Happy Arbor Day!

Arbor Day is not like other holidays. Each of those reposes on the past while Arbor Day proposes for the future. J. Sterling Morton

Arbor Day was started in Nebraska in 1872, when J. Sterling Morton, president of the State Agriculture Board, was successful in getting the state legislature to declare April 10th Arbor Day, a day where Nebraskans were encouraged to plant trees. It is estimated that one million trees were planted on that first Arbor Day!

Morton became passionate about planting trees after moving to Nebraska in 1854 -- a state that did not have a lot of trees! By 1885, the state made Arbor Day an official holiday to be held on April 22nd, J. Sterling Morton's birthday. Today, all 50 states celebrate Arbor Day, as do many countries around the world.

In Illinois, Arbor Day is held the last Friday in April every year, placing the holiday on April 30th this year. Illinois was the 8th state to make Arbor Day a state holiday in 1949.

The celebration has expanded from the planting of trees to include education about the need to care for trees throughout the year. The holiday has long appealed to educators who recognized the learning opportunity that the occassion provided for students of all ages.

As awareness of the impact of carbon dioxide levels on the global climate grows, the role of tree planting seems to become more vital. Why? Trees absorb carbon dioxide and release oxygen. Trees store carbon in their roots and their wood.

In addition to all the other wonderful things trees do for us - clean the air, increase property values, reduce stormwater runoff, provide natural beauty, give shade on a hot summer day, provide a strong branch for a child's swing, etc, etc - trees are also an important part of sequestering carbon. Sequestering carbon and reducing the amount of carbon dioxide that contributes to climate change.

So plant a tree already!!

Support TLC in April!

Just a reminder that there are only a few days left in the month of April, which means just a few more days to support TLC & the environment!

If you haven't ordered your oak yet, you have until Friday! Red, bur & swamp white varieties ranging from two foot ($20) to five foot ($75). And 30% of the sale price supports TLC's 3rd Generation Oak Fund to help ensure that oaks will be an important part of the McHenry County landscape FOREVER!

Summer's coming, and that rainbarrel full of clean, free water will be so good for the garden, but you have to order yours by Friday to get the great price of $65 for a 55-60 gallon rainbarrel! Tumbling composters are also available for just $130.

Pick up for the trees, rainbarrels & composters is May 14-15 at Hennen Conservation Area, 4622 Dean Street, Woodstock.

And, you have until Friday to eat at Duke's Ale House, who will donate 5% to TLC if you bring a coupon with you (or ask your server for one at the Restaurant).

2030 Land Use Plan Vote Tuesday

Tuesday night at 7pm, the McHenry County Board will meet to vote on the proposed 2030 Land Use Plan that has been 3 years in the making.

In the last few days, several people have asked me my opinion on the plan. Let me sum it up this way:

I think the plan should show all undeveloped and unincorporated areas west of Route 47 as farmland or environmental resources. I have several reasons for favoring this approach:

1. It puts the County clearly in the position of supporting farmland and groundwater protection - resources that will benefit all county residents.

2. It sends a message to municipalities that the County is going to stop approving developments in the unincorporated areas of the County - this type of development is more expensive to all county residents (more expensive for the schools, more expensive for emergency responders, more expensive to maintain the extra roads, etc etc).

3. It puts the County in the best possible position to start working collaboratively with municipalities on Intergovernmental matters such as groundwater protection, fuding for road maintenance, and even future growth boundaries to ensure the land and water resources available are used in a sustainable way that benefits all residents -- today and in the future.

I believe recent news articles support this approach:

• Agritourism grows in County (without farmland, we have no agritourism, and it is big business!)


• Fire Destroys home in unincorporated area north of Crystal Lake (because the home was in an unincorporated area without fire hydrants, tankers full of water had to be brought in by departments from McHenry and Lake county communities to fight the fire)


• Industrial Solvent present in local water supplies (article is archived since it's from December 2009) - notices were sent out to residents in Crystal Lake and Fox River Grove letting them know that levels of Trichloroethylene (TCE) in the local water supplies are at half the legal limit.

Think about it, as currently drafted, the plan purports to encourage future development to occur in or adjacent to existing municipalities -- a style of development known as "compact and contiguous." Yet, the plan shows vast areas of unincorporated land as being developed for commercial, industrial or residential uses in the future, BUT it has NO requirement that the development occur only through municipal annexation.

What this means is that a developer can use the plan to gain approval of a project that is NOT compact or contiguous, but is consistent with the plan map. And there isn't much the county board can do to stop them if the project is consistent with the map.

Take a look at the map, especially the area by Marengo and Union. The purple areas are proposed Commercial/Office/Research/Industrial areas and the yellow parts are planned for rural residential development. Thousands of acres of each use on land that is currently farmed. Thousands of acres underlain with groundwater that is highly vulnerable to pollution.

I repeat: I think the plan should show all undeveloped and unincorporated areas west of Route 47 as farmland or environmental resources. Someone suggested to me that this would be the absence of a plan, but I strongly disagree with that notion.

