Oakological Succession

Posted on May 20, 2015 by paulmozina

What does the future hold for the Oak Savannas and Woodlands of Wisconsin? I left the 2015 Oak Savanna Alliance workshop last Saturday at Camp Timber-Lee with a decidedly unsettled feeling aka, cognitive dissonance. Am I fighting for another seemingly hopeless cause i.e., stopping the War On Drugs, or trying to get a real investigation into what happened on 9/11, when I volunteer my time and attention, my spiritual currency, to restore and preserve the oakosystems in the Kettle Moraine? Can, or rather, should, anything be done to prevent the oakological succession of the oak forests below the “tension zone” to mixed central and northern hardwood forests?

“Oak forests on medium- and high-productivity sites throughout the Midwest have been decreasing in extent for several decades. Historically, regeneration in these forests was facilitated by a periodic fire regime. Today, it is difficult to regenerate oaks on these nutrient-rich sites due to competition from native and nonnative plants that outcompete oak seedlings. Browsing by white-tailed deer also limits the survival and growth of oak seedlings. The lack of successful regeneration along with selective harvesting of mature oaks contribute to the gradual succession of oak forests to mixed central hardwoods, which includes species such as red and sugar maple, basswood, elms, green and white ash, and ironwood.” Wisconsin’s Forests 2004 United States Department of Agriculture

DNR Natural Area Conservation Biologist Matt Zine made an excellent presentation about the progress of the oak succession and the master planning process currently happening at the Lulu Lake SNA. But it appears, given the meager crumbs of financial support they get, that the Bureau of Natural Heritage Conservation should be renamed to the Museum of Natural Heritage Conservation. With an annual budget of around $5 million, supporting 33.5 full time employees (of which only a handful are working in southeastern Wisconsin), to manage the endangered resources on 673 State Natural Areas comprising 373,000 acres, they are hard-pressed to do more than save a few choice relics. Matt explained that they are 10 years behind when it comes to creating master plans for all of the SNAs, and that’s excluding the SNAs above the tension zone, which presumably do not contain any endangered resources, or stand to benefit from any formal management planning. We don’t know how many, or what percentage, of the SNAs below the tension zone have master plans. This limited perspective on our endangered resources ignores the other 5 million acres of publicly owned lands in the state as well as the privately held lands (approximately 29 million acres.)

Wetlands near Lulu Lake

Matt is the messenger and I’m having trouble with the message. Am I fighting Mother Nature when I cling to the ideal of the pre-settlement oak savannas and woodlands and work to restore something that can never be again? It’s not just the trees, it’s the oakosystems and the mystique of the Native Americans who nurtured and mastered a life sustaining and harmonious balance of flora and fauna. I fear that, if we don’t preserve the oak savannas and woodlands, we will loose forever the native wisdom accumulated over centuries, that they intrinsically and beautifully embody.

Thank goodness there are people like Eric Tarman-Ramcheck, Emily Stahl and Amanda Kutka, who organized the Oak Savanna Alliance Workshop, and Zach Kastern and Ginny Coburn, who share my passion for the oak savannas and woodlands of the Kettle Moraine! Zach and Ginny have been organizing volunteer workdays in the Southern Kettle Moraine in partnership with the DNR for three years now. Zach was awarded the Land Steward of the Year award by the Oak Savanna Alliance. Way to go Zach!

Zach receiving the award from Matt Zine.

The Buckthorn Man made a decent presentation baring his heart and soul while sharing his experiences volunteering for 20 years in the Kettle Moraine.

I’m plagued with doubts as I continue my efforts at The Scuppernong Springs Nature Trail: am I doing “The Right Thing” or am I fighting the natural succession? Is it wise to abandon the management practices of the people who lived here for thousands of years, which kept the natural succession in check?

