While still singing the praises of thenatural world for its own sake, theTree Body now finds common groundwith many Palos Park residents by alsospeaking in the positive rhetoric ofproperty value protection. As Linda, aretired high school teacher, says, “Thereason the property values are higherin Palos Park is because of the beau-tiful environment.” Whenpocketbook-oriented residents under-stand that, they come to an importantrealization—incremental losses of treesand open space corrode the characterof Palos Park with negative financialconsequences for everyone.

A measure of the success of thisapproach came in July when manyresidents showed up at a villagecouncil meeting to resist the proposedsale of an “unused” wetland owned bythe village. The council ultimatelydeclined to part with the parcel.

The Tree Body now has many morevolunteers and many more allieswithin the village government.Younger residents are also makingtheir voices heard. An affiliated foun-dation is in the process of beingcreated to attract more outsidefunding. Thinking big, the Tree Bodysuccessfully encouraged the villagecouncil to include strong emphasis onthe protection of the village’s naturalresources and support for natural land-scaping in the village’s 20-yearcomprehensive plan.

While the Tree Body presses forwardwith a far-reaching vision, its memberscontinue to mind the everyday details.For instance, members are helping todirect the Public Work’s department’stree maintenance operations and evenguide the location and species selec-tion for new tree plantings.

“What we feel here,” Linda says, “isa lot of momentum building.”

—Nathan Aaberg

W I N T E R 2 0 0 0 25

Several inches of heavy snow fallone winter evening on rural fields

near Glacial Park in McHenryCounty. In the morning, a flock ofwhitish finch-like birds with tawnycapped heads and spotted cheeksbathe in the snow and interject chattytrills. When they fly to a field to seekseeds buried in the snow, their largewhite wing patches confirm theiridentity. These are snow buntings(Plectrophenax nivalis), aptly namedbecause they breed in the inhospitableArctic tundra, but come to theChicago Wilderness region in winterwhere they are completely at home inthe cold, snowy climate.

The snow bunting breeds farthernorth than any other land bird, build-ing nests of mosses and sedges onstony beaches and grassy tundras inthe Arctic. The female must hide hernest well, in crevices or mosses toavoid predators such as Arctic foxesand snowy owls. Winter comes earlyto the Arctic. The cold kills the grasses and sedges, and when the lastof the seeds have been plucked bysnow buntings and other animals,these birds must fly south to find food.

The journey is treacherous; snowbuntings are sometimes one step aheadof a blizzard, sometimes one stepbehind. By time they reach theChicago Wilderness region, the briskwind is signaling winter’s arrival.

But snow buntings welcome thesnow. On extremely cold nights, theysink as low as possible into the snowto keep their legs and feet from gettingexposed to the air. Even when temper-atures fall below zero, snow can pro-vide insulation to the buntings, whichcan withstand temperatures of minus40˚ F.

Birders start seeing snow buntingsin the Chicago Wilderness regionsometime in October. Look in ruralgrasslands, fields, and along the LakeMichigan shoreline for a light-colored,sparrow-sized bird with a short, conicalbill, feeding on the ground in smallflocks. Its mottled white, brown andtawny colorations blend in well withthe snowy grasslands. Listen, too, forits distinctive flight call.

Snow buntings: Living snowflakes on shorelines and grasslands


At the end of October, birderscounted 100 snow buntings atWinthrop Harbor along the LakeMichigan shoreline. A week earlier,birders saw some 50 buntings at theNorth Point Marina in WaukeganHarbor. In winter, you may find snowbuntings in fields at Fermilab inDuPage County, along the LakeMichigan shoreline at MontroseHarbor, at Illinois Beach State Park inLake County, along the Indiana DunesNational Lakeshore, and along theroadsides near fields in rural areas,especially in McHenry and KaneCounties, among other places.

Truly a bird of the ChicagoWilderness in winter, the snowbunting typically does not go muchfarther south than central Illinois.

Usually only two or three snowbuntings are counted south of theChicago region during the annualChristmas Bird Count. Flocks ofdozens to about 100 are counted onChristmas Bird Counts in the westernportions of the Chicago region. Snowbuntings are also numerous duringcounts in central Wisconsin,Michigan, and the Canadianprovinces.

The buntings molt their buff andwhite winter plumage when they leavethis region in late winter to journeynorth. By the time they have arrivedat the treeless tundra to breed wheredaylight is continuous, they are wear-ing deeply contrasting black and whiteplumages.

—Sheryl De Vore

Photo: Rob CurtisPhoto: C. Postm

us/Root Resources

Winter plumage

Breeding plumage


Deer ticks survive principally where there are large numbers of deer. The ticks live on mice when young, but require deer when older.

Last summer, a gray catbird built itsnest in a shrubby woodland. But

this winter, a different creature lives inthe seemingly abandoned nest. On abrisk winter hike, you may walk rightby an old bird’s nest, not even know-ing the life that may be brimminginside—a large-eyed, big-eared,brown-backed 1-2-inch long animalwith snow-white underparts and feet,and long, thin tail. It’s called thewhite-footed mouse .

The white-footed mouse (Pero-myscus leucopus) dwells mostly inwoodlands, river bottoms, and shrubbyareas. An acrobat on tiny feet, thismouse can climb on trees and shrubswhere it creates a dome of plant mate-rials, feathers, and down on top of anold bird’s nest. Snuggled inside, thewhite-footed mouse can survive and

MICE AND DISEASE

White-footed mice: home recyclers


even bear young during cold winters.The white-footed mouse and its

close relative, the deer mouse, looknearly identical, although if placedside by side the deer mouse is oftenslightly smaller, with a shorter tail.Neither hibernates in winter and bothare active at night. But they live indifferent places.

