A Summer Vacation You'll Never Forget
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A summer vacation you’ll never forget Dear Friends, Every two years enlightened people gather to celebrate and learn about caring for one of nature’s greatest gifts to humankind. That would be the Tall Grass Prairie. And the gathering would be the North American Prairie Conference. This year, the Conference will be in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Aug. 6 to 10. We invite you and your family to attend, and we’re pleased to bring you this preview of the conference from the pages of Woodlands & Prairies Magazine. Rich and fun-filled learning experiences fill the agenda, including many activities for children. On field trips you’ll see landscapes as they existed thousands of years ago in all of their glorious diversity. At conference sessions you’ll gain insights into what makes these landscapes tick. You’ll learn how the principals of ecological restoration apply to managing the land you care about… whether it’s your back yard, a back 40 or a public park. Join us for a summer vacation you’ll never forget. John P. Morgan, Chairman, 23rd North American Prairie Conference. Rollie Henkes, Editor, Woodlands & Prairies Magazine For a complete schedule, housing accommodations, a registration form and other details, please go to: www.napc2012.org See you in Winnipeg! 1 About Caring for Your Piece of this Good Earth Spring 2012 $6.00 SPECIAL ONLINE WOODLANDS EDITION & PRAIRIES MAGAZINE with Mrs. Woods © Oh Canada! SPECIAL REPORT: The North American Prairie Conference goes to the tip of the tall grass prairie. ALSO IN THIS ISSUE: Biological control of spotted knapweed and garlic mustard. Protecting the next generation of oak forests from deer browse. Tall grass prairie in the Red River Valley of southern Manitoba. 2 HolidaySpring 2011 2012 | |Woodlands Woodlands && PrairiesPrairies magazine magazine | with | with Mrs. Mrs. Woods Woods Spring 2012 $6.00 WOODLANDS & PRAIRIES “We ought to get together” MAGAZINE About caring for your piece of this Good Earth. The North American Vol. 9 | No. 1 | 2012 Prairie Conference EDITOR & PUBLISHER Rollie Henkes ENERGIZING A MOVEMENT CONTRIBUTING EDITORS Dan Bohlin Alice D’Alessio Jennifer L. Hopwood Jack Knight Dear Friends, Carl Kurtz Inger Lamb Canada and the 23rd North American Prairie Conference take center stage this issue. That gave me reason to dig into the history of the conferences and to visit with some of the DESIGN veterans who have been to many of them. Brenda Boddicker What jumps out at you is how closely the conferences are tied to the growth of the eco- logical restoration movement. Like a prairie burn, the conferences have spurred the growth CIRCULATION Mrs. Woods of new ideas, and changed lives in the process. A sweet lady, but don’t push her too far! Peter Schramm remembers his first conference very well. In fact, he organized it. In the mid ‘60s he was a newly minted biology professor at Knox College, Galesburg, Ill., Woodlands & Prairies Magazine is and had taken over the restoration of a 40-acre tall grass prairie---a project begun in the late published by Wood River Communications. ‘50s by the zoologist and environmental philosopher Paul Shepard. Located on college land Copyright 2012 that had lost its original prairie habitat, the restoration project was one of the first of its kind. by Wood River Communications. Schramm wanted to connect with others in this lonely pursuit. He drove up to Wiscon- Reproduction prohibited sin for a look at an even earlier restoration attempt---the Curtis Prairie at the University of without permission. Wisconsin Arboretum. He compared notes with the arboretum’s naturalist, Jim Zimmerman, and its director, David Archibald. SUBSCRIPTION: “As we exchanged information, we got really excited about prairies and the work we were $18/year. doing,” Schramm recalls. “I said, ‘You know, we ought to get together with others doing this DIRECT ALL kind of thing.’ They said, ‘Why don’t you organize a meeting?’ ” CORRESPONDENCE TO: Off and running Woodlands & Prairies And so he did. In 1968, Schramm organized a P.O. Box 713, “Symposium on Prairie and Prairie Restoration” at Monona, IA 52159 Knox College. Two years later, in 1970, Zimmerman Phone: 563-539-4144 coordinated the “Second Midwest Prairie Confer- ence,” held at the University of Wisconsin. And what Email: was to become known as the North American Prairie [email protected] Conference was off and running as a biennial event. Visit us at: No longer voices in the wilderness, conference www.mrswoodsmagazine.com (Continued on page 4) On the cover Rarely has a black-soil prairie escaped the plow, but that is the case in southern Manitoba, where the Manitoba Tall Grass Prairie Preserve protects 12,000 acres in the flat, fertile Red River Valley. Nuttall’s sunflower (Helianthus nuttallii) numbers among the more than 900 species of prairie flora and fauna that have been documented here. The photo, which is by Donna Danyluk, was taken a few miles north of the Canada-U.S. border. 