Sky-dancers The eyes sparkle as tiny hands reach for the earth. Small fingers grasp the succulent stem and pluck from the ground something that was made for picking — a fleshy stalk topped with a ball of white, feathery tufts.…
May has finally arrived! The overwintering patience of the many a “cabin fever” shut-in has paid off with an April full of bluebells, birdfoot-violets and hoary puccoon flowers. Now May is upon us and new flowers will soon greet those…
Snow Trillium Spring has officially blossomed! On St. Patrick’s Day, I managed to get out to a special place in the woods where some of the first flowers of spring peek through the leaf litter. It has been a mild…
Spring Cleaning It’s that time of year when we start looking forward to the end of a long winter. A season of renewal is looming. However we often enter this time of year feeling that we are still weighed down…
Refuge under siege As I write this, a group of armed, anti-government, militants is thinking about leaving a National Wildlife Refuge they have occupied since Jan. 2. Not to give it back to the public, but rather, to go into…
Late in the day on Dec. 16, a 50-year-old conservation program survived to see another day (we hope). The Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF) was passed and signed into law on Sept. 3, 1964. Since that date, over $3.6…
Oh Christmas Tree . . . December is upon us, and it’s time to start gearing up for the holidays. One of the hallmarks of the holiday season for our household is the decorating of the Christmas tree. Usually around…
October 2015 was officially decreed Oak Awareness Month, or OAKtober, in Illinois. The initiative to recognize the plight of oak forests was spurred by The Chicago Region Trees Initiative and its partners throughout the state. It is part of a…
One of the first Peoria Park District conservation areas I visited outside of Forest Park Nature Center was a large woodland off of Singing Woods Road. Access was difficult and there wasn’t even a place to park. Since that first…
A Legacy for Future Generations It was a summer day in 1990 that I piled into a car with several folks and drove up into Marshall County to explore some natural areas. We were off to meet someone who had…