You won’t find a deer mouse(Peromyscus maniculatus) in a tree orshrub. This species doesn’t climb.Instead it lives mostly in grasslandswhere it builds a burrow one to 12inches below the soil. There it keepswarm and raises young.

Because so much of Illinois’ grass-lands have been lost, deer mice num-bers are declining statewide. Thewhite-footed mouse, which also livesin hollow logs, stump holes, thickets,

and underground burrows, may bemore adaptable.

Both serve as important foodsources for owls, weasels, foxes, andother animals. In fact, says Steven D.Bailey, an owl expert and ornithologistwith the Illinois Natural HistorySurvey, “the northern saw-whet owl, aChicagoland Wilderness winter visitor,relies to a great extent on white-foot-ed mice for its food.” Bailey said in arecent analysis of saw-whet owl pel-lets, “the contents all had remains ofthe leucopus species.”

Deer and white-footed mice getnicely fattened for their predators byeating plant seeds, including thosefrom oak and hickory trees. Theomnivorous rodents also eat insect lar-vae, spiders, and centipedes. Theyspend hours at night eating and eat-ing. Small rodents need more food inproportion to their weight than dolarger warm-blooded animals becauseit’s hard for the little guys to conserveheat. They need a zippy metabolism toproduce the extra warmth that coun-teracts the effects of a small body-to-surface-area ratio.

Some winter evening, when you areoutside in a quiet woods, listen for softscratching on a tree trunk or in leaflitter, as well as a quiet musical buzz.You’re hearing a white-footed mousesearching for his midnight snack orsinging, perhaps, for his supper.

—Sheryl De Vore

LYME DISEASE

Lyme disease, a serious conditionaffecting various body tissues, is trans-mitted by deer ticks. In its early stages

it is manifested as a skin rash, but itcan also spread to the joints, nervoussystem, and to other organ systems inits later stages. White-footed mice canbe hosts of the disease, transmitting itto the ticks which, when they becomeadults, can transmit it to humans. TheIllinois Department of Public Healthreports that the incidence of Lyme dis-ease in the state has been decliningsince 1991. In some instances, Illinoisresidents probably got the disease inanother state and came home with it.Health officials recommend wearinglong-sleeved shirts, long pants, andtucking pants legs into one’s sockswhen walking through grassy areas.For more information, see theAmerican Lyme Disease Foundation,Inc., www.aldf.com

HANTAVIRUS

Hantavirus pulmonary disease canbe fatal. It is transmitted by breathingor touching rodent feces, includingthose of the white-footed mouse.However, it is not transmitted viarodent bites. Hantavirus causes flu-likesymptoms including fatigue, fever, andmuscle aches; later symptoms includecoughing and shortness of breath. PatPiercy of the Illinois Department ofPublic Health said Illinois has onlyhad one confirmed fatal case of han-tavirus. Of 70 mammals trapped nearwhere the victim lived, 61 were thewhite-footed mice and seven testedpositive for the disease. Bottom line isnot to dig into or sniff rodent burrows.For more information:www.cdc.gov/ncidod/diseases/hanta/hps

Photo: Joe Nowak

Photo: Michael Redmer

Mouse trails in snow

FOR THE NATURE SCOUT

1. What nationality was Jean Jacques Audubon?

2. What is the other common name of big bluestem grass?

3. Which is the heaviest owl in the Chicago Wildernessregion?

4. Which is the lightest owl in the Chicago Wilderness region?

5. Which of these are native to North America? White crossspider, Queen Anne’s lace, Timothy grass, starlings, yellowjacket wasps, house sparrows, and dandelions.

6. Which Chicago Wilderness animal is the only NorthAmerican marsupial?

7. What kind of insect is a firefly?

8. Which are the two classes of living animals that are warm-blooded?

FOR THE BEGINNING NATURALIST(Reading helper may be needed)

1. What is the scientific word for an animal’s longwinter sleep?

2. Stick insects eat a) sticks b) grasshoppers c) leaves.

3. Clouds are made from a) smoke b) water c) dust.

4. What does nocturnal mean?

5. When a seed sprouts, which part of the plantemerges first?

6. What do you get if you cross an insect with arabbit?

FOR THE JUNIOR NATURALIST

1. True or false: Spiders have antennae.

2. In which country, other than the USA, cantallgrass prairies be found?

3. Why is it a good idea to leave dead trees in thewoods?

4.Where might you find rat-tailed maggots,ramshorns, cattails, arrowheads, and darners?

5. What is the loudest insect?

6. What is an herbivore?

7. Which is different from the other three? a) turtle b) lizard c) frog d) snake. (There areseveral correct answers. See how many you can get!)

8. What do you call crazy little bugs that live onthe moon?

FOR THE SENIOR NATURALIST

1. To which family of mammals do mice, squirrels, beavers,and groundhogs belong?

2. True or false: Deer kill more people each year than anyother wild animal in North America.

3. True or false: The Illinois River is polluted by sedimentsfrom cultivated land.

4. Where might you find a rattlesnake master, a shooting star,and an Indian paintbrush?

5. What is the major chemical pollutant in acid rain?

6. Which are the three groups of animals capable of poweredflight?

7. Which is the odd one out? a) Cord grass b) Little bluestemc) Kentucky blue grass d) Indian grass.

8. What is the difference between a coyote and a flea?

—by Catriona Bowman

FOR THE BEGINNING NATURALIST1.hibernation 2.c)leaves 3.b) water 4.being active at night, like an owl 5.the root 6.Bugs Bunny

FOR THE JUNIOR NATURALIST1.false 2.Canada 3.asfood, homes and shelter for many birds, insects and fungi 4.In a pond. Rat-tailed maggots are fly larvae, ramshornsare snails, cattails and arrowheads are plants, and darners are dragonflies. 5.A male Cicada, which can be heard from400m (one fourth of a mile) away. 6.a plant eater 7.c)Frog, because frogs are amphibians. The other three are reptiles. d) Snake, is also correct, as snakes don’t have legs.a) is also correct! Turtles are the only ones with a shell. 8.Lunaticks.