3 goers today are part of a growing movement energized peri- (UNI), and he feasted on the proceedings. “I felt like a kid in odically at forums by the exchange of information on a broad a candy store,” says Smith today. “People such as Ray Schul- range of topics on ecological restoration. enberg, Paul Christiansen and Peter Schramm were breaking “We knew we were onto something even at the first con- new ground in prairie restoration. Listening to them made me ferences,” Schramm says. “The scientific papers kept getting realize I was on the cutting edge of a new world.” better, and the show-and-tell posters and informal discussions Smith went on to break new ground in his own right, es- were big hit. The interesting thing was the broad mix of tablishing the Tallgrass Prairie Center at UNI. He was also the participants. In addition to scientists we were getting amateur executive producer of the landmark film documentary about the naturalists, teachers, students, government environmental prairie: “America’s Lost Landscape: The Tallgrass Prairie.” workers, and people who simply wanted to know more about Smith adds that when he attends the conferences today, he getting wildflowers and other prairie plants started in their enjoys talking with rookies as green as he was back in 1972. gardens or other land.” “Their unbridled prairie enthusiasm makes me feel renewed and refreshed. It gives rise to hopes that the 21st century will Down to earth be the century of ecological restoration,” he says. No ivory tower academic, Schramm has always taken spe- cial interest in the applied side of the science, which sometimes he calls more of an art than A turning point for Packard a science. “I learned more Stephen Packard will never forget his first prairie confer- about prairie restoration when ence. It was in 1978, centered on the Fermilab prairie in Bata- planting large areas by machine via. It was a regional conference rather than the North Ameri- than when working with small can conference, but it marked turning point for Packard. “It research plots,” he says. Now convinced me that’s what my life was for,” says Packard, who 78, Schramm applies what he’s today is the founding director of learned over the years in his Audubon Chicago Region. His own prairie restoration busi- many writings include chapters ness. He develops his own in the Tallgrass Restoration forb-rich seed mixes using Handbook for Prairies, Savan- local ecotype seed, planting it nas, and Woodlands, which he Peter Schramm with a Nesbit rangeland grass edited with Cornelia Mutel. drill he modified 30 years ago. (Enter “Peter Schramm Prairie Packard has attended North Restorations” in search engines on the web.) American Prairie Conferences Other pioneers shaped Schramm’s evolution as a trail blazer from Ohio to Texas and from in prairie restoration. They included Ray Schulenberg, who put Nebraska to Ontario. His im- in the first prairie at the Morton Arboretum in Chicago, and prai- pressions follow. rie Pied Piper Robert Betz, a professor at Northeastern Illinois “Who were these people? University, who led many field trips and would spearhead the Some were focused hard sci- large-scale prairie reconstruction at the Department of Energy’s entists. Some were dedicated Stephen Packard Fermilab complex in Batavia, Ill. “I would hang on every word volunteers, some were clearly visionaries. The miracle was when out with these men,” Schramm says. “They gave me a that we all seemed to fit together as...something. It was hard to sense of what a prairie really figure out what that thing was. It certainly wasn’t that we were was. I decided my life’s work thinking the same. But even those with strong disagreements would be learning how to re- knew we were in something very big and difficult, and we felt store such prairies.” in it together. Major ecosystems were fighting for life. We were trying to figure out how to recognize and find them -- and man- age them back to health.” “Like a kid in a candy store.” Prairie elders continue to Wouldn’t it be nice? pass the torch, often abetted In this election year contending political movements will by prairie conferences. Daryl be sucking more than their share of the oxygen out of the air in Daryl Smith Smith attended his first North our public discourse. Wouldn’t it be nice if North Americans American Prairie Conference could find common ground in a movement that protects our in 1972 at Kansas State University. He was already on the path natural assets? As Mrs. Woods might say, “It’s the ecology, to prairie restoration work at the University of Northern Iowa stupid!” ~ Rollie Henkes 4 HolidaySpring 2011 2012 | |Woodlands Woodlands && PrairiesPrairies magazine magazine | with | with Mrs.