It happened on October 12, 2021. A new community of eco-caring people began that day. A great and needy nature preserve began its journey back from the edge: click here for more background, ecology, nature photos, etc.
What we predicted we would do (see below) we now have done!
On that Sunday, we started to tackle the mess shown below:
This "dark as a dungeon" buckthorn thicket was shading and killing the northwest edge of the best "hanging fen." Those who chose this work started cutting away and burning this mess. (That shaft of sunlight is from the hole we cut in the dense brush edge - to make an opening for our new stewards group to walk in.)
The photo below comes from our initial planning session:
Advisor Dennis Dreher is explaining how brush along this branch of the Kishwaukee River headwaters is degrading and killing the south edge of one of the raised fens.
We would not only slay brush. We'd also laugh at it, as it won't be there for long.
For perspective, in the photo below, the raised fen is in the foreground as we look north toward that dark, satanic shadow that threatens the hanging fen (on the slope).
The big dark bump on the horizon, above, is the fen-killing brush we're standing inside,
three photos back.
A week earlier, near our cars, on the edge of Red Tail Golf Course, the planning team finalized the plans.
Amy Doll, at left, Friends director, coordinated this kick-off with Lakewood village staff.
Steve Byers, second from right, resident of Lakewood and recently retired Field Rep for the Illinois Nature Preserves Commission, offers suggestions ranging from how to get more yard signs in place to simplifying fire breaks for the big controlled burns: we can cut the brush along the stream, so that unburnable water will edge one side of the burn just as the unburnable golf course edges the other. (And with streets on both other sides, a lot of our firebreak work is easy.)
The plant for Sunday was to study and learn a bit from the experts, and then buckle down to work. We did it!
For other Fen posts, see:
Kish Fen Kick Off was sponsored by the Village of Lakewood, Friends of Illinois Nature Preserves, the Illinois Nature Preserves Commission, and The Land Conservancy of McHenry County. During that event, some of us volunteers gathered rare seed to sow where brush had killed all. Some cut and burned the buckthorn. The institutions are spread thin and can't do all that work. But we The People can.
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