On Tuesday May 12, I spent most of the day cutting garlic mustard with my brush cutter. I am observing that in the areas where I concentrated on cutting garlic mustard last year, there is significantly less this year and the plants that are present are typically 6-8″ tall, spindly, and with relatively few seeds. I am gaining confidence that the strategy of mowing garlic mustard can succeed by focusing on keeping it out of the “best” areas and then gradually expanding the no-GM zone.

The river is starting to make a head cut at the Hotel Spring bridge location where the DNR recently excavated (scroll down to the leprechaun image in this post for more details.)

The sun made a dramatic appearance late in the afternoon.

On Wednesday, May 13, I was back at it whacking garlic mustard and pulling water cress. I also spent some time weeding the spotted knapweed from the patches of lupine that are proliferating on the west slope of the sand prairie.

Sunset at Ottawa Lake.

On Saturday, May 16, Pati and I stopped at The Springs on the way home from the Oak Savanna Alliance Workshop to check out the lupine.

And finally, on Monday, May 18, I spent an absolutely beautiful spring day cutting garlic mustard, pulling water cress and digging out spotted knapweed.

I weeded quack grass and water cress from the Indian Springs.

In the late afternoon I joined Pat Witkowski and the Ice Age Trail Alliance “Monday Mudders” to do a little trail maintenance near the tower at Lapham Peak State Park.

Views from the tower.

See you at The Springs!

Volunteers of America

Posted on May 11, 2015 by paulmozina

I’ve been asked to make a short presentation about my experience as a volunteer and volunteer opportunities at the upcoming Oak Savanna Alliance workshop.

I’m a little worried that The Buckthorn Man will show up and start ranting like he is prone to do. I asked him recently what his problem with volunteering was since he does so much of it, and that really set him off (don’t worry, none of this will make it into my presentation on May 16.) The Buckthorn Man talks fast and loud when he gets excited, but I think I got the gist of it, which I will relate here now.

We need Volunteers to start a Revolution!

Make informed, free will choices, to spend your time and attention, your spiritual currency, in harmony with Natural Law

and take RIGHT actions in the world!

The Trivium: Grammar, Logic and Rhetoric, are the tools a rational mind applies to make sense — common sense — conscience (to know together) out of the world we live in. You need a conscience to volunteer. You’ve got to see the need!

If not me, who? And if not now, when? Mikhail Gorbachev

I’ve been cutting buckthorn on State owned land for 20 years because I see the need. According to the Wisconsin Realtors Association: “Wisconsin consists of approximately 34.8 million acres of land. Over 5.7 million acres of this land, or 16.5 percent, is publicly owned and used for parks, forests, trails and natural resource protection.” The lands are owned by federal, state and county governments, none of which apply the resources necessary to be good stewards.

Yes, there are caring individuals in all levels of government (especially the Wisconsin DNR), who see the needs, but they are constrained by a lack of funds to providing only a veneer of stewardship i.e., just enough to maintain good public relations and earn money to help offset the maintenance costs. I’m not a fan of government, so I’m not suggesting we plead with them: I’m an anarchist (yes to rules, no to rulers). Government is mind control. It takes away rights we have and assumes rights no one has; taxes, prohibition, licenses and malum prohibitum laws are evidences of that.

Right here, right now, we have to deal with the cold, hard facts that, of the money government currently steals from us, the vast majority is going to fight wars of aggression, build an all powerful security state and line the pockets of the titans of finance who are really running the show. We are rapidly headed towards a One World Government, a New World Order, make no mistake about it.

The opportunity to volunteer has never been better. Open your eyes! An Abrams 1 tank costs $8.5 million and Wisconsin State government plans to spend only $5 million employing 33.5 full time employees on endangered resources in 2016. We have 673 State Natural Areas on which the Bureau of Natural Heritage Conservation (formerly endangered resources) focuses and they all need tender loving care but the priorities of politicians are elsewhere. The Department of Defense plans to spend $495 billion in 2015 as compared to the entire Wisconsin DNR budget of $570 million. The U.S. wars in Afghanistan and Iraq are estimated to have cost $6 trillion. We have spent almost $1 trillion on intelligence agencies since the false flag attacks of 9/11. Do you see the problem? I know I’m conflating state and federal budgets here, but the political hierarchies are just there to obscure the illegitimacy of the whole structure.

