"'-II

PRAIRIEPROJECTIONS

North Branch Prairie ProjectVolume VI, Number 1

February 1993~ ,.

•\

The' Human Beings of the North' Branch.A New Chapter to an Old, Old Story ,

By Gerould Wilhelm

David Brower VisitsChicago

(Adapted from a September 17, 1992speech for the North Branch PrairieProject 15 Year AnniversaryCelebration by Susanne Masi.)

Last November David 'Brower, firstexecutive director of the Sierra.Club,.founder of Friends of the Earth, presentChairman of the Earth Island Institute,environmentalist extraordinaire, gave thekeynote address for the Field Museum'sopening of the Messages from the

, Wilderness exhibit While in town, he, 'toured Bunker Hill Prairie with North

Branchers after a Sunday workday.~ The following is an excerpt from anarticle entitled Restoring the Environment;A Conversation with David Brower. Itwas published in the December 1992 issueof Chicago Audubon Society's Compassnewsletter and is reprinted with

, permission from editor David Cohen. Theinterviewer and author was Compasseditor Marilyn Hawkins.

'. Continued on page 11

but it wasn't until recently that we beganto rediscover and tell this story.

The co-evolution of civilized man andassociated species is believed to havebegun about 10,000 years ago, but it didnot begin in an ecological void .: Theprincipal elements of this association arecontained within the genes of thoseorganisms, the collective memory of an'even older time,

Long ago the earth's terrain was farless complicated than it is today. About350,million y'ears ago, the climate of-Pangaea, the original unbroken land mass,was subtropical with few vascular plant'species growing in a land of shallow seasand low swamps, These gathered in the

. abundant atmospheric carbon and fixed it.' through photosynthesis at a rate far greater

Continued on page 12

. \Tobegin the story of the Human Beingsof the North Branch, we must go back: toa time and place where the ecosystem inwhich they live had its origin.

Today, most of the land of the NorthBranch region has been obliterated eitherby modern agriculture or development andisdominated by a small number of plantsadapted to such conditions. What littleremains of the natural landscape containswithin it those native species adapted tosustain self-replicating' ecosystems,wherein our future lies. This. is a story ofthese two floras and the people with whomthey co-evolved. It is an old, old story,

. ,.

Inside this'issue:

• Editorial: Circles, Seeds, and Bagels,page 2• Early Life on the Farm at Somme.page 4• Emergency!,page 6 .• First Conservation Congress in IllinoisConvenes,page 6• "Plant Communities and PeopleCommunities", page 7• North Branch Amphib~s, page 8

Photo by Karen Hal/and

, David Brower, Gerould Wilhelm, and Stephen Packard at Bunker Hill

1 Volwne VI, Number I, February 1993Prairie Projections

I

{b Editorial: Circles, Seeds, and Bagels.A Reflection on North Branch Traditions'. .

Every North Branch Prairie Projectworkday begins when people gather in acircle to greet each other, exchangeinformation, and receive instructions onhow to do the morning's work. This ishow we procreate, bringing new life to theProject. We must hold the attentionofnewcomers and communicate our goalsclearly so our membership will grow.This is a ceremony to celebrate thebeginning of the day. We are filled with asense of mission, eagerness, theexpectation of success. Hence, a tradition:the workday circle, . .

Without seeds we could not continueour work. Every year the North Branchcommunity collects seeds and, in autumn,gathers to process and mix what has beenharvested. The seed mixing party is a fulland festive day. We work hard; we talk a .lot; we count the big garbage bags full ofseed at the end of the day and are proud.A second tradition.the precious seedmixing party.

