Ephemeral Morning

After a recent column I wrote in the Woodstock Independent, I received a mysterious fax of a poem titled: Ephemeral Morning.

Earlier this week, I ran into TLC member Beverly Meuch who asked me if I received her fax! Now that the mystery of the poem's author is resolved, I am happy to share the poem here:

Ephemeral Morning

by Beverly Meuch

Mist moves in with the morning.

The forest stands cloaked in grey,

Silence and stillness adorning

The dawn of mysterious day.

The fern slowly frees its frond,

And fog encircles the leaf.

While out in the meadow, the pond

Reflects the sun, the thief.

Thanksgiving Message

This from Chief Seattle (Seatlh), c. 1860

We are a part of the Earth and it is a part of us.

The perfumed flowers are our sisters;

The deer, the horse, the great eagle,

These are our brothers.

The rocky crests, the juices of the meadows,

The body heat of the pony, and man -

all belongs to the same family.

So when the Great Chief in Washington sends words

That he wishes to buy our land, he asks much of us.

If we decide to accept, I will make one condition:

The white man must treat the beast of this land as his brother.

I am savage and I do not understand any other way.

I have seen a thousand rotting buffalos on the prairie,

left by the white man who sot them from a passing train.

I am savage and I do not understand how the smoking

iron horse can be more important than the buffalo

that we kill only to stay alive.

Where is man without the beasts?

If the beasts were gone, men would die

from a loneliness of spirit.

For whatever happens to the beasts

Soon happens to man.

All things are connected. This we know.

The Earth does not belong to man;

Man belongs to the Earth. This we know.

All things are connected.

Whatever befalls the Earth befalls the sons of the Earth.

Man did not weave the web of life,

He is merely a strand in it.

Whatever he does to the web,

He does to himself.

Thank you to retired TLC board member Dale Galloway for sending this lovely statement to me.

Think about this: Man did not weave the web of life - he is merely a strand in it. If we all think of this simple idea when we are making decisions in our daily lives, just imagine the profound effect it could have on the planet? "Will this action strengthen the web or make it weaker?" Keeping in mind that while some actions may strengthen one's personal strand, they will weaken others...

Wow. That whole notion kind of blows me away!

Have a happy, sustainable, nourishing, and web-strengthening holiday!!

What's in a name?

I have a problem with a lot of the names of natural areas and parks. They just don't do anything to inspire me.

For example, Lions Park or Bailey Woods (named after the group or individual who donated the land) are pretty plain-sounding.

Some use words that sound Native American or French (or both) like Meredosia or Chautauqua or Emiquon (all Wildlife Refuges in Central Illinois), which harken back to an earlier era, but start to sound alike over time.

Some parks are named after an animal, plant or natural community that is found there, like Boloria Meadows in Bull Valley (named after a species of butterfly), which seems to take the risk of sounding like a subdivision (Turtle Crossing in Harvard comes to mind -- it's a subdivision, not a park where turtles cross...)

Other sites are named for the geographic location, as is TLC's Crowley Sedge Meadow which is located on Crowley Road near Harvard and TLC's Powers Creek Conservation Area (which could easily become the name of a subdivision by substituting "Estates" for "Conservation Area"...)

So, why am I rambling on about this whole issue of naming natural areas or parks? Well, just this week, TLC acquired the nicest remaining wet prairie in all of McHenry County, and now we need to come up with a name.

The site is currently known as "West Woodstock Prairie" (since it is on the west side of the City of Woodstock, and is a prairie). Yawn.

The property was originally bought for $50 in 1843 by a man named Peter O'Brien, so maybe "O'Brien's Meadow" is an option.

The property is located in the headwaters of Franklinville Creek, so how about "Franklinville Headwaters Preserve"? It is mostly a wet prairie, so maybe Franklinville Prairie Preserve?

The land sits at the base of a steep bluff, so maybe something like "West Woodstock Bottoms" would be appropriate? Or "Franklinville Bottoms"?

You see the challenge! Now, if someone came along and made a donation to cover the costs of buying the site, we could just name it after him or her: TLC's Jane Smith Praire Preserve!

Just a thought.

Wild Parsnip Advice

If you have it, you know it!

If you aren't sure, read carefully, because you want to be very careful around this plant!

