SEWRPC Surveys The Springs

Posted on June 15, 2014 by paulmozina

I love to landscape the landscape at the Scuppernong Springs. This distinguished tract of land deserves our love and attention for the sake of its beauty. So please, come out and help me dig a little spotted knapweed from the sand prairie!

The lay of the land at The Springs was evoked beautifully by John Muir, in his classic: The Story of My Boyhood and Youth, and I had to pinch myself last night as I walked alone behind the Scuppernong Spring and thought: ‘this is my garden’.

I’m intrigued by how others experience my garden.

Here is a great image from Landscape Photographer Byron S. Becker: “The photograph was taken in the spring of 2008 along Suppernong River near sundown. The camera was a 4×5 with a 90mm lens, using TriX 320 film and the exposure was 2 minutes; the developer was Pyronal.”

Below is an example of Kristen Westlake’s Fine Art Photography. You can see more of her images of The Springs, and all of her other outstanding work, here.

I had a wonderful week of beautiful weather for landscape gardening at The Springs! Last Monday, June 9th, I tried something new, per the advice of Jared Urban, and burned the first-year garlic mustard off the cut-off trail with my blow torch. Below is where the cut-off trail joins the main trail at signpost #13.

And after…

I got the worst patches and now the trail is officially “burned in” as Don Dane would say. I spent the afternoon digging spotted knapweed from the sand prairie and was glad to have Ben Johnson’s help with this seemingly Sisyphean task. We focused on cleaning up the lupine patches.

On Friday, June 13, I was joined by Dan Carter, Senior Biologist with The Southeastern Wisconsin Regional Planning Commission (SEWRPC). Dan was continuing SEWRPC’s ongoing effort to document the vegetation at The Springs and invited me to come along.

SEWRPC has divided The Springs into 4 areas for their vegetation surveys:

1) The dry prairie at the springs (aka, the Indian Campground)
2) The dry woods
3) The springs, immediately adjacent wetlands, and upper reaches of the creek
4) The fen and sedge meadow in the vast open area immediately to the west (includes trench where marl was mined).

The first three areas listed above are located in the blue circle on the right below and the fourth is in the larger blue circle to the left. Click the links above to view SEWRPC’s preliminary vegetation surveys.

As we walked through Buckthorn Alley on our way to the hotel spring, Dan and I stopped frequently to make notes and take pictures. Dan recently completed his PhD in Biology at Kansas State University and he has a wealth of knowledge, understanding and wisdom. Here are just a few of plants he identified.

Be careful at The Springs! Poison Hemlock.

Bulrush

Forked Aster, a state threatened plant!

Valerian

Horsetail

We visited the Ottawa Lake Fen State Natural Area and Dan showed me two new springs that I had never seen before. They emerge from the east side of the wetlands and you can find them by walking across the fen from campsite #334 towards the north until you come across their outflow channels.

Of course, there were lots of interesting plants here too.

Bracken Fern

Lake Sedge

And the carnivorous Pitcher Plant

Thanks Dan, for showing me around the place I love!

I spent the afternoon pulling and digging spotted knapweed on the sand prairie. There is a bumper crop of this noxious invader!

A soothing sunset at Ottawa Lake.

A “Honey” moon at the Lapham Peak Tower.

I had the pleasure of spending yesterday, June 14, at my favorite spot again.

The Indian Spring is being quickly overrun by quack grass and water cress so I spent the morning pulling these invasive plants. Before…

… and after.

Then I moved up the hill to the sand prairie and continued pulling and digging spotted knapweed. It’s going to take years to get rid of this stuff unless I get a whole lot of help.

Speaking of which, my good friend Carl Baumann, who has been harvesting black locust on the south end of the trail, split all of the logs in my woodpile setting the stage for some cozy fires at My Shangri-La. Thanks Carl!

And Andy Buchta noticed the freshly cut buckthorn by the main entrance on Hwy ZZ and he has commenced to piling. Thanks Andy!

It was a great week!

See you at The Springs!

Order Out Of Chaos

Posted on March 27, 2014 by paulmozina

When I returned to work at The Springs almost 3 years ago, I found it in a state of utter chaos. Buckthorn crowded every trail and cloistered every view. The Indian Springs were hard to find amidst an impenetrable tangle of brush. The Sand Prairie was spiked with half burned, dead and dying, red and black oak and black locust trees. The Scuppernong River was choked with water cress and the Hillside and Hidden Springs were lonely places no longer visible or visited. The river valley was dominated by phragmites, cattails and brush, and aspen encroached from every side. Weeds like garlic mustard and spotted knapweed forced the native grasses and flowers to cower and hide.

Slowly but surely, the Super Friends♥ of the Scuppernong Springs are working diligently to bring order out of the chaos. Yesterday, Rich Csavoy and I finished burning the brush piles in the Buckthorn Alley; it looks like a war zone, and I can’t wait until it greens up (skunk cabbage is already emerging.) The south end of the trail, where Carl and Marty are harvesting black locust trees with chain saws and a skid steer loader, looks like a war zone too. The transition from chaos to order is a little like making sausage, and what, exactly, do I mean by “order”? Tom, one of the birders (he’s a snow bird himself) who keeps his peepers peeled, warned me a couple years ago, “now don’t go turning this place into a park!”

Do we equate “order” with a return to a natural state? That’s not possible; human hands have worked the land for thousands of years. For me, and, if I dare speak for my Super Friends♥, our goal at The Springs is to return the landscape, and its flora and fauna, to the pre-settlement condition that the first inhabitants of the land defined as “order”. I think they were on to something.