This is why the Volunteers Marty Balin sang about must start a revolution. We must say NO! and reject the whole concept of authority — that some folks have a right to rule, so long as some other folks say they do — and create a society of voluntary association. There never was a time when the politicians who styled themselves “The United States of America” were accountable to “we the people”. Read Gustavus Myers’ History of the Great American Fortunes, and see how this country was born in infamy. What, besides threats and coercion, binds you or I to the U.S. Constitution and grants jurisdiction i.e., control, to these bureaucrats?

It comes down to this: my problem with volunteering on publicly owned land is that it tends to make it look like the current system is succeeding. As a society, formed into bodies corporate and politic (governments), can we continue giving short shrift to being good stewards of the land in favor of exploitation and continued degradation while relying on expanding the army of volunteers to make everyone feel good about it? It ain’t RIGHT!

Remember, “You are the Crown of Creation, and you’ve got no place to go.”

Well, thanks Buckthorn Man, that was interesting, but I wouldn’t dare bring any of that up next Saturday at the Oak Savanna Alliance workshop. Personally, I volunteer to help restore the quality and diversity of “the commons” as a way to preserve my sanity in a world gone mad. Making a positive difference, no matter how small, means everything to me.

Way back on April 27th, I enjoyed the opportunity to help the Kettle Moraine Land Trust on a workday with young people from the Elkhorn Area High School at the Beulah Bluff Preserve.

Herb Sharpless introduces the plan for the day

Views from the bluff before we set to work

The view at the base of the bluff where we began working

It was a great day!

I’ve been super busy cleaning the house from top to bottom and preparing for my adventure in legal land, which is still ongoing, and I haven’t gotten out to The Springs nearly as much as I’d like to. But, I did find time to join Pat Witkowski and her team of “Monday Mudders” on a beautiful late afternoon working on the Ice Age Trail just east of The Springs. There is a short section of trail that was rerouted a couple years ago and Pat was not happy with the results, so she is moving the trail up the slope a little to improve the drainage.

Part of the team worked on a stewardship zone, just a bit up the trail, that Dave Cheever has had his eyes on. There is a cluster of 10 or so massive, native white pines, that stand out conspicuously from the surrounding red pine plantation, once you know what you are looking at, and Dave thought it would be a great idea to clear the buckthorn from around their bases. Right on!

I hope to join Pat and the “Monday Mudders” again soon!

Last week I finally got back to work again at The Springs and spent a morning pulling weeds in the area around the Scuppernong Springs. This patch of garlic mustard is history!

Last year Ben Johnson and I weeded the lupine patches on the west slope of the sand prairie and I returned to get any spotted knapweed that we missed. There is going to be a stunning outburst of lupine this year!

Some curious friends stopped to see what I was up to and show off the beautiful morels that they found in the river valley on the east side of the sand prairie. I went looking myself but came up empty.

The spring flowers are in full bloom!

Last Saturday I was planning to join Zach, Ginny and Jared for a State Natural Areas workday at Bluff Creek West, but I’m faced with fields of flowering garlic mustard at The Springs. Instead, I spent the day brush cutting garlic mustard. Now you may scoff at the idea of mowing garlic mustard but I am seeing great results in some areas. It depends on how much seed is dormant in the ground and how thoroughly you can prevent new seed from maturing. This was an unusually busy spring for me and I’m way behind on the garlic mustard, but I see that this approach, as opposed to foliar spraying poison, is going to work in the long run.

Late in the afternoon, I donned my chest waders and pulled watercress from the river. I’m not trying to get it all out, I just want to keep a channel open.

It was past 6:00pm when I finally called it quits.

