Frogs and fairy shrimp and salamanders, oh my!

Did you hear the sound of a thumb raking over the teeth of a comb while on a recent hike? That's the Western Chorus Frog. The first frog to emerge when the ground thaws.

They are very loud near some wetlands in our area, particularly in the Alden region where small, fishless ponds (vernal pools) abound this time of the year. A diversity of tiny creatures, such as the fairy shrimp (photo to the right), are found in abundance, providing a valuable food source for the recently emerged amphibians, as well as the hatchling salamanders, frogs, toads and turtles.

In larger ponds - those with fish - these small creatures do not survive, as they become food for the fish. But, in the small temporary pools of spring, the young amphibians are able to mature, feed on mosquito larvae, and breed so there will be future generations!

If you live near one of these spring pools, be on the lookout for spotted salamanders! They have a tendency to end up in window wells - the three on the left were rescued from one during a spring hike to look at vernal pools and the critters found there!

Wild Things! Oh, you make my heart sing!

Every other year the Wild Things conference is held in Chicago. It's a forum geared primarily towards individuals who are engaged in natural land restoration throughout this part of the Midwest.

The number and diversity of programs is amazing -- ranging from how to make toys with buckthorn wood, to advice on using Social Media (like facebook and blogs) to connect with the community and other volunteers, plus plenty of research updates related to bird diversity, woodland restoration and invasive plant control...

The program was held in early March this year at UIC, and organizers say there were at least 1,400 people in attendance! That's a lot of Wild Things in one place! Generally speaking, the crowds were pretty laid-back. (Except when they realized that the Crunchy Vegetable sandwich was just cream cheese with cucumber slices... things nearly got ugly...)

I think my favorite session was by Joel Brown, a UIC faculty member known for creating "Project Squirrel" to monitor the distribution of grey & fox squirrel species around the US.

Dr. Brown is an evolutionary ecologist. That means he studies how natural selection serves to optimize natural community characteristics like feeding and reproduction. The data gathered through Project Squirrel help to understand the trends and characteristics of the two species. For instance, the study has found that fox squirrels tend to occur more frequently in areas with lots of stray cats than their grey cousins. Over time, the data will serve to track changes in the populations, perhaps yielding insights into the ways that evolution -- natural selection -- gives species the ability to adapt to environmental changes in just a few generations.

But, Dr. Brown didn't talk about Project Squirrel at Wild Things. Instead, he gave the room examples of how much & how fast species will evolve in the face of human disturbance.

Take Yellow Jackets for example. This bane of Labor Day parties in the Chicago region is now resistant to the poison in common pesticides like Black Flag. Dr. Brown suggested taking a can of Black Flag, and spraying a yellow jacket until it is so wet it cannot fly. Then watch the pest. It will spread its wing to dry off, and once dry, it will fly away. Now, spray the pesticide on some ants or a fly -- they will die. But the yellow jacket will not. That's because over many generatons, yellow jackets in the Chicago area have evolved to be resistant to that chemical.

How does this happen? Well, consider that in the early days of the pesticide, there were a few yellow jackets who survived - either they didn't get a strong enough dose, or they already had some natural resistance to the chemical. Those individuals passed their resistance on to the next generation. And so on and so on, until the vast majority of yellow jackets that emerge in the Chicago area have that same resistance. That is "natural selection," and it is happening right in front of us every day.

Plants adapt the same way to herbicides - they become resistant. And then the chemical companies create new poisons that the plants are not yet resistant to. BUT, it's only a matter of time before they develop resistance. It's a viscious circle, isn't it?

The same type of adaptation happens to animals - even to city-dwelling pests like raccoons. As Dr. Brown pointed out, one is not doing the neighborhood raccoon any favors by trapping it and taking it out to live in "nature" at a forest preserve or conservation area. City raccoons are adapted to live in town. Putting one out in nature is essentially signing its death warrant.

Better to learn to live with the raccoons than to relocate them.

Horses and their connection to water quality!

The Illinois Horse industry is a $1.3 Billion dollar industry, and the highest concentration of horses in Illinois is found in McHenry and Lake Counties.

And every adult horse generates up to 55 pounds of manure every day. When you add in the bedding straw, that amount to 12 TONS of the stuff per horse per year.

When not managed properly, horse manure can increase flies and spread of parasites among horses. It can also impact water quality when not stored correctly. And that can mean excess nutrients, bacteria and parasites in local streams or even in the groundwater.

Now, one might ask "why don't the horse farms just spread it on the fields?" That's a good question! First off, depending on how much land one has, and how many horses, it could be problematic to spread that much manure on the fields. Second, many horses have round worms, and if their feces are spread on a field, the worms (a nasty parasite) can survive up to 10 years - so that's potentiall 10 years of round worm infections for the horses.

However, hot composting of the manure will kill most bacteria and parasites - provided the compost process is of a sufficient duration.

In Lake County, a waste hauler, Prairie Land Recycling & Disposal, collects horse manure from many farms and takes it to a facility called Midwest Organics that composts the material with other compostables. They bag the finished product, and it is actually sold at Whole Foods!

There is another option that has been developed by the University of Illinois Extension service: ManureShare. This is a manure exchange program that links gardeners and landscapers who are searching for good compost material with livestock owners who have excess manure.

Quoting from the website: This benefits water quality by removing excess nutrients from farms and by lowering the amount of commercial fertilizer used by gardenrs and others.

The Hooved Animal Humane Society (HAHS) in Woodstock is working with Extension to run a demonstration of on-site composting of horse manure. It will be interesting to see how the program works!

Fleming Road Update

With 17 Natural Heritage Corridor Easements under our belt, I guess TLC is serious about helping to preserve the Fleming Road corridor!

After attending the County DOT's fourth Citizen's Advisory Group meeting for Fleming Road on March 3rd. I can summarize the comments from the Village of Bull Valley, Fleming Road Alliance, Environmental Defenders, Boone Creek Watershed Alliance & County Bicycle Advocates in three words:

"You're Not Listening!"

Two alternatives were presented to the group: one that would require the removal of about 120 trees, and another that would result in just 19 trees being taken down. The one that saves more trees would use retaining walls and curbs/gutters in spots to reduce the amount of grading they would do where there are hills adjacent to the road as in the picture.

The members of the CAG have been saying for nearly a year that they would like the County to consider an alternative that keeps the road in the same footprint as it is in today -- 2- 10 1/2 foot lanes and a one foot shoulder (of sorts) on either side of the pavement.

Folks agree that the road needs to be repaired, and that there are a small number of areas where water pools on the road. They just don't understand why $935,000 or so is being spent to study "how" to overhaul the road, when the residents have asked that it be kept much as it is today.

At one point the discussion turned to safety, and the need to make the road more safe. A representative from the County Sheriff's department commented that the incidence of accidents on the road is "amazingly low." One of the CAG members pointed out that a good way to predict the future is to look at the past -- in other words, perhaps Fleming Road has such a low accident rate for the simple reason that it is in the configuration that it is today.

In fact, studies show that wide, flat, straight roads are less safe than roads that are more narrow and have trees and the like nearer to the pavement.

So, if we place safety ahead of speed, then maybe the road agencies could start replicating the design of Fleming Road - windy, hilly, narrow roads with lots of large trees near the pavement?