At about 11 am. on workdays,everything stops for the bagel break. It's atime to catch your breath, snack a little,

-and socialize. The site steward providesthe bagels. No other food will do. Atlunch time, when the weather is pleasant, agroup will picnic. In the winter, lunch isat a local restaurant. It'sgood .conversation. It's developing friendships.In December, after the season of seedmixing and bums, the annual harvest feasttakes place at:the Heartland Cafe. Itmarks the end of asuccessful year. InJanuary, the annualpotluck dinner is atime to presentawards to individualvolunteers, conductimportantmembershipbusiness, and eatgreat food. A thirdtradition (really

, several traditions):tlfe bagels.

Prairie Projections

Traditions give ussubstance. Traditionssignify continuity.Traditions einbody thewholeness of our good·works and allow thepassage of knowledge tothe community ofvolunteers who are firstrecruited and then held byinstilling the value of thework in their very souls.But are our North Branchtraditions sufficient?

Conference speakers,articles, and thought-provoking conversationsattest to the relationshipIndians had to the land,Iaud the spirituality ofIndian culture.and point toour lack of connectednessto nature. The conclusionsare generally the same:Our lives are not complete.We should try to becomemore like our predecessors.Borrowing from Indian traditions will letus reconnect, make us whole.

The traditions of the Indians are part ofthe history of the land, but they are part ofa culture that is not ours. They arose fromconsiderations that are remote from ourexperience. Four arid a half millionpeople did not live in Cook County whenthe drums 'were beating and the shamans

Other participants at the Seed MixParty, November 21,1992, Emily

Oaks Nature Center

2

Laurel Rosstiemonstrates a Seedprocessing technique to Bob'

Bluestone.Photo by Mary Hanlon

chanting. People from all over the worlddid not crowd upon each other, culturesoverlapping, a maze of ideas andconflicting behaviors. Each Indian tribewas a nation that lived and died together .

. Membership was by birth. Traditionsgrew out of lives that were not separated •by distance, by differing philosophies, orby choice. ,

No matter how much we would like toimitate this culture, we cannot recreate thefeelings or the context which produced thedrum beats. We can appreciate theirhistory. We can say, "This is the way itwas." We can understand that drums werepart of a dance to make rain, or a prayerfor a good harvest, or a huntingceremonial. But we cannot make thesetraditions our own.

.The understanding of Indian peoplescan teach us valuable lessons. They hintat how to better manage the land we arerestoring, To some extent we can modelourselves after these people who acted sodifferently, They were so accutely in tune

Volume VI. Number 1. February 1993

I

. Photo by Mary HanlonEach ecosystem requires a unique mix of seeds .. Neil Peck

adds to a storage can designated "wet savanna."

_with the ecology and the space requiredfor living because their numbers were few

. and their tools were simpler. But we needto appreciate the significance of Indian 'traditions within the context in which theyevolved and sustained a homogeneouspopulation.

Traditions have meaning only within .the context of a culture. Despite its-short

. history; the North Branch Prairie Projecthas begun to develop traditions. They arestill evolving-a-like we are. As Oursixteenth year begins, the secondgeneration of volunteers is restoring andrebuilding ecosystems, ,

What can we do to foster North Branchtraditions? In a community, traditionsdevelop over time or they won't stick.They won't stick unless they nurture thework of the group. It is a slow process.Traditions emerge from within people whowork together toward common goals.New North Branch traditions will comeout of our Chicagoland culture, our dailyactivities, our own lives. What.experiences are life-giving, sustaining,good? We want to incorporate them intothose activities that are necessary for thesurvival of the ecosystem and to help us tounderstand the land and to understandeach other.

We'need to write and tell more storiesabout whatwe do. Brush Piles and

Prairie Projections contain wonderfularticles about oui work. But historicscientific, issue-related; and informationalessays, while important, are not enough.We need more Jim Cutlers, poets who willtouch our hearts with their humor or make .us see our surroundings in a new way. Weneed the stewards to keep journals and -share them so that others can write mythsand short stories and essays like Richard.Carter's youthful remembrances ofburning prairies,

And we need musicians like JohnHaugland and Spencer: Rand and theDuoFolk to sing and play. We need songs.

about us and what we do and how we failand how we succeed. And sometimes allwe need is just music. Workdays arememorable when Dorian Riggen has beenthere with his flute, playing to tliesavannas and the prairies and to us.. We need to capture the landscape andthe people of-the landscape as they are-transforming. We need artists like JoelSpears, Carolyn Aronson, and CorasueNicholas whose visual representationscelebrate the beauty of and the changes inthe landscape. We need morephotographers to capture moments in time,like Mary Hanlon's picture of the 1992summer interns.