See you at The Springs!

Bluff Creek West

Posted on March 20, 2015 by paulmozina

Thanks again for coming to visit me at The Springs!

The Sand Hill Cranes are back and I’m wondering if we have opened up enough new habitat for a second family to take up residence in the area. It has been an exceptional winter season for cutting buckthorn and, thanks to the Kettle Moraine Natural History Association funding the efforts of Chris Mann and the Kettle Moraine Land Stewards, LLC, we have opened up many acres of wetlands.

Prime real estate is available for ducks as well and on April 2, Brian Glenzinski, former DNR Wildlife Biologist now working with Ducks Unlimited, will be joining me to tour The Spings. You might recall that Brian is the artist who carved The Acorn given out by the Oak Savanna Alliance for their Land Steward of the Year award. We plan to list with Brian and he was very positive about building some new “upscale” duck homes in the neighborhood.

By the way, don’t miss the Oak Savanna Alliance workshop on May 16th. Contact Eric Tarman-Ramcheck (TR Natural Enterprises, LLC) for details and be sure to let him know who you think deserves The Acorn this time.

The highlight of the last two weeks was the morning I spent with the Southern Kettle Moraine SNA Volunteers at the Bluff Creek West State Natural Area, just south and east of Whitewater, WI.

For sanity’s sake though, I’m going to recollect the events of the past few weeks in chronological order.

After weeks of cramming to prepare my defense against the band of thieves and robbers known as government, for my “day in court”, I needed a day in the woods with my chainsaw to settle my nerves. I returned to the marl factory on March 12th to attack the last stand of buckthorn on the wedge of land between the Tibby Line railroad tracks (signpost #2) and Marl Pit Bridge (signpost #4). Below, the area as seen from signpost #4.

Now, imagine you just stepped forward to the treeline shown above and looked right, straight ahead and left.

We carved a hole in the middle of this buckthorn thicket and now was the time to finish the perimeter. I had a fine day cutting and stopped early to help my friend Scott, and his buddy Mr. Schnuddles, collect some firewood.

The view from signpost #4.

I love to take a walk around The Springs at the end of a hard day’s work!

Hmmmm, why is that monster parked in the DNR lot above the Hotel Springs?

The bubbler at the Emerald Springs was especially active.

Ben, dude, we need to build a bridge here man!

On Saturday, March 14th I joined Zach Kastern, Ginny Coburn, Jared Urban, and a great crew of SNA volunteers clearing buckthorn from the transition zone between the calcareous fen and the oak uplands at Bluff Creek West. The area we worked is at the base of the forested ridge shown in the upper right hand corner of the Bluff Creek Prescribed Burn plan shown below.

Zach and Jared introduced the agenda for the day…

… and we got after it!

We made tremendous progress thanks to volunteers like this team from the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater Ecology Club.

I got a chance to talk to Zach Kastern about the project.

I really enjoy these events and you might like it too!

I spent the afternoon at The Springs finishing the last patch of buckthorn near the marl factory that I described above.

Ben, dude, we gotta fix this boardwalk!

Sunset at the Sand Prairie.

On St. Patrick’s day I found evidence that leprecons had visited the springs the night before!

I had NO IDEA they could operate heavy equipment!

Abe Wittenwyler, heavy equipment operator with the DNR, wasn’t looking for a pot of gold under the Hotel Spring bridge; he had come to excavate the riverbed to address the hydrology issues that Ben Heussner identified as a result of the elevation survey the DNR conducted last year. I called Ben for an update, left a message, and got to work cutting buckthorn in the wetlands just down the trail — to the left — from the main parking lot on Hwy ZZ. Here is how it looked before I got started.

When I broke for lunch, I got Ben’s message and headed over to the Hotel Springs to meet him. We walked along the river and reviewed the results of our efforts last year while Ben waited for Michelle Hase, DNR Water Regulations and Zoning Engineer, to review the project.