Here is the management warning from the Illinois Nature Preserves Commission "Vegetation Management Guidelines" web page for this plant: "Warning-- Care should be taken to avoid skin contact with the toxic sap of the plant tissues by wearing gloves, sleeves, and long pants.Although eradication of this exotic is desirable from a human safety as well as ecological standpoint, in some situations the best control measure is to do nothing."

The plant is phototoxic - in other words, it gives off an oil that is activated by sunlight. And once activated, it can cause burn-like rashes.

I was at a conference recently, and asked several experienced land managers about parsnip - before giving me their management advice, each one would role up his or her shirt sleeve and point out scars earned during parsnip management work to be sure I knew how dangerous the plant was.

Despite the plant's toxicity, it can be controlled. NOTE: once the plant turns brown, it is ready to drop seed! So, while this advice is coming right at the end of parsnip season, it might help someone develop a plan of attack for next year.

Use the plant's life-history to your favor. It is a biennial, meaning that during its first year of growth it focuses on putting energy into its root system, and in the second year (or sometimes the third), it sends up a stem and blooms to set seed and create the next generation of plants.

With this in mind, it is ineffecive to herbicide the plant in year two, because the herbicide is designed to be delivered to the root when the plant feeds the root, and in year two, the plant is focused on producing seed, not feeding the root! That means the herbicide can't do its job. However, in the first year, herbicide works great because the plant is focused on putting food into the root, so if you are able to identify first year plants, spray away (using glyphosate, aka Roundup).

Here is a summary of the best advice I obtained about non-chemical control of the plant:

1. Wear long sleeves, long pants & gloves to be sure the plant does not touch your skin. After you finish any contact with the plant, thoroughly wash your clothes - including the gloves - take a shower just to be sure, and wash any tools that came in contact with the plant so you don't pick up the oil later. Another suggestion was to wear a miner's helmet with a light and cut the parsnip in the dark - the person who suggested this was quite serious!

2. If there are just a few plants, pull them out by the roots before they set seed. Destroy the plants by burning them. DO NOT leave the plants lying where you pull them.

3. If you have an infestation that is too large to hand pull, then try this approach: after the plants flower, but before they set seed, cut the seed heads off and gather the cut tops together to burn them. NOTE: the plants are likely to flower again and will set seed, BUT, the flowers will be smaller, there will be fewer seeds, and many of the seeds are likely to be sterile. In four or five years, this approach should result in a dramatically reduced number of plants. At that point, the remaining ones can be pulled.

4. If mowing the parsnip (because of size or resources), use a pull-behind tractor type mower, not a push mower, and definitely not a rotary cutter or weed whip! Those are much more likely to scatter the oil around where you or someone nearby can be harmed! Mowing should be timed carefully to occur when the plant has finished blooming but has not set seed. (Friday, August 1st would have been a good day - the plants I saw looked ready.) The area mowed should then be checked in a few weeks for resprouts, and if necessary mowed again.

5. One good piece of news is that sites with a well-established prairie planting are not likely to be invaded by parsnip, and, if an area is enhanced, the parsnip is likely to fade on its own over time.

6. Prescribed fire does not really help control the plant, BUT, it will make it easier to identify the first year plants in the spring since they will be some of the earliest plants to come up.

I'd like to thank my friend Vern LaGesse from Springfield for talking me through the ins and outs of parsnip management, and for reminding me to check the INPC vegetation management website because they have pulled a lot of good resources together to help individuals with managing weeds on their property.

This is a photo of first year growth

Do you have an experience with parsnip control to share? I'd love to hear it!!

Some facts FYI:
Life history: Wild parsnip typically lives for two years. The first year, as a spindly rosette of leaves, it keeps fairly low to the ground while the plant's carrot-like taproot develops. It may live two or more years this way until conditions are right for flowering. The second year, a hollow, grooved flower stalk rises 2-5 feet high, first holding clusters of yellow flowers and later dozens of flat, oval seeds.

Leaves: Pinnately compound, with a main stem and 5 to 15 leaflets.

Flowers: Yellow, in flat-topped umbrella-like clusters at the top of the plant.

Season: Wild parsnip rosettes are among the first plants to become green in spring, and its flowers turn a prominent yellow in midsummer. After flowering and going to seed, plants die and turn brown in fall, but first year rosettes remain green until frost.

Habitat: Roadsides, abandoned fields, unmowed pastures, edges of woods, prairie restorations.

Oaks & Gypsy Moths

Gypsy moths (Lymantria dispar) love oaks, and their caterpillars can strip a tree of its leaves in short order.