We need to experience oursurroundings with all of our senses. Weneed to move within the landscape as Partof it, sensing every tussock, ridge, puff ofwind, and blade of grass. Then can wecreate meaningful traditions in motion,dance. .

. We need to acknowledge all of ourcultural heritages, share prairie andsavanna stories, and share laughter. Weneed to capture our belief in what we do,interpret it, and' everywhere preach it, sothat others can begin to write and sing andpaint and dance as we do.

I! will happen that one day'we will lookat all that we have accomplished and seeourselves as, in Jerry Wilhelm's words,"the Human Beings," the ones who belongto this land. Then our infant traditionswill begin to express our collectiverestoration hopes to future generations.

By Karen Holland

Prairie Projections

.Photo by Mary Hanlon

Volunteers at the annual potluck share storles.Ideas,and fun., 3 Volwne VI. Number I. February 1993

horses began to get pretty bad in,35, and '35 was the year they firststarted to put rubber tires ontractors. In the spring of'35 I got(In advertisement from theFirestone Experimental FarminAkron. Everything had tire£- .wagons, rakes, wheelbarrows,.everything. My father found out hecould get a rubber-tired tractor atInternational Harvester, arid hecame to me and said, "Ij I bought arubber-tired tractor will you runit? I'll get Art to run the gas

. station." So we had the firstrubber-tired tractor in the area.

Early Life on the Farm at SommeReport on em Interview with Louis Werhane

l;3y Tor Faegre

Louis Werhane is a retired farmerwhose grandfather once owned the land to

, the west of Waukegan Road and north ofDundee Road which we know as SommePrairie Grove. The Werhane familyfarmed this land from the time they settledthere in 1853 until 1926 when the CookCounty Forest Preserve District bought itNow 80 years old, Werhane wasinterviewed by North Branch volunteersSteve Packard, Karen Holland, Tom .Murphy, Laurel Ross, Brian Seinfeld, andJoe Smith. They sought clues to thehistory of Somme Prairie Grove thatwould reveal its original character. Theywanted to know how human intervention

r had altered the landscape.In doing environmental restoration, we

try to discover what the land was like inpre-settlement times=-which parts wereprairie, which were savanna, and whichwere woodland. To get back to this timewe have to play archaeologist and peel

.back the layers that have built up over the"original"landscape. From settlementtimes until the Forest Preserve Districtbought it, farming practices changed theland-by grazing, mowing, plowing, andsetting drainage tile on the open lands andby cutting down the oaks -inthe savannas ..In Louis Werhane we have one who cantell us something about how the hand ofman has altered this land. '

The original settler along the WestFork of the North Branch of the ChicagoRiver was a fellow named John IndianClark. According to Werhane, Clark was

, the first white man to live in the area, andhis job was to carry the mail on horsebackfrom Milwaukee to Chicago. Werhane'sgreat grandfather bought the property fromClark in 1853. The going price of land 'purchased from the government was $1.25an acre. The Werhanes had moved to theUnited States from Germany in 1848 (atime of political upheaval in Germany.which resulted in a great exodus toAmerica). Louis recounts how hisgrandfather had 240 acres, most of whichare included in Somme Woods today. Ofthis, his father got 60 acres of the best

Prairie Projections

farm-land ... "because he.was the oldest,he got what he wanted to pick. Uncle Bill

. got a long strip from Middle Branch Creekall the way to the railroad tracks."