Ben Heussner, Steve Gospodarek and Abe Wittenwyler.

Michelle recommended they distribute the “spoils” excavated from the river slightly differently than Ben had in mind. They regraded the slope on the east side of the river, sowed a crop of annual grass, and then covered the area with straw. Ben was genuinely proud of the bridge he built there back in 1992 and he’s looking forward to building the replacement this summer. Me? I’m going to watch the river make a head cut.

I returned to my work site and cut buckthorn, like a mischievious leprecon, for the rest of the day.

And later visited my favorite haunts.

Yesterday I returned to the area and continued to open up dramatic views into, and out of, the very interior of the Scuppernong River Nature Preserve. I completed clearing the area shown below to totally open the views into the interior wetlands.

Then I moved much closer to the parking lot to take on this wall of buckthorn.

It was a flawless day and I cut down a hell of a lot of buckthorn. Views into the interior wetlands are now revealed.

And, looking back towards the parking lot, that wall of buckthorn is not so formidable anymore.

I’m going to cut as much buckthorn as I can before the garlic mustard and other weeds start to emerge.

I got my first call of the season from DNR Burn Boss, Don Dane. Let’s get it on!

See you at The Springs!

p.s. I did not prevail against the agents of the state in court on Friday the 13th. It ain’t over yet!

Natural Law

Posted on November 16, 2014 by paulmozina

It was a dam cold winter morning at the Hartland Marsh when I carelessly let my hands get bitten by frost. Like gravity, it’s a law of nature: if you don’t understand and protect yourself, you’re going to get hurt. Ever since then my hands are the first to tell me Winter has arrived.

The polarity between hot and cold is really only a matter of degree i.e., the amount of vibratory energy that is present. And the rhythm of the seasons is just Nature’s Way. We have no trouble understanding the physical laws of nature but how about the spiritual laws of nature? What are they?

I’ve recommended Mark Passio’s Natural Law Seminar before on this blog and it bears repeating. The degree to which we, collectively, live our lives in adherence with natural law, will determine the kind of world we create: the reality that manifests around us.

I’ll give you a quick, thumb-nail sketch, using a few slides from Mark’s presentation to wet your appetite.

What are the principles, or first things, underlying natural law?

And what binds them together?

But you already know this!

What are the consequences of following natural law or ignoring it?

At it’s heart, natural law teaches us the difference between right and wrong.

What distinguishes natural law from mans law?

How can we get what we say we want from life?

You don’t have to look far to see which way we are heading… but, we can change that by seeking and speaking the truth.

I like to think I’m combining the laws of nature (physical) with natural law (spiritual) by voluntarily giving my time and attention, my spiritual currency, working to reveal the beauty of God’s creation. For my reward, I get to keep my sanity in a world gone mad.

This past week I continued prepping The Springs for the prescribed burn that the DNR plans to execute next spring. I’m focusing on the sand prairie area now cutting buckthorn, cherry, red oak, black locust and honeysuckle seedlings and resprouts.

I’m taking my time and poisoning as many cut stumps as I can find after each tank of gas burned in my Stihl FS-90 brush cutter. One reason the buckthorn is coming back so strongly here is that I took the shortcut of not poisoning the stumps the first time I brush cut here back in 2012. For every stump I didn’t poison, a half-dozen new shoots appeared.

I quit early to spend time at The Springs with my dear friend Ed Brown, who was in town to attend the 2014 Urban and Small Farms Conference hosted by Growing Power.

Hey Ed, thanks for inviting Pati and I to take a tour of Growing Power’s headquarters here in Milwaukee with you!

Pati joined me for the sunset at Ottawa Lake.

Last Wednesday, I picked up where I left off on the sand prairie. It was another cold day swinging the brush cutter.

I’d really like to get all the brush laid down in the areas that I have previously cut before the snow falls, so I hit the trail again on Friday. Here are a couple of views Friday morning.