To plan for farmland and enviornmental resources in the unincorporated areas does nothing to stop municipalities from annexing land for development.

The best way to make it clear that the County is serious about wanting future development to occur in municipalities, to protect precious groundwater resources and to ensure there is a thriving agricultural industry in the county in the future, is to have a County Land Use Plan (aka a plan for future development in unincorporated areas) that reflects what the County Board would actually approve in the unincorporated areas.

The next question is "What can we do?" The short answer is to call your county board members and tell them what you think before they vote Tuesday night.

Spring Ephemerals are Up!

Dutchman's Britches (Dicentra cucullaria) is one of my favorite spring flowers! The blooms look like tiny pantaloons (thus the name - which is also spelled Breeches).

This picture was taken April 9, 2010 at Wonder Lake Sedge Meadow - a TLC easement in, you guessed it, Wonder Lake! In addition to the sedge meadow on the 28 acre site, there is also an oak savanna in the upland buffer - that's where the Britches were growing!

This plant is one of the first native flowers to bloom each spring. Typically, we might expect to see them around April 24th, but this year everything is early! VERY early!

Bloodroot, another early Spring flower, has already come and gone in some local woodlands. Normally, it is still around in early May! The bluebells - which can almost always be counted on to brighten Mother's Day - are coming up already, and will probably have already passed by the time Mom's Day comes along a month from today (May 9th!).

Chorus frogs have been calling since late March, and the Spring Peepers (another species of frog) are already busy.

Bluebirds are nesting - I had one report of someone seeing a bluebird egg laid in one of their bluebird boxes on March 31st -- that's early! Very early!!

Even the bad guys like buckthorn and honeysuckle are going strong. In previous years, the earliest I noticed buckthorn in our local woods was April 12th. This year it was clearly greening up on April 1st (a really cruel April Fool's Joke!).

I'm having a hard time not thinking that this is another sign of Global Warming/Climate Change at work. The experts say that we will see more extremes in weather as the Global Warming process accelerates.

It's kind of a big deal when things start sprouting and blooming out of sync from their usual time of year. Insects pollinate flowers, but if the flower blooms before the insects emerge -- or if the insects come and go before their flowers bloom -- the flowers don't get pollinated. No pollination, no flowers in the future.

One oddball year here or there is okay, but if it becomes a trend, it could spell trouble!

County 2030 Plan Final Stretch

I try to be an optimist, but sometimes it's really hard to keep my spirits up...

Take the McHenry County 2030 Land Use Plan as an example. The County Board held a series of Public Open House meetings last month that were very well attended. They received over 300 comments in some written form - emails, letters, notes about the maps, even handwritten comments.

But then the Planning & Development Committee - with scant discussion of the comments - voted to send the plan to the full County Board for a vote at its April 20th meeting. They made some changes to the map to reduce the amount of residential sprawl shown (although they decided to maintain the plan for residential development on top of two of the largest remaining oak woodlands in the county, despite TLC's request to amend that portion of the map). However, they kept all of the thousands of acres of commercial/office/industrial land around Marengo, despite three important facts:

1. the areas planned for this type of use are some of the most sensitive groundwater recharge areas in the entire county -- and everyone in the county is dependent upon groundwater for their daily water use (even elected officials).

2. many of the areas so planned are prime agricultural lands - some of the best farmland in the US, and even the world.

3. the agricultural industry is the second largest economic force in McHenry County. And consider that for every person who works on a farm, there are something like 20 people who have jobs because of those farms. Yep, think of the people who clean and process the seed, who manufacture and sell farm chemicals, who manufacture and sell farm equipment, who process the end products from the crops raised on the farms, etc, etc.

I don't know about the rest of you, but I for one like the idea of my food being raised in the USA, rather than imported from former South American grasslands or the Ukraine (two other prime agricultural regions based on climate & soils). And it kind of honks me off when our elected officials create a farmland preservation commission on the one hand, and then push a policy document aimed at further damaging an already threatened local industry.

That's two handful's of rich, black, humus-y soil in the picture on the left. And that is the reason for this area being such a primo spot for growing crops of all sort. The soil combined with a favorable climate where it rains regularly during the growing season. There may come a day on this planet when wars will be waged over resources like this.

Oh wait, that is already happening in Africa... But it would never come to that here, would it???

April is TLC month at Duke's Ale House!

Just a quick reminder that for the entire month of April, 5% of purchases made at Duke's Ale House in Crystal Lake will be donated to The Land Conservancy of McHenry County! Just bring along a TLC coupon that you can print from our website, and present it to your server to help them keep track!

Additionally, Duke's mixologist created a special drink for the month of April called the Hairy Aster - named after a native plant (Aster pilosus). each martini-style drink sold during April will result in $1 being donated to TLC to support our land preservation mission!

Duke's Ale House has gained a reputation for their menu selections made from locally raised products including honey, beef, herbs and vegetables! They also host the monthly Green Drinks group where people gather on the first Wednesday of every month from 5-7pm to network with other people who are interested in the environment! Hope to see you there on April 7th!