Although theWerhanes farmed for fourgenerations, Louis was not one toemphasize the virtues of farm life. Hereturned again and again to thedifficulties:

Grandpa had 25,30 head of cows.I mean this was when they milkedall these "buffaloes" by hand. Myuncle, when he got married, hesaid, "one thing I know I'm notgoing to have, and that's a damnmilk cow, because you have to get

,up at 5 0' clock in the morning."

Louis saw the change from horse-powered to gasoline-powered farming andhe readily embraced it Mechanizationwas the force.that saved farm life forLouis when he began to have doubts aboutcontinuing. He says that he would haveleft farming if it were not for theintroduction of the tractor, specifically therubber-tired tractor:

If it weren't for Harvey Firestone, Idon't know if I'd be here today. Itsounds funny, but Harvey Firestonewas the guy who-put farms on

,.rubber. I had this gas station up atPhil Johnson's, October' 33 toOctober' 36-well, let's go back to1919. Right in here myunclebought a Fordson tractor, and Ican still see my father sitting athome saying, "If they ever pusoneof those on rubber tires I'll buy

. one." They didn't even have truckson rubber tires then, and here myold man is talking about a tractor.Wea, lo-and-behold, his team of

4

Werhane'smother had her own part infarm life. It was she who turned theirvegetable garden produce into a cash crop: .

In 1919, my mother and a neighbordecided they were going to sellpickles and corn on Labor Day outon Waukegan Road. My dad, hesits there' and looks out at thewomen and laughs and laughs. Hedoesn't think they'll sell anything!But when they get done at the endof the day they had seven bucks.MyoId man quit laug hing rightthere, 'cause that was a way tomake a buckiIn '22, we started,the vegetable stand for good. Thiswas the first vegetable stand northof Chicago.

The real purpose of the interview wasto discover what the land was like beforesettlement and how it was altered byfarming. Flat midwestern farms had vastwetlands, often considered useless by thefarmer unless they could be drained.When drained, the wetlands were often themost fertile land. As Louis describes it,the lower areas had deep black earth.They dug test holes to discover the depthOf the topsoil and in one spot, he says,they found-three- feet of rich dirt. But

Volume VI, Number 1,February 1993

1 -

When the Forest Preserve Districtbought the land from the Werhanes in1926, they paid $400 at! acre. Louis saidthat people were delighted to sell land atthat price, especially when it wasn't thebest farm land like the woods and -marshes. Werhane was asked what he

_-thought of the Forest Preserve.

Louis Werhane (standing, right) describes Sommeas he knew it to Steve Packard, Joe Smith, and

Laurel Ross. Photo by Karen Hotlend

these lower areas were usually too wet toplow, so they put in tile to drain them. Itwas a lot of work in those days to dig theditches by hand, but it wasworthit,Werhane says. "My dad was one of thefirst ones to install tile. Every time he hada buck he would put some in."

There is a special area in file SommeNature Preserve, west of the SommePrairie Grove that was the Werhane' s landand is virgin prairie and home to severalrare plants. We wondered how thisparticular place managed to escape theplow. Steve Packard pointed to a map andasked Louis Werhane what he knew of thesite.

Hoping to learn what the oak -savanna_was like during the period it was -cultivated, Steve Packard asked how thewoods figured in the life of the farm:

L.W.: I will tell you what the woodswas. -The woods was a pasturefor cows-they had just as muchgrass in the woods as they did in

_ the prairie.S.P.: - Do you know how far back they

burned it? _L.W.: Well, \hey burned it every year.S.P.: ' Did they burn the grasses".L.W.: No, they didn't burn the grasses.

There wasn't any grasses to burn;the cows took care of that.

S.P.: We have one of the frnest little, pieces of prairie in the whole

state right here and we have triedto figure out why it wasn'tfarmed.

L.W.: They probably did.S.P.: We know they didn't, because

it's got virgin soil and there arevery rare plants that only growwhere it's never been plowed.Why did they leave that out?