And the same two perspectives in the afternoon. Can you tell the brush was cut?

I worked until the sun went down.

Finally, to cap off the week, I joined Ginny Coburn, Zach Kastern, Jared Urban and a great group of State Natural Areas volunteers, including students from the UW Whitewater Ecology Club, at the Whitewater Oak Opening, one of the 16 sites that comprise the Clifford F. Messinger Dry Prairie and Savanna Preserves.

Ginny gives an overview.

That was a nasty site!

Zach shows how to poison a stump.

Jared, Ginny and Zach organized the teams and we got after it.

That’s Mike with the chainsaw below.

Eric swinging his saw.

Steve lives next store, literally, and he is committed to restoring the oak savanna on his property and the surrounding state owned land.

I was amazed at how much we accomplished before high noon!

Let there be unity between your thoughts, emotions and actions.

See you at The Springs!

Burn the Whitewater Oak Opening!

Posted on May 13, 2014 by paulmozina

It’s been another busy burn season in the Kettle Moraine State Forest — Southern Unit. The biggest burn unit was 1,110 acres in the Scuppernong River Habitat Area stretching north from Hwy 59 and west of Hwy N, just a bit west of Eagle.

The crew from the Bureau of Natural Heritage Conservation focuses on the State Natural Areas but during burn seasons they jump in where ever they are needed. Last Saturday, May 10, they burned the Whitewater Oak Opening SNA, which contains a unit of the Clifford F Messinger Dry Prairie & Savanna SNA.

Zach Kastern turned me on to this area last September.

As the team gathered from working on the firebreaks, you could sense that this might be the last burn of the year and they were determined to make it a good one. Nate Fayram was the burn boss.

Here is the burn unit.

The terrain is classic Kettle Moraine!

Nate thoroughly reviewed all aspects of the burn plan with the team, which consisted of DNR veterans: Jessica Renley, Kevin Doyle, Adam Stone, Jared Urban, Alex Wenthe, Bridget Rathman and volunteers: Gary Birch, Ben Johnson and myself.

Defending private property within the burn unit was the highest priority.

I worked the drip torch all day and there is definitely an art to efficiently delivering the flaming drops of diesel and gas.

We got a nice little head fire running up the hill in this area somewhere between points E and G.

Black zone along Highway P.

We tied in the lines near point K at around 5:05pm and then proceeded to burn out the interior. The fire didn’t always carry over the moraines or deep into the kettles so we had to crisscross the interior with our drip torches to complete the burn. I was really pooped from going up and down the steep moraines and it was sweet to be released after my drip torch was emptied for the last time.

I parked my truck where Easterly Rd meets Kettle Moraine Drive at point C and took a walk into the burn unit.

I got up on a high ridge overlooking one of the hillside prairies and I could hear their chainsaws whining as they took down burning snags; they were still hard at work!

Jared Urban would monitor the burn unit all night and Nate planned to return in the morning to complete the mop up. We are lucky to have such a hard working and dedicated DNR team taking care of our State Natural Areas!

See you at The Springs!

Kettle Moraine Oak Opening

Posted on February 17, 2014 by paulmozina

A lot of ingredients go into a successful land restoration recipe and you’ll always find persistence as the base stock. Our chef Saturday, February 15, at the Kettle Moraine Oak Opening SNA chilly bowl, was noted Oakologist and Wisconsin DNR Conservation Biologist, Jared Urban.

Restoring and preserving oak savannahs and woodlands is an important goal of the DNR’s Endangered Resources Program (newly christened as the Natural Heritage Conservation Bureau), and Jared has been focusing on organizing and empowering volunteers to accomplish this.

Zach Kastern gets the party started.

Our chef sets the table.

Feast your eyes on this work crew!