FOR THE NATURE SCOUT1.French 2.Turkey foot grass 3.The Arcticsnowy owl, which weighs in at 70 oz. (just over 4 pounds). 4.The Saw-whet owl, a real light-weight, at 4 oz. 5.None. 6.A beetle 7.Birds andMammals

FOR THE SENIOR 1.rodents 2.True, indirectly. Deer overpopulation hascaused an increase in deer-vehicle accidents which kill both people anddeer. Source: Illinois Dept. of Natural Resources. 3.True. Source: IllinoisDept. of Natural Resources. 4. On the prairie—they are all prairie plants.5.Sulfur dioxide, which combines with water to form sulfurous acid. 6.Insects, birds, and bats. 7.c) Kentucky blue grass. The others are prairiegrasses. 8.One howls on the prairie, the other prowls on the hairy.

Test your local nature knowledge!

Family Quiz Game

W I N T E R 2 0 0 0 27

Gu e s t Essay

Marsh Under Moonlightby Miles Lowry

One night two years ago, when battlinginsomnia and the light of the full moonstreaming through my bedroom window,

I decided to walk to Lincoln Marsh. It’s just afew minutes from my home. There I was metwith revelations I had not experienced since mydays as a mountaineering instructor inColorado.

The moonlight was so strong. No artificiallight corrupted my night vision. Soon subtleshades of gray in the shadows gained strength

and power. I was hooked. Since then, I havevisited the marsh at each full moon to makepictures.

In the summer, the night is cool. The soundsof sora rails and bullfrogs compete. Muskratssend smooth wakes behind them in the water.At times, egrets can be seen asleep in the oakson an island in the middle. The great hornedowl is a regular—his silhouette can be seen ona barren branch.

Cold winter nights are stark. Nature raw


NOVEMBER

and severe. I set up my camera and tripod inthe same spot each full moon, each lunarmonth, to interpret the effect of the light onthe marsh. With 45-minute exposures, it iseasy for me to adapt to the quiet darkness. Asmy camera records the image, I hike along thetrails.

Canada geese sleep on the water before itfreezes. Their movements are blurred by thelong exposure. Airplanes emerge over thehorizon, their lights making tracks in the sky.

From time to time I have worked to restore

this 130-acre marsh. I love the physical work.Who needs a gym? But as a photographer, thedeepest inspiration for me is the break theseacres provide from the visual monotony of thesuburbs.

The Wheaton Park District, the ForestPreserve District of DuPage County, and theConservation Foundation have all helped pro-tect Lincoln Marsh. I pray that it will be herefor centuries, for millennia. This soggy place isan island of magic for me and thousands ofothers, all of whom know it in our own way.

W I N T E R 2 0 0 0 29

JANUARY

News of the wildwill be funded by allocations from theLand and Water Conservation Fund andthe Migratory Bird Conservation Fund.

—Elizabeth Sanders

2 FOREST PRESERVES FOR SALE?

In June, the Board of Commissioners ofthe Forest Preserve District of CookCounty voted to sell a 2.36-acre parcel ofland along the Des Plaines River to theVillage of Rosemont to expand its conven-tion center. Board President John Strogerpromised to use the proceeds of the sale tobuy a larger parcel. He argued that thestate’s tax cap legislation prevents theDistrict from raising acquisition funds. ButJohn Sheerin, speaking for Friends of theForest Preserve, pointed out that theregion’s other Forest Preserves have beenraising hundreds of millions of dollarsthrough referenda approved by voters.

Conservationists fought to stop thedeal, arguing that this land was acquiredby the District to remain protected forfuture generations and that, since theparcel was not ‘surplus’, its sale wouldestablish a dangerous precedent for theDistrict. Surplus land, as determined bythe District’s Advisory Committee, is landwith no ecological or recreational value,often because it is a small, isolated piece ofland. The Advisory Committee voted thatthis parcel was not surplus as it includesforest and wildlife habitat. Alan Andersonof the Chicago Audubon Society says, “Itsure seems to be a woodpecker haven, withmany trees along the river and inland pro-viding nesting and feeding habitat.” In his

visits, Anderson has also observed easternphoebe, spotted and solitary sandpipers,black-crowned night-herons, great-crestedflycatcher, Baltimore oriole, and non-avianresidents from dragonflies and damselfliesto a 12-inch female soft shelled turtle.

Many Commissioners sought to assureCounty residents that this sale would notby itself lead to others. Commissioners CalSutker, William Moran, Greg Goslin, andMike Quigley, however, opposed the sale ofland. Commissioner Moran, for instance,listed his reasons for voting against thesale: “I voted no because I believe that thissale would set a bad precedent for thefuture of our Forest Preserve lands. Ourgoal should be to acquire more land, andnot to sell the existing, which has notbeen declared surplus. Even though themoney from the sale is to be used for theprocurement of future lands, it’s the prin-ciple of selling non-surplus lands which Ibelieve is far more important to the futureof our Forest Preserves.”

—Bill Eyring

3 GRASS ON A COOL GREEN ROOF

Native peoples called it “chi-ca-gua”.Soon the nodding wild onion, Chicago’snamesake, will be growing literally on topof City Hall. It and many other nativeplants will compose the newest architec-tural innovation in Chicago: a “greenroof.” It’s all part of US EPA’s Urban HeatIsland Pilot Project to test ways to coolcities in the summer.

“Dark-roofed buildings and dark pave-ment absorb the sun’s rays, warming thecity by as much as 4˚ to 6˚ F,” said WilliamAbolt, Commissioner of the Department ofEnvironment. “The City Hall garden willindicate how effective rooftop gardens maybe in reducing urban temperatures,” saidVirginia Gorsevski, program analyst withthe EPA’s Office of Air and Radiation.