L.W.: I can't figure it out.

My pet cow died in that pond. It'sall brush in there now. Six catscouldn't find one rat in there.There was one place in here whereGrandpa had about four acres andthat was.hog pasture with oaktrees. Hefed 25 hogs and part oftheir feed was acorns. They hadrings in their noses so they couldn'tdig out the roots. _

Next, Steve Packard mentioned a pondon the land east of Waukegan Road, andMr. Werhane remembered it well.

, So thereason why this pristine prairie wasleft alone remains a mystery.

Prairie Projections 5

I always thought the ForestPreserve was supposed to "preserve the woods the way theyused to be, so someday somebody-would know what they used to belike. My father would have tears 'in his eyes to see it. Unless youwere a farmer, you wouldn't knowwhat Canada thistles were. The'farmers would, cut the thistles [outof the fields}. When the ForestPreserve came in, there the - ,

thistles just got ripe and blew andeverybody got' em; We werenortheast of this thing and herewould come the Canada thistles.I'm notkidding!

North Branchers can appreciate this, asthistles remain a big problem in someareas.

But thistles were not theonlyproblem.Even the Forest Preserve District's attemptat reforestation met with difficulties. -Theydecided that some of the old fields shouldbe wooded and contracted-to have themplanted with trees. Werhane did not thinkmuch of the tree planting. The trees werethin, " ... like a lead pencil. I betcha' byspring there weren't twenty trees left-therabbits atethem all." Can we say that therabbits were the first North Branchvolunteers? In any case, they are still outthere eating away at the young trees, doingtheir bit to help bring back the prairie.

It is rare these days to find one such asLouis Werhane, who is a descendent ofthe original European settlers and is stillliving in the same community and able totell how this land was settled. We are

I indebted to Louis for sharing his story,and especially for telling it with greathumor.

-YolumeYl, Numbed. February ~993

First ConservationCongress in Illinois

Convenes-Prairie Steward Is Delegate

by Rick Gabriel-

FOCUSEMERGENCYI

by Adria Goodson

September 23,1992: - Two to three acresof red oaks were cut down at LinneWoods to make wayfor buildings forconstruction workers. The constructionworkers will be handling the rock,disposalfor the North Branch of theDeep Tunnel Project (TARP). No-attempt was made to mitigate the damageto the remaining oaks. Wood chipswere 'strewn throughout the remaining oaksand onto Railroad Prairie. Severeerosion will occur without immediateaction.

It was too late to prevent damage to theoaks at Linne Woods. Discussions withthe Metropolitan Water ReclamationDistrict, Illinois Environmental ProtectionAgency, and TARP contractors, however,produced the following results: a fencewill be installed between Railroad 'Prairieand the construction area, mitigation toprevent erosion, particularly along theriver, will be undertaken-and workersnow understand that caution must be usedwhen constructing near natural areas. ,

Emergencies likethis one severelythreaten the successful restoration work ofthe North Branch Prairie ProjectTherefore, the groundwork for anEmergency Response Group and a

Proactive Good Neighbor Group is beinglaid by a planning committee chaired byChris Urban. Both teams will report toexisting work groups.

The Emergency Response Group willconsist of 3 to 5 people who can movequickly to address emergency situations asthey occur and prevent any additionaldamage. The members will draw on pastexperiences and current knowledge tosolve problems.

The Proactive Good Neighbor Groupwill consist of long range planners whosegoal will be to prevent emergencies bysuch means as doing public outreach toincrease awareness. This group will alsodraw on past experiences to forestallrecurring emergencies like vehiculardamage at Bunker Hill and garbagedumping at restoration sites.

By developing these two Units we cancontinue to restore and preserve prairieand savanna sites which might otherwisebe irreparably damaged. If you would likebe a part of these groups,please call Chris' Urban,(312) 871-2827, for more,information.