Some local governments spray to control the moths, typically using BT (Bacillus thuringiensis) applied while the caterpillars are still small - BT is not effective on caterpillars that are mature. There is a good summary of the pros and cons of BT available on the Ohio State University website.

Mature gypsy moths have a yellow-ish head, and distinct red and blue spots down their backs. In the photo, you can see one on a man's hand for scale.

They are similar in appearance to other caterpillars that you are likely to see in woods, such as the Eastern tent caterpillar and the Forest tent caterpillar.

The Eastern tent caterpillar makes silk tents, and favors cherry trees, apples and crabapples. These are native to the US, and while the tents may look bad, the insects rarely harm trees.

The Forest tent caterpillar has a blue head, blue sides to its body, and prominent yellow or white spots down the center of its back. This is a native species that favors aspens, sugar maple, oaks, birch & black gum trees.

Both of the native woodland caterpillars lay their eggs in a dark mass wrapped around twigs. The gypsy moths lay their eggs in a 1-3 inch long mass on the bark of the tree. The egg mass is tan, and covered with fine hairs.

If you see gypsy moth caterpillars, destroy them. If you notice egg masses on the bark of a tree, scrape them off into a container and either bury or burn them. Each egg mass contains from 100-1,000 eggs!

Here is a link to additional information on a Michigan State University website:
gypsy moth control & management.

IF YOU SEE A GYPSY MOTH IN ANYSTAGE OF LIFE CALL the Illinois Department of Agriculture TOLL FREE: 1-866-296-MOTH(6684)

Now Coming to a Town Near You

I heard/saw the most wonderful presentation earlier today by author Gina Olszowski who spoke about her first book: Now Coming to a Town Near You: Voices of Urban Sprawl.

Gina is a Geneva native, alumna of Drake University with a background in advertising, and a passion for photography.

Growing up, Gina watched as the Geneva area turned from "the country" to the suburbs, and she wondered why - even though all of the adults she knew were sad every time a farm was developed - farms continued to be developed, one after another.

She started taking pictures and talking to people - farmers, residents, elected officials, urban planners, etc. She started to connect the dots. This wasn't really the landscape that people wanted, but they felt helpless to do anything, and that made them sad - sad for the things lost, sad for the memories of their time on the land that others would never share - and sometimes, sad that they just stood by and let it happen.

What is this "it"? Many call it sprawl, but after looking at just a few pages of the book, and reading a few of the personal stories, I think I want to start calling it "urban creep." Lots of folks seemed to be saying that the growth and change just kind of crept up on them, and before they knew it, everything they once knew was gone.

(I like "urban creep" too because of the word creep - it is so definitely a negative word, isn't it? A person can sprawl out on a bed or a couch, and that isn't bad, but when traffic creeps along, or insects are creepy, or a person is a creep, it isn't good.)

We have a copy of the book in the office, and I gave one to Arlene at Read Between the Lynes bookstore on the Woodstock Square, and hope that she will even have a "meet the author" type event and start carrying Gina's books.

You can also order them through Gina's website: http://www.atownnearyou.com/ - $19.95 plus tax & shipping. And being a community-minded person, she is donating two-thirds of the profit to The Conservation Foundation - a land conservation group in Naperville (kind of like TLC but larger, and covering several counties).

Oh, and did I mention that Gina is 24 years old, and she just did this because she thought that there was a story to tell - a story that people needed to hear - a story told by their friends and neighbors - a story being repeated over and over and over again.

"Now Coming to a Town Near You" !! If everyone chose to speak up about the change they are seeing, and to make different choices in their lives, we could stop the creep from coming to the towns near us!

I planted an oak day!

Fifteen bur oak seedlings were planted by six families at Queensbury Farm on May 24th as part of TLC's first annual "I planted an oak day". The day was an opportunity for local residents to have a hand in restoring oaks to the county's landscape.

One tree at a time, one acre at a time, one property at a time. 'Til one day, the County will be known as the place where oaks thrive!

The day was part of TLC's Project Quercus program to save, restore and replant the county's oak woodland resources.

Last year, the owner of Queensbury Farm placed a conservation easement on her entire 58 acres of land on Queen Anne Road. The Farm is like a blank slate that will be restored to wetland, prairie and savanna in the coming years.

The event raised about $150 for TLC's Third Generation Oak Fund.