“Mayor Daley was impressed by thebeauty and efficiency of the rooftop gardenshe saw during a recent visit to Hamburg,Germany,” said Abolt , “and he wanted totry something similar here.” The 20,300square foot, $750,000 rooftop garden willbe paid for by part of a $25 million-a-year,four-year commitment to conservation pro-grams by Commonwealth Edison Co., thecity’s major power company.

—Elizabeth Sanders

4 HEADWATERS OF THECHICAGO RIVER PROTECTED

In October, after more than a year ofnegotiations, the Village of Lincolnshirepurchased 63 acres that include the head-waters of the West Fork of the Chicago

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1 GRAND NEWSLast August, Bill Hartwig, regional

director of the U.S. Fish and WildlifeService, authorized the Grand KankakeeMarsh National Wildlife Refuge (Spring’98, pp. 28-29). As proposed, the Refugewill one day include 30,000 acres scatteredwithin the 3.3-million-acre watershed ofthe Kankakee River in northwesternIndiana and northeastern Illinois. Onceone of the largest inland marshes inAmerica, this area provides habitat for twofederally endangered species (Indiana batand Mitchell’s Satyr butterfly) and over200 state-listed species.

“The Kankakee River Basin is a remark-ably rich area, and we plan to protect andrestore examples of its fine wetlands, oaksavannas, and tallgrass prairies,” said JohnRogner, field supervisor for the Chicagofield office of the Fish and WildlifeService. “We also hope to acquire flood-plain areas that can be restored towetlands, in order to expand this valuablehabitat,” he said. The stated goals of therefuge are to preserve, restore, andenhance all endangered or threatenedspecies; restore and preserve a naturaldiversity and abundance of flora and fauna;protect migratory birds; provide the publicwith additional high-quality, wildlife-com-patible public use and environmentaleducation opportunities. Land acquisition

Two sites in Chicago Wilderness had plants found nowhere else on earth. The marshes of Lake Calumet had American thismia (now extinct). A Kankakee River island had Kankakee mallow (still doing fine).


Photo: Alan Anderson

yy

More than 24,000 ballots were cast. Theperegrine will serve a four-year term as theambassador of Chicago’s habitat areas, thenwill face its first re-election challenge.

—Mark Sheehy

6 GRAINGER WOODS GROWSOn September 17 the Lake County

Forest Preserves Board of Commissionersapproved the purchase of a 34-acre parceladjacent to Grainger Woods. The newland purchase protects environmentallysensitive wetlands, a sedge meadow andwet-mesic prairie, and brings the Preserve’stotal acreage to 291. “This purchase pro-vides further protection for a rare northern

flatwoods forest and seven endangeredspecies found at Grainger Woods,” saidBoard President Carol Calabresa. In 1996,the Grainger Corporation donated 257acres to the Lake County Forest Preserves.This constituted the largest single landdonation in the Forest Preserves’ historyand is part of Grainger’s unique conserva-tion development plan for its new515-acre corporate headquarters. GraingerWoods Conservation Preserve is locatedon St. Mary’s Road and Route 60, justwest of I-294 near Mettawa. For a free setof trail maps and a copy of the ForestPreserves’ free Horizons newsletter, call(847) 367-6640.

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By clustering our homes together, we saved over 60% of our land.

Come share it with us.

We share 350 acres of open, protected space.

River, provide a connection to FlorsheimPark, and harbor a small population of astate-threatened plant species known asmarsh speedwell. The original park con-tains high quality prairie and oak woods(with a floristic quality index of 82, indi-cating the presence of highly diverse andconservative plant species). It is a dedi-cated Illinois Nature Preserve.

The newly acquired parcel is borderedby Everett and Riverwoods Roads and I-94. The headwaters of the Chicago River,located on the eastern portion, containshickories, oaks, and musclewood and ishigh quality oak forest, though invaded bybuckthorn and in need of restoration. TheVillage, with help from Friends of theChicago River and Lake County Storm-water Management Commission, hopes tosecure funding to restore the headwatersand surrounding watershed. Village ofLincolnshire restoration projects areunderway at Rivershire, Spring Lake, Balzer,and Florsheim Parks. The Village scheduleswork parties every Friday at alternatingsites; anyone interested should contactLydia Scott, assistant to the director ofPublic Works, at (847) 883-8600.

—Kathy Kowal

5 PEREGRINE FALCONDEFEATS NIGHTHAWK

The peregrine falcon edged out thecedar waxwing and four other candidatesto become Chicago’s first-ever OfficialCity Bird. The Official Bird election wasthe brainchild of Chicago Audubon’s TerriLikens, who had learned of a similar pro-gram in Portland, Oregon and thought itwould be a great way to raise public aware-ness of bird species in Chicago. TheChicago Department of Environment pro-vided funding for ballots and campaignposters. Ballots were cast in genuine Boardof Election voting booths October 16-22 at

area parks,schools,museums, andcultural centersas part of NatureWeek inChicago. Othercandidates onthe ballot were(in order of votesreceived): thecedar waxwing,the commonnighthawk, theeastern kingbird,the belted king-fisher, and theblack-crownednight heron.

W I N T E R 2 0 0 0 31

Photo: Malachi Ritscher


News of the wild

7 A VICTORY OVER SPRAWL“It was a remarkable coming together of

people and organizations that saved CampRed Mill,” said LaPorte County (IN) ParksFoundation President Jim Jessup. The localGirl Scout Council announced inSeptember 1998 that it wanted to sell the160-acre property for $325,000. “We hadno money and no plans for acquiring it. Itseemed an impossible dream to puttogether so much money in time to savethe land from developers keenly interestedin the property’s potential both for upscalehousing and peat mining,” said Jessup. Bylast July, however, all the pieces had beenassembled, and a deal for the land’s pur-chase was closed.