Prairie Projections, 6

Director of the Illinois field office AI, Pyott and Volunteer Stewardship Network

volunteer Rick Gabriel represented TheNature Conservancy as 'delegates to the

- Illinois Department of Conservation's(I.D.O.C.) first Conservation Congress.One 'hundred eighteen delegatesrepresenting environmental, hunting,fishing, boating, forest and park districts,and other conservation and recreationgroups attended the three, day meeting inSpringfield on February 5, 6, and 7.

The Conservation Congress is anoutgrowth of The Governor's Conferenceon New Horizons for Conservation, Parksand Recreation initiated by GovernorEdgar. It is intended, to be ongoing,

Photos by Mary Hanlon

Deep Tunnel (TARP) constructionat Linne Woods-and Railroad

- Prairie

Volume VI, Number l , February 1993 ' -

I, '

meeting every year or two. The goals are:.1) to find common ground and

build parnerships between the variousconstituencies;

2} to build a stronger legislativeconstituency for I.D.O.C. and forconservation issues in general; and,

3) to provide input to I.D.O.C.for its strategic planning processand to thestate legislature and the governor.

The I.D.O.C. invited more than 1,200. individuals representing 350 groups toparticipate ill five regional caucuses.Sixty delegates were elected from within

. the five regions. Conservation DirectorBrent Manning invited an additional 58statewide groups to send delegates.Regional caucus representatives met toraise issues, establish priorities and electdelegates to represent their regions at 'theConservation Congress,

Our Region Ilincludes McHenry,Lake, Kane, Cook, Dupage, Kendall: Will,

_ Grundy, and Kankakee counties. Threegroups with which, we are affiliated haverepresentatives. Rick Gabriel, steward atBerkeley Prairie, is representing TheNature Conservancy. George Birminghamof the DesPlaines/Salt Creek VolunteersCoordinating Committee is alternate. JuneKeibler, Kane County Natural AreasVolunteers Regional Administrator, is •representing the Volunteer StewardshipNetwork. Her alternate is Jerry Kolar, anorthern Lake county regional steward.Bill Zima, North Branch Prairie Project

. volunteer represents NBPP with LisaDeutsch, TNC Prairie Universitycoordinator, as alternate. Because of theshort notice, it was a scramble to get justthese three groups represented. For thefuture, LD.O.C. has agreed that the VSNwill.send representatives on a county bycounty basis.

We must have greater representation toassure that issues important to the 'Volunteer Stewardship Network will behigh on the Department of Conservation'spriority list. Because of their greaternumbers, it appeared that the hunting and

Prairie Projeetions

. fishing groups would dominate the _agenda. Historically they have receivedfunding and attention from the 'department. However, during thecaucuses it became apparent that we allhave a great deal in common and a greatdeal to lose ifthe I.D.O.C. budget isreduced. Habitat acquisition andprotection was voted the number onepriority for Region IIand was acommon concern for most groups ,present. .

The Conservation Congress is an- important opportunity for expanding

support for the programs that benefit ourwork. Many thanks to Laurel Ross,Northern Illinois Field Representative forThe Nature Conservancy, for her guidanceand encouragement. For moreinformation or to get involved, call RickGabriel at 312-472.:0441.

"Plant Communities andPeople Communities" A -

Lecture by Charles Lewisby Laurel Ross

Last November 12 the work of theNorth Branch Prairie Project and theVolunteer Stewardship Network werefeatured in a lecture which filled theCudahy Auditorium of the MortonArboretum beyond capacity. This talk byCharles Lewis, Research Fellow, of theArboretum was titled "Plant Communitiesand People Communities," It explored thesignificance of human interactions withplants-and coincided with Mr. Lewis' .retirement from the Arboretum and thepublication of his book Green Nature!Human Nature.