Jared likes to spice up workdays with unique mixes of people, locations and activities and Saturday’s stew pot included burning brush piles and cutting and poisoning buckthorn, honeysuckle and other brush on the sunny south side of an oak covered moraine just northeast of the intersection of Bluff Road and County Hwy H. Enthusiastic volunteers from the Ecology Club, and S.A.G.E. (Students Allied for a Green Earth) at UW Whitewater, the Kettle Moraine Land Trust, and others, provided the meat and potatoes for the savory stew but Jared’s “secret ingredient” was Gary Birch.

Gary has dedicated his professional career (first with the Wisconsin DNR and currently with the Wisconsin Department of Transportation) and a lot of his personal time to nurturing, protecting and researching the flora and fauna in Wisconsin. Here is a small sample of Gary’s diverse activities:

Recipient of the 2002 Wisconsin DNR Volunteer Of The Year Award (along with The Buckthorn Man).
Leading field trips with the Natural Resources Foundation
Working with The Prairie Enthusiasts on the land management committee for the Smith-Reiner Drumlin Prairie SNA
Representing the WisDOT as a recipient of the The Transportation and Utility Rights-of-Way Best Management Practices Advisory Committee Volunteer Group Award.
Researching the Karner Blue Butterfly for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service from his perspective as a Wisconsin Department of Transportation Biologist/Ecologist.
Leading the WisDOT effort to implement the NR40 state administrative rule (see group award above)

NR40 establishes classification of invasive species and regulates certain categories of plants. The BMPs (Best Management Practices) identify measures that ROW (right-of-way) managers can take to minimize the introduction and spread of invasive plants by applying maintenance resources effectively. A growing concern for more than 20 years, experts point to invasive species as a threat to ecological balance and the economic value of Wisconsin’s lands and water.

…

Gary Birch, an ecologist with the WisDOT Division of Transportation Development, says the department is reviewing the impact of NR40 on its policies and mowing directives for state highways. WisDOT also is working with the DNR to create programs on invasive species management for use around the state. Birch hopes to circulate the DNR Field Guide at future workshops, part of “a monumental effort” to help road maintenance managers and crew members recognize problem plants and what methods to use, when.

Gary’s life’s work epitomizes persistence, which is the key to any “monumental effort”. His latest tip is to check out the Pleasant Valley Conservancy SNA, which I plan to do soon! Thanks for everything you do Gary!

Meanwhile, back at the Oak Opening, Jared led a crew of brush cutters, stump poisoners and brush haulers and I led a team to set the piles on fire..

Zach Kastern led another team clearing brush along the horse trail.

Jerry took one for the team.

Herb Sharpless, with the Kettle Moraine Land Trust, led another crew working farther north along the horse trail, but they were in brush so dense that I didn’t see them!

It was another wonderful and satisfying day working at the Kettle Moraine Oak Opening SNA!

See you at The Springs!

Eagle Oak Opening

Posted on January 19, 2014 by paulmozina

What’s in a name? The Wisconsin DNR’s Endangered Resources Program has been rechristened the Bureau of Natural Heritage Conservation. Now, I don’t know about you, but I’d rather be kicking some invasives’ butt with the Endangered Resources crew than resting like a folded doily in some mothballed bureau. What’s not to like about ER? I can’t even pronounce BNHC!

Long live the ER team! It was less than 2 years ago that Jared Urban began coordinating with local volunteers to adopt a State Natural Area and yesterday we saw the maturation of that effort in a splendid workday at the Eagle Oak Opening SNA. ER crew leader Jessica Renley, along with Jared, Adam Stone, Scott Stipetich and Don Dane formed the nucleus of a high powered and highly organized effort to remove red cedar and other unwanted trees from the Eagle Oak Opening.

We had a great group of volunteers!

Jared explains the who, what, where, when, why and how.

The ER team had prepared four different work zones ahead of time by clearing small areas and stacking brush piles. Shortly after we divided into teams, we had 4 fires raging, 3 sawyers sawing, 2 poison daubers and whole lot of brush piling. Actually, there were 6-8 chainsaws ripping and everyone was busy doing their part.