“Camp Red Mill is a significant naturalarea,” said Indiana Department of NaturalResources (DNR) ecologist Tom Post.“The many springs and seeps on the prop-erty form the headwaters of the LittleCalumet River, and the property’s wetwoodlands harbor several rare plants,including rough sedge and Americangolden saxifrage.”

The Shirley Heinze EnvironmentalFund, as administrator of a grant awardedby the US Fish and Wildlife Service underthe North American WetlandsConservation Act, facilitated the commit-ment of $65,000 in federal funds for theproject and donated $2,500 of its own.When the Indiana DNR agreed to accept107 acres as a state nature preserve, theIndiana Heritage Trust—a state agencythat finances land preservation throughthe sale of environmental license plates—contributed $160,000. The NorthernIndiana Public Service Company also gave$50,000. Local donations totaling $50,000from scores of individuals and organiza-tions were matched by an additional$50,000 grant from the Lilly Endowment,through LaPorte County’s UnityFoundation.

The property will eventually become aLaPorte County Park, and plans arealready underway to renovate existingstructures for use in environmental educa-

The Illinois Nature Preserve system was the first in the nation. Its land protection statute is so strong (and its commissioners so dedicated) that not asingle acre of its hundreds of preserves has ever been lost to any other purpose.

tion programs. The bulk of the property,however, will remain a natural area.“Future generations will be able to enjoyand learn about nature in this beautifulsetting,” says Heinze Fund executivedirector Paul Kohlhoff, “only because con-cerned local citizens were able to forge apartnership with government and businessfor the general good of the public.”

—Ronald Trigg

8 NATURE WEEKThe city of Chicago celebrated its first-

ever Nature Week from October 16-23,bringing people of all ages closer to natureby engaging them in a variety of activities.Mayor Richard M. Daley launched a newinitiative called Nature Chicago to coordinate the resources of all the city’snature-related organizations, institutionsand government departments to foster aunified awareness and stewardship ofnature in Chicago through conservation,

planning, and education. This initiativeseeks to provide natural areas and natureprograms in neighborhoods; enhancehabitat, water quality, and recreational useof Chicago’s waterways; improve the city’s“green” infrastructure such as bike trails;and encourage conservation-minded designand development.

In after-school programs during NatureWeek, children made leaf rubbings,searched for bugs, and learned aboutnature in their neighborhood. “I knowthere is lots of nature in my neighborhood,and I think it would be ugly without it,”said one youngster. Thirty environmentalorganizations and institutions set up dis-plays in Daley Plaza for a Nature Festival,attracting downtown workers out for a

lunchtime stroll. Evening lectures foradults, covered topics like “Landscapingwith Native Prairie Plants.”

—Nicole Kamins

9 WRECKLESS ABANDONIndiana Dunes National Lakeshore

recently conducted an innovative siterestoration project: airlifting junk fromsensative habitat. Before becoming anational lakeshore, a large roadless sectionhad been a local dumping ground withauto bodies and large appliances left todegrade in an area that also happens to beprime habitat for the endangered Karnerblue butterfly. Traditional methods ofremoving the junk would have severelyimpacted the wild lupine—he sole foodsource for the Karner butterfly larvae.Instead, the scattered debris was gatheredup by hand and packaged for removal by acontract helicopter. The nearly 14,000pounds of material removed during twodozen flights was hauled away by a localrecycling firm. The event received exten-sive regional media coverage focusing onthe resource management benefits of theproject.

0 PRAIRIE GUIDE FOR TEACHERS

The Liberty Prairie Conservancy hasjust produced a Prairie Awareness Programthat provides a wealth of information forelementary school teachers about endan-gered Midwestern grasslands. The programincludes a 4th-6th grade curriculum,teachers’ guide, teachers’ activity packet,and a video called Jason’s Prairie Journal.Kits also include posters and bags of mixednative tallgrass prairie seeds to encourageyoungsters to plant a grassland of theirown. A glossary helps children develop anecological vocabulary.

The Prairie Awareness Program can bepurchased by Chicago Wilderness areaeducators of 4th-6th grade, by calling(847) 548-5989, or e-mailing to [email protected]. Supplies are limited. The program was produced by A+ Mediaand partially funded by ComEd.

—Sheryl De Vore

{ STEWARDSHIP FORUMThe Morton Arboretum Naturalist

Certificate Program is sponsoring a stew-ardship forum to explore the “Effects ofLand Management on Illinois’ BirdPopulations.” The effects of restorationactivities on bird populations has beencited as both a major concern and a majorsuccess. Do methods exist that can maxi-mize the value of ecosystem managementfor bird conservation?

Camp Red Mill

Photo: Ronald Trigg

Voting for the city bird

Photo: Chicago Department of Environm

ent

W I N T E R 2 0 0 0 33

This one-day seminar assembles fiveexperts on the subject: Jeffrey Brawn,Ph.D., population ecologist, IllinoisNatural History Survey; AngeloCapparella, Ph.D., associate professor ofZoology, Illinois State University; DennisDeCourcey, director, Chicago BirdObservatory; James Herkert, Ph.D., listingcoordinator for Illinois Endangered SpeciesProtection Board; and Brad Woodson,restoration ecologist, McHenry CountyConservation District. The day will con-clude with a roundtable discussion.Date and time: January 29, 2000; 9:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m.Place: Morton Arboretum, Lisle, IllinoisFee: $105 non-member, $85 member(includes lunch)Information: Jeff Skibins, (630) 719-2458