"Tonight we will be searching forconnections between people communitiesand the plant communities they nurture,"he began. "The connections, not physicalbut mental, are hinted when we considerhow' experiencing plants or green natureaffects our inner self ... we willdifferentiate between two nodes ofexperiencing plarits, reviewing what hasbeen learned through research when weare observers of the landscape andcontrasting it with the lack of research

7

pertaining to human experiences when oneparticipates physically, taking on the roleof planter and nurturer."

After reviewing a number of avenues'of participation he concluded with a .description of the Volunteer StewardshipNetwork through which "the nurturing ofpeople communities for plant communitiesreaches its fullest expression."

It was-an evening when NorthBranchers present (there were at leastseven of us there) could be proud of ouraccomplishments, ow: role in historysecure.

Lewis quoted William Jordan, "Thesepeople (the volunteers) are engaged in arelationship with nature that is active,participatory and beneficial ... it isnothing less than a ritual - I am tempted tosay a sacrament - of reentry andreconciliation with nature,"

The lecturepreceded a two daysymposium which had as its purpose toassess what is currently known about theactive involvement of people with plant'communities and to brainstorm questions .and issues relevant to study at theindividual and community levels in orderto develop an agenda for research andaction.

This extraordinary symposiumincluded as participants such researchluminaries as Rachel and Steve Kaplan ofthe University of Michigan, Roger Ulrichof Texas A&M, and Robert Sommer ofthe University of California. In addition,there were practitioners such as myself,Suzanne Malec, director of the community.gardening program of the Chicago BotanicGarden .. 'the goal was to develop a dialogthat will advance research, planning andmanagement ,

Lewis summarized, "Results of thisresearch may show us a way through a'more intimate relationship with nature, tocreate a more humane environment inwhich to work, live and play,"

c.

Vol~ VI, Number I, February 1993

~orth Branch AmphibiansBy Elfin Beltz

Introduction

, 'J

Reptiles and amphibians are twodissimilar classes of vertebrate animalsusually lumped together because nobodywas interested in them. Fish, birds andmammals were somehow more acceptable,more exciting, and more studied. Withinthe last 100 years, with a lessening of allsorts of prejudices, the study of reptilesand amphibians has become an -ology ofits own, herpetology. The first textbook ofherpetology was published in 1963, inRussia; the first Englishlanguage textbook in1972. However, the'fieldidentification guide forreptiles and amphibians

. using a live-mark system,similar to the Roger ToryPeterson method forbirds,was first publishedin 1958. In 1991, thethird edition wasprepared by RogerConant (the originalauthor) and Joseph r.Collins of the Universityof Kansas Museum ofNatural History, It isbook 12 of the PetersonField Guide Series and inmy opinion is the onlyreptile and amphibianfield guide on the markettoday for North America worth buying:

A field guide is a necessity for anyoneinterested in the accurate identificationand natural history of specific animals.Can you tell at a glance the differencebetween a northern leopard frog and a

. pickeral frog? I can't, my husband (Ken-Mierzwa) can, but then he doesn't know

. one warbler from another and neither do I.Even after a1ifelong interest in naturalhistory I would not presume to identifyplants, birds, fish, some mammals and afew reptiles and amphibians without theappropriate book, soI highly recommendfield guides to everyone.

Another important reason to get a fieldguide is to be up to date on the scientific

names of organisms. Some people are notcomfortable with psuedo-Latin, and onlychoose to use common names. That'so.k., but please realize that - like birds -reptiles and amphibians have standard "common names. Please don't callNorthern Leopard Frogs by any othername if you don't use the Latinate

. binomial. Incidentally, the first work ofthe scientific name is always supposed tobe a noun and is referred to as the genusname or the generic name. The secondword is an adjective modifying that noun

Head Front foot -

herpetology will understand you fine,With that in mind, here is a list of .

amphibians which may be found at theNorth Branch:

