Will the foredune stand?

Erosion from Lake Michigan has been gradually eroding foredunes from the Wisconsin state line down into Beach Park. There are many factors contributing to this, some of which are too complex for this simple blog post. We have come to love each and every one of these rare dune species as if they were our brothers, sisters, children, grandchildren. And we do what we can to share our love of these special places with all we meet. So....

Please do ask the questions:  How do we help raise awareness of first principles of botany, ecology, consilience, in our local communities? How do we best steward the land that we love? How do we build empathy and understanding towards others, and all living creatures, so that all are treated with care and respect? How do we come together in community to make the world sustainable for all?

Investments in botanical knowledge pay off!

For my friends who missed it: this year I finally took the plunge and invested in my growing love of botany: The Wilhelm-Rericha seminar series sponsored by Conservation Research Institute. It is a six part series, with three five-hour classroom sessions, and three full-day seminars on the flora, geology, pollinators, and ecology of our Southern Lake Michigan region. The first day was a deep dive into the study of native bees and consilience. 

What is consilience? E.O. Wilson wrote a book about it. I will refer you there. But basically it's an understanding that in nature, all things work together, with the resulting awareness that the loss of one thing is a loss to all of us. To quote Aldo Leopold, "The first principle of intelligent tinkering is to keep all the parts." 

What's alarming is the rapidly growing use of neonic insecticides, which have devastated all our pollinator populations. We need our bees, at the very least to pollinate our food plants, but also because they are an integral part of Nature's gift to us.

Also: the latest updates to Common Plant Families of the Chicago Region are now available here:
https://fieldguides.fieldmuseum.org/guides/guide/503

I was fortunate to  recruit the renowned Dr. Gerould Wilhelm to review the pages last year and add very helpful information. We are in the process of adding seven more pages to the series. Hopefully that will be complete by the end of this year.

And... we are also in conversation with the Illinois chapter of the Nature Conservancy regarding designing more bandanas for their stewardship volunteers - stay posted!