Field seminar for conservation volunteers

                                                 Intro by Rebecca Hartz 

Some see learning as linear, hierarchical. At Somme, working with nature and with people, we’ve had the privilege of seeing otherwise. The field seminar has become a key tool for bringing stewards of all levels of expertise and experience into the work of learning together. New volunteers examine the landscape alongside staff and seasoned restorationists.  

Good stewardship is a humbling experience, a logical response to the vastness of the ecosystem, which is bigger and more mysterious than any one brain can try to manage. So we try to do a greater service to nature by thinking and working together, learning and re-learning with an ever-evolving community of hearts and minds. 

There’s hope in collaboration, and joy in sharing in each other’s observations and wonderings. Zoe Raines puts fresh eyes on this work in the post below.                                                                                     

by Zoe Raines

I’ve been a conservation volunteer for just two months. So I was incredibly grateful to be a student during last weekend’s field seminar at Somme Woods.

At field seminars, stewards discuss the ecosystem, and how to restore it. I was probably the least experienced conservationist there – eager to learn from all the great people who attended. Fifteen of us met in the parking lot and began with the customary circle, sharing our names, nature preserve sites we work at, and experience with woodland restoration.

Volunteer stewards gather for the ecological restoration field seminar at Somme Woods on October 27th.
Group photo by Eriko Kojima

Guided by Rebeccah Hartz and Eriko Kojima, our goal was to visit several woods, savanna, and wetland areas to evaluate their current state and learn to think critically about how to craft future plans of care.

Getting to know a woodland site

First, we had to understand what the site stewards were working with. Somme Woods is a combination of bur oak savanna and oak woodlands, so the principal tree populations are bur, white, and swamp white oaks. For the animals and plants of the oak communities, the tree canopy needs to be thin enough to let in light that enlivens the blanket of native vegetation below. But in the absence of fire, there are too many invading trees.

Stewards of these sites have to make the decision: Which trees do we cut? How will that impact our principal tree population and the native undergrowth?

As we hiked through Somme Woods, Rebeccah and Eriko pointed out an area where invasive trees, especially common buckthorn, have badly darkened the woods. Notice how there’s no healthy undergrowth of plants and grasses on the ground, because the density of tree cover doesn’t allow for it.

Volunteer stewards at the field seminar hike through a portion of Somme Woods thick with invasive trees like common buckthorn.

But at another site just a few minutes walk away, volunteers learned that sometimes, if you cut too many non-native or not-oak-associated trees to let in light, tall goldenrod will take over before there’s an opportunity to seed the desired native mix.

Tall goldenrod takes over the undergrowth in an area of Somme Woods

Therefore, stewards also need to be able to scythe or mow the goldenrod and gather and plant the right seed mix. In each area we visited throughout the woods, showcased in photos here, these big decisions are being made about a small area.

This is where the sustaining part of the work comes in – because the care of ecological restoration is an ongoing practice.

Making tough choices for ecological restoration

We learned that part of what makes stewards’ decisions so hard is that they’re triaging with their care. They have to decide what the most urgent needs are, and what limited resources they have available, given permissions, tools, and manpower.

And the field seminar wasn’t just theoretical knowledge. That future plan of care we were learning throughout the afternoon? It was informing the plan for real work that volunteer steward groups would be doing at Somme Woods over this coming winter season.

Volunteer stewards observe and take notes

Calling all conservation volunteers!

If you want to help stewards in their ability to make more ambitious decisions in their plans for these beautiful oak savanna and woodland sites – lend your hands and support! Come out to the woods and prairies ... and work and learn with all of us.

Find an upcoming volunteer workday near you!

The field seminar group walks through tall savanna grasses