TheLi-it

Blue spotted salamanders, Ambystomalaterale

As the name suggests, these-havedelicate blue spots on the sides(ltlate!ale") and back of theirs limy littlebodies. They live underground most ofthe year and can be found under logs inspring (sometimes in fall). Adults arriveat temporary ponds just as the ice is

melting. Males do anintricate and stylized danceto get the females to accepta packet of sperm. The.females lay eggs attached toleaves and other detritus inthe pond. Salamanderlarvae are odd littlecreatures. Soon afterhatching they get all fourlegs and have external gills,They are nearly transparentand eat daphnia (waterfleas) and other smallinvertebrates. At about13/4" (4'2 mm) in.length,they transform and leave theponds to live like adults .

---=:".~_Trunk

IJ Hind foot

Costal groove

. .Prairie Projections.

TailCostal fold

. Tiger salamanders,Ambystoma tigrinum .

"These are large (to 12inch), long-lived (to 11 years) heftysalamanders, slimy as above, but withyellow spots. Tigers (lttigrinurn") areoften confused with the spottedsalamander (Ambystoma maculatumy butthe latter has its spots in rows, not allovertheback. Use your field guide for allyellow-spotted salamanders until you cansee the difference at a glance. Theirlifestyle is similar to that of the blue-spotted salamanders, but the larvae are .larger at transformation. Incidentally, thegenus name "Ambystoma" .means "to craminto the mouth," and is an accuratedescription of the feeding habits of these .animals. .

Volume VI. Number 1.February 1993

. /IIustration by Elfin Beltz

Idealized salamander withdiagnostic characters

and is called the specific name. Thesystem works the same way as your lastname identifles those who are related toyou and identifies individuals by differentfirst names. Just think of a teacher doingthe roll call on the first day of school:"Smith, Mary - Smith, Catherine: are youtwo related?" That's how scientific nameswork. B ufo american us "andB ufowoodhousii are so similar that they're inthe same genus, but different enough to beconsidered separate species. "Unfortunately, the common names don'twork like that. Just another reason forlearning the Latinates, eh? Pronouncethem like Italian food, and everyone in

' .

8

American toads, Bufo american us tines on a cheap plastic hair comb ("ge-ee- how creativel), so a field guide is really aAmerican toads are easily eik"). Combined, a group of western necessity to be sure that the frog you think

recognizable, warty little fellows, with chorus frogs reminds me of sleigh bells. you saw is what you're calling it.golden eyes and a walk that reminds me of They.are visually The males in

, oak leaves blowing. They are the only distinguished from the this species make atoad in this area, so you don't have to - rest of the frogs on call that is ,worry about who is who. However, if you this list by the three, described as ago even a short distance from Chicago, ' brownish lines deep, rattlingyou will need your field guide, because running down their snore, withthere are other species of Bufo that occur otherwise tan-colored ' occasionalin the same places as American toads, and backs. This is why clucking grunts.look fairly similar. Toads breed in just the Latin name is What surprised me'about any body of water: ponds, buckets, "triseriata; which when I heard ittire ruts, pool covers, dog bowls, etc. means "three-lined." was how quiet it"Bufo" means "clown" in Latin and See, Latin's not so was compared toapparently refers to the Romans' opinion tough, huh? the noisy littleof their toads. It is where we get the word "Pseudacris" means Pseudacris I was"buffoon." As for "americanus" I "false-shrill one" and accustomed tosuppose that is named for Vespucci, too. is in reference to the hearing. By the

The song of the male is a melodic trill. fact that this genus is , Pseudscrt« triseriata way, "pipiens" is aYou can tell boy toads from girl toads by similar to a genus Western chorus frog' misnomer, appliedsqueezing their "armpits" gently. If it is a calted "Acris." No, by the namerboy, it will grunt at you. This isbecause none of them are " Illustration by Elfin Beltz because he heardof aggressive breeding techniques called green Acris, although some of them these and spring peepers (which docommon to many frogs and toads. The are very green. "pipiens") and since the leopard frogs .