} WINTER CHAUTAUQUASponsored by the Geneva Forum for

Arts and Education and The Geneva ParkDistrict, Peck Farm Park is hosting aWinter Chautauqua that opens with acommunity perspective program,“Landscape Genealogy.” Art classes, story-telling, personal renewal workshops, adrum circle, and a jazz concert will roundout the celebration. Fees vary.Date and time: February 19, 2000; 8:30 a.m.-9:00 p.m.Place: Peck Farm Park, Geneva, IllinoisInformation: Dilip Das (630) 262-8244

q NATURAL LANDSCAPING SEMINAR

“Think Globally—Act Locally” andglean insights from former astronaut anddirector of Pittsburgh’s Carnegie Museumof Natural History Dr. Jay Apt and Dr. BobBreunig, director of the Lady Bird JohnsonWildflower Center at a seminar sponsoredby the Wildflower Preservation andPropagation Committee of the McHenryCounty Defenders, McHenry CountyCollege, and the McHenry CountyConservation District. Attendees will hearabout the impact of human civilization onthe Earth and the role of native plants inhelping to provide remedies.Date and time: February 26, 2000; 8:30 a.m.-4:00 p.m.Place: McHenry County College, CrystalLake, IllinoisFee: $35 includes lunchInformation: McHenry County Defenders(815) 338-0393

w BIRDING AMERICA IVDiscover great places, great people, and

great birds from the Chicago area to theextremes of the Americas. Sponsored byChicago Audubon, the Birding America

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conference will highlight special birdingdestinations, here and abroad. A new fea-ture this year will be a set of skill-buildingworkshops, designed to help peoplebecome better birders and make birdingmore interesting.

Keynote speaker Richard Knapton fromEagle Eye Tours will talk about birding inCosta Rica. Concurrent sessions includeSteve Kelling from Cornell Lab on “BirdResearch”; and Walter Marcisz and SherylDeVore on “Warblers by Sight and Sound”.The closing speaker will be Greg Butcher,Editor of Birders World, presenting“Regional Specialty Birds of the 48 States”.Date and time: April 1, 2000; 9:00 a.m. - 4:00 p.m.Place: Chicago Botanic Garden, Glencoe, ILFee: $30 includes parking, late registra-tion (after March 21) $35Information: Chicago Audubon (773) 539-6793

e HABITAT COUNTS AT RYERSON SYMPOSIUM!

Thomas Lovejoy, former director of theWorld Wildlife Fund, will deliver thekeynote address for the Friends of RyersonWoods Special Millennium NatureWeekend and Symposium in May. Thisweekend event will feature bird walks, work-shops, hands-on activities, and displays for

children and adults, focusing on the theme,“Habitat Counts!” Lovejoy will speak onSunday, May 7, in the early afternoon.Learn and celebrate during the peak of birdmigration and wildflower blooming on thebeautiful grounds of Ryerson ConservationArea in the Lake County Forest Preserves.Date: May 6-7, 2000Place: Ryerson Conservation Area, DeerfieldInformation: Ryerson Woods (847) 948-7750

r NATURE WORKSA crackling fire, the aroma of coffee,

some hearty muffins, and a good book willall be part of Nature Works Café, a newprogram offered by the Forest PreserveDistrict of Will County. Nature WorksCafé is a book discussion group that willmeet at Plum Creek Nature Center on thefourth Wednesday of the month, Januarythrough April.January 26–Pilgrim at Tinker Creekby Annie Dillard February 23–A Sand County Almanacby Aldo Leopold March 29 –Desert Solitaireby Edward AbbeyTime: 7:00-9:00 p.m.Place: Plum Creek Nature Center,Goodenow Grove F.P., south of CreteInformation: Forest Preserve District ofWill County, (815) 727-8700


Most insects survive the winter in a state called “diapause.” The egg, nymph, larva, pupa, or adult (depending on the species) goes into astate of suspended animation until spring.

News of the wildt PENNIES FOR THE PRAIRIE

When faced with the daunting task ofraising about $480,000 to save 80 acres ofopen space adjacent to Barrington’s FlintCreek Savanna from development,Citizens for Conservation (CFC) memberJo Seagren remembered that every little bithelps. Seagren, Melissa Warshaw, andother volunteers decorated and distributedmilk and water cooler jugs to local busi-nesses and area elementary schools in a“Pennies for the Prairie” campaign. By latefall the children had collected almost 800pounds of change totaling $2,411.

The expanded preserve will containnearly a mile of creek, four oak groves,assorted wetlands and 30 acres of prairie.Pam Meiser, teacher and student counciladvisor at Rose Elementary School, chal-lenged her students to predict what theirmilk jug full of pennies weighed each week.They charted predictions, weighed the jugsin the nurse’s office, and recorded amounts.“Some kids even took their allowances tothe bank to trade them in for pennies,” saidMeiser. After six weeks of wholeheartedfundraising, Tami White’s class collectedalmost 131 pounds of change and won aStudent Council/Parent TeacherOrganization sponsored ice-cream party.

—Alison Carney Brown

y BEST BURN SEASON IN MEMORY

That’s what most land managers havebeen saying about fall 1999. But WayneLampa, whose memory goes back toDuPage County Forest Preserve District’svery first burns said, “Well, you get a fineopportunity like this every 10 to 12 years.1988 was another good one. There aremany important areas that just won’t burnuntil you have a long dry season like this.”

Lake County Forest Preserves’ KenKlick said, “It’s been a rewarding season—exhausting but rewarding. We burned anincredible 30 sites. We burned every daybetween October 15 to December 3—except for three days, two because it wastoo windy and one because it was raining.”

As this issue goes to press, DuPageCounty had burned an impressive 4,700acres out of a goal of 5,400. (There will bea summary report of the 1999 season in thespring issue.) DuPage’s Cindy Hedgespointed out that a year like this is espe-cially important for areas badly infested bynon-native grasses. “They burn poorly if atall unless it’s really dry,” she said.

The focus in most counties was on hard-to-burn areas. In some wooded areas, a falllike this is the only opportunity to burnwithout winds so strong that the old oaksare likely to burn too. And for marshesclogged with excess cattail, a dry fall burnis likely to thin them out to make room forthe plants, birds, and other species of open“hemi-marsh.” According to many landmanagers, the last fall of the millenniumwas distinguished for “quality burns.”

But Lake County’s Klick made perhapsan even more profound point. “Perhaps thegreatest accomplishment was on a differentlevel. We demonstrated to our Board thatwe can burn under dry conditions withoutproblems. They had faith in us, and welived up to it.”

u 98 in ’99: NEW MEMBERSOn November 22, Chicago Wilderness

welcomed six new members bringing thetotal number of organizations to 98. TheEnvironmental Studies Program in theCollege of Arts and Sciences at LoyolaUniversity of Chicago offers numerouscourses relating to biodiversity and conser-vation. Faculty research projects includeassessing effects of major land-use changeson stream quality in McHenry County,studying attempts to reverse cattail inva-sion at Ryerson Woods, and monitoringimpacts of non-native species on LakeMichigan biodiversity. DePaul UniversityEnvironmental Science Program provideseducation on local and global environ-mental issues. Through teaching andresearch activities, faculty seek to fosterconcern for the protection, restoration andstewardship of Chicago’s natural environ-ment. The 13-acre Emily Oaks NatureCenter, a Skokie Park District facility, has

been a restoration site since 1988. Thecenter’s native plant garden for seed pro-duction is maintained solely by localvolunteers. Emily Oaks’ annual summercamp focuses on kids’ relationship withnature. NiSource EnvironmentalChallenge Fund is a not-for-profit corpora-tion created by Northern Indiana PublicService Company to stimulate local effortsto preserve, protect, and enhance the envi-ronment in the NIPSCO service area. TheFund provides grants for biodiversityrestoration/enhancement projects. ThePark District of Highland Park offers pro-grams to enrich the quality of communitylife through a variety of leisure pursuits andenvironmental education. The ongoingrestoration of the 100-acre Heller NaturePreserve is a Park District project. TheRiver Forest Park District seeks toacquire, develop, and preserve recreationalopen space and park facilities. The ParkDistrict seeks to provide opportunities forresidents to become active participants inrestoration and conservation efforts.

i WASTE NOTWhen it looked like the seven million

ton Prairie View landfill next to MidewinNational Tallgrass Prairie near Joliet wasgoing to expand to 20 million tonscapacity, activists sprang into action.Members of the Sierra Club, Thorn CreekAudubon Society, and Midewin Alliancewrote letters, testified before the WillCounty Board, and submitted petitions tothe Illinois Pollution Control Board(Spring ‘99, p. 32). “The intent of the1996 legislation that created Midewin, theNational Cemetery, and two industrialparks, has always been that this would be asmall landfill for waste from Will Countyonly,” said Marianne Hahn, president ofthe Midewin Alliance. With no deedrestrictions, however, the county couldhave enlarged the landfill allowing garbagefrom much of northeastern Illinois to bedeposited there. But Congressman JerryWeller, apprised of the potential danger toMidewin’s fragile habitats, sponsored anamendment to the Defense Department

I PLEDGEOn June 1, 1999, nearly 1,000

Chicago third graders graduated fromthe five-month North Park VillageNature Center’s NeighborhoodNaturalist program. During the cere-mony, children recited theNeighborhood Naturalist Pledge: “Ipledge to be a good NeighborhoodNaturalist; I pledge to protect the treesin my neighborhood; I pledge to keepnature in my neighborhood healthy.”

Photo: Pam Meiser

W I N T E R 2 0 0 0 35

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budget that limits the landfill to waste fromWill County and municipalities lying partlyin the county. Weller’s amendment becamepart of the signed bill in September.

Meanwhile, Waste Management ofIllinois Inc. is seeking a permit for the sitefrom the Illinois Environmental ProtectionAgency. The Sierra Club and other groupsare urging Illinois Governor George Ryan’sadministration not to grant a permit forthe landfill unless threats to Midewin’sPrairie Creek are addressed and eliminated.

—Alison Carney Brown

o THEY WILL COME

When asked if she planned to truck inanimals to stock the proposed prairie at theWildwood Nature Center at Maine Park inPark Ridge, Supervisor Julie Greve stated,“No, if we build it, they will come.” Theplan will transform the site into a prairiegrove harboring more than 150 species ofgrasses and flowers. Grasses such as big andlittle bluestem, bottle brush, Virginia rye,along with blackeyed Susan, asters, wildblue iris, and bee balm will provide habitatfor many species of birds, butterflies, smallmammals and more.

Pizzo & Associates, landscape archi-tects, has designed the restoration and willbegin work this spring. The WildwoodNature Center hosts a summer naturecamp for more than 100 children. A localEagle Scout, Joe Luzio, approached Grevefor a nature project and she assigned himthe task of removing non-native trees andshrubs. This ambitious scout is developinga map and field guide identifying the flora.The restoration may yield another divi-dend by un-inviting Canada geese, thescourge of manicured golf courses andparks, which prefer to avoid high grasseswhere their predators might hide. To helpout, contact Greve at (847) 692-3570.

—Michael Graff

Special thanks to Jack Darin of the Sierra Clubfor his help with the news. If you know of newsleads or exciting tidbits, contact editor AlisonCarney Brown at [email protected] orP.O. Box 101, Wilmette, IL 60091.

Joe Luzio


Hawthorns became common trees in this region only after the arrival of dairy farming. Thorn trees can beat the competition only under conditions ofheavy grazing. A woods that today is full of hawthorns was not that long ago a cow pasture.

Alayer of soil, a layer of foliage,both filled with life. But inbetween is a layer about five

feet high, of very little. One overpopu-lated animal species walks throughthat layer, eating everything thatgrows. Overpopulated deer, here alongthe Des Plaines River in Wheeling,have destroyed most of the ecosystemthey could reach.