Getting rid of the buckthorn is an obvious first step to bringing order out of the chaos and I returned to the buckthorn alley again yesterday to put a torch to piles that Andy Buchta made. I can’t thank Andy enough for the work he did this past winter. He closely monitored when we cut, and when the next snow was forecast, and consistently worked in nasty conditions to pile the brush, thus setting the table for us to complete the cleanup effort.

Here is what we faced at the east end of the buckthorn alley.

Rich Csavoy arrived just as I finished documenting the “before” scene and he had his own “Order Out Of Chaos” story to tell. Rich, along with others from the Jerusalem Presbyterian and Rock Prairie Presbyterian churches joined HOPE (Helping Other People Everywhere) on a mission to help the people of Peking and Washington, Illinois, rebuild from the devastating tornadoes that ripped through their homes last November. Rich’s crew was assigned the task of “car siding” the interior of a cabin.

Rich is the tough looking dude second from the left below.

That’s Rich in the bibs front row center.

I knew it was going to be a good day with Rich at my side! We burned a lot of piles and made it all the way to end of the buckthorn alley.

While we were working Andy Buchta came by looking for the last couple spots that needed piling. I directed him to the area under a beautiful oak on the east side of the wetland by signpost #13 and he got after it.

Thanks again Andy!

This past Sunday, I ran into Super Friend♥ Jim Davee armed with tools and a replacement sign for the spur trail that leads to the Emerald Spring. I was thrilled to see his handiwork!

Thanks for bringing order to the chaos Jim!

At the south end of the trail I ran into Carl and Marty harvesting black locust trees for firewood. This is a win-win situation; they get great firewood and remove the eyesores that these dead hulks are. The land will heal quickly from the scars of the skid steer loader.

Finally, I made my way to the south point of the Scupernong Springs Nature Preserve property to take a look at the progress that DNR trial boss, Don Dane, has made with the forestry mower (see the end of this post to see the results of his first day mowing.)

What a day! As I headed back to my truck, I had a wonderful feeling thinking of the many people contributing to transform The Springs from chaos to order. Thank you all!

See you at The Springs!

p.s. I just got the notice for the Kettle Moraine Natural History Association’s Annual Friends meeting at 10:30am on Saturday, April 5, 2014 at the Kettle Moraine State Forest-Southern Unit Headquarters, located 3 miles west of Eagle on Hwy 59. This is a lot of fun, hope to see you there. Click image below to read the details.

Little Kestol Prairie

Posted on March 16, 2014 by paulmozina

Little Kestol Prairie is a secret nestled in the rolling moraines and oak savannahs of the Kettle Moraine Oak Opening State Natural Area (SNA). Well, OK, it’s not a secret anymore, it’s outlined by the black circle just south of Young Road on the map below.

Zach Kastern has known the secret of this remnant, dry prairie, for some time and has been working to keep invasive species, as well as fast spreading native woody trees and brush, from overtaking it. So when Jared Urban, the DNR’s SNA volunteer coordinator, asked him for a location for the March workday, Zach was quick to suggest it was time to reveal the Little Kestol Prairie. (Ed. note. After I posted this, Zach commented that the prairie was probably named after Joe Kestol.

The Joe Kestol house on Territorial Road was built when the Kestol family came from Norway about 1846. It has been occupied by Joe Kestol until 1993, when he went to live at a Retirement Home.

Georgia Kestol corrected the history in a comment posted on 5/5/15:

J. W. Kestol refers to the late James Kestol, my father, who was a teacher in Janesville, Wisconsin. The farm, about 200 acres bordered by the state forest, has been in the Kestol family for 105 years. Little Kestol Prairie is named for James Kestol, not Joe Kestol. Joe Kestol, deceased, was James’ brother. He owned the farm on Territorial Rd, a sesquicentennial farm that has been in the family since 1851.

Thanks Georgia!

The Little Kestol Prairie is also mentioned in the Walworth County Land Use and Resource Management Plan.) Listen to Zach share the secrets of this ecological remnant and what he hoped we could accomplish on a beautiful Saturday morning.

A great crew of volunteers including: members of S.A.G.E. (Students Allied for a Green Earth) at UW Whitewater, the Kettle Moraine Land Trust, and free agents like Don, Brandon and Ginny (thanks for the cookies) contributed to a very successful workday.

My day started at The Springs, where I stopped to get some “world class” spring water to drink.

When I arrived, Zach, Jared and Ginny were reviewing the plan for the day. Below, Zach documents Little Kestol Prairie with some before photos.

Soon we were hard at work on the slippery, snowy, wet hillside.

Herb and Stephanie cleared an area at the bottom of the hill.

I spent the morning following Brandon, who was swinging a brush cutter, with one of Jared’s patented poison daubers, and that was a nice change for me. Zach flagged the hazelnut, hickory, oak and other “keepers” so the brush cutters (Rebecca and Brandon) had to be very discriminating. As the morning warmed up, even the snow on the north side of the hill began to melt. Although many of us got cold, wet, feet, nobody bailed out!

Ginny and Herb double team the brush.

Wrapping up…

Here are some perspectives from the top of the Little Kestol Prairie.

I spent the afternoon back at The Springs harvesting black locust firewood for my upcoming camping adventures at My Shangri-La.

I ran into Carl Baumann and John and Sue Hrobar, who reported seeing American Woodcocks by the new spring we uncovered in the Buckthorn Alley (I forgot to mention the Sand Hill Cranes returned this past Monday, the 10th.) Carl was picking up some black locust and cherry firewood for his new friend Marty, who lives in the neighborhood and, like many others, ran short of firewood this season. Nice work Carl!