Some people would say that thisscene represents two overpopulatedspecies. One ate the shrubs. The otherate hot dogs or paté at the picnictable.

Yet under the right circumstances,great numbers of people, nudged bylaws and ethics, can live compatiblywith biodiversity. Great numbers ofdeer cannot. Neither laws nor ethicsimpress them. Deer eat or die, theybreed whenever they can; that’s it.People not only can restrain them-selves, we can also notice symptoms.We have needed and have developed apractice of medicine that can maintainourselves in good health, most of us,most of the time. We need, and are

developing, a medicine of ecosystems.It’s called restoration.

For 20 summers now, the deer of theDes Plaines preserves gobbled uporchids and lilies and asters andshooting stars. Then, as each autumnturned into each winter, the deer fellback on the same food as beaver. FromNovember through April, deer sustainthemselves mostly on the bark of twigs.

The hungry mouths and teeth ofdeer can reach about five feet high.Thus, in areas where deer are severelyoverpopulated, a distinct line five feetfrom the ground develops as a visiblesymptom. As the shrubs go, and theyoung trees go, so go the flowers, andall the butterflies, and most birds, andmost biodiversity.

The spreading oak on the left prob-ably whiled away its youth (like thespreading hawthorn on the right)among cattle in a pasture. The largertrees back then, its parents, had earlierpresided over buffalo and elk and wolfand Potawatomi. No browse linedeveloped because wolves and humanhunters helped to maintain a balance.

Buckthorn (a distinctive green inthis photo, long after the native specieshave gone dormant) is a different kindof wolf. It gobbles up the light, fillingthe spaces the sun shone through.

But so do all the other treetops onthose dense young trunks visiblethrough the browse line. Aggressivenative trees are seeking to replace theoaks. Fire was a part of the balance,with the wolves and hunters. It wasthe fire-maintained open woodlandthat allowed the oaks to flourish. For a while, imbalances seemed to toll thedeath knell for an ancient ecosystem.

Three clues: crowded little trunks,green buckthorn, browse line. Theyare merely symptoms marring a beau-tiful ecosystem. They don’t necessarilymean death; they’re just symptoms ofillness. As we are learning to read thelandscape, we also are learning torestore good health to the eartharound us.

Photograph by Pat Wadecki.Words by Stephen Packard.

R e ad i ng pictures

Three Clues

Photo: Robert Kucera

W I N T E R 2 0 0 0 37

Bird Conservation Network

Brookfield Zoo

Butterfield Creek Steering Committee

Calumet Ecological Park Association

Calumet Environmental Resource Center

Campton Historic Agricultural Lands, Inc.

Canal Corridor Association

Center for Neighborhood Technology

Chicago Academy of Sciences

Chicago Audubon Society

Chicago Botanic Garden

Chicago Ornithological Society

Chicago Park District

Citizens for Conservation

City of Chicago, Department of Environment

College of DuPage

The Conservation Fund

Crystal Lake Park District

The Conservation Foundation

Conservation Research Institute

DePaul University Environmental ScienceProgram

Downers Grove Park District

Ducks Unlimited

DuPage Audubon Society

Emily Oaks Nature Center

Environmental Law and Policy Center of the Midwest

The Field Museum

Forest Preserve District of Cook County

Forest Preserve District of DuPage County

Forest Preserve District of Kane County

Forest Preserve District of Will County

Fort Dearborn Chapter, Illinois Audubon Society

Fox Valley Land Foundation

Friends of the Chicago River

Friends of the Parks

Friends of Ryerson Woods

Garfield Park Conservatory Alliance

Geneva Park District

Glenview Prairie Preservation Project

The Grove National Historic Landmark

Hammond Environmental Education Center

Illinois Audubon Society

Illinois Department of Natural Resources

Illinois-Indiana Sea Grant College Program

Illinois Natural History Survey

Illinois Nature Preserves Commission

Indiana Department of Natural Resources

Indiana Dunes Environmental Learning Center

Indiana University Northwest

Irons Oaks Environmental Learning Center

Jurica Nature Museum

Kane-DuPage Soil & Water ConservationDistrict

Lake County Forest Preserves

Lake County Stormwater ManagementCommission

Lake Forest Open Lands Association

Lake Michigan Federation

Lake View Nature Center

Liberty Prairie Conservancy

Lincoln Park Zoo

Long Grove Park District

Loyola University, Environmental Studies Program

Max McGraw Wildlife Foundation

McHenry County Conservation District

Metropolitan Water Reclamation District of Greater Chicago

Morton Arboretum

National Audubon Society

The Nature Conservancy

NiSource Environmental Challenge Fund

North Cook County Soil & Water ConservationDistrict

Northeastern Illinois Planning Commission

Northwest Indiana Forum Foundation, Inc.

Northwestern Indiana Regional PlanningCommission

Openlands Project

Park District of Highland Park

Prairie Woods Audubon Society

River Forest Park District

Save the Dunes Conservation Fund

Save the Prairie Society

Schaumburg Park District

John G. Shedd Aquarium

Shirley Heinze Environmental Fund

Sierra Club, Illinois Chapter

St. Charles Park District

Sustain, The Environmental InformationGroup

Thorn Creek Audubon Society

The Trust for Public Land

Urban Resources Partnership

US Army Corps of Engineers, Chicago District

US Dept. of Energy, Argonne NationalLaboratory

US Dept. of Energy, Fermi NationalAccelerator Laboratory

US Environmental Protection Agency, Region 5

US EPA Great Lakes National Program Office

USDA Forest Service

USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service

USDI Fish & Wildlife Service

USDI National Park Service

The Wetlands Initiative

Wild Ones Natural Landscapers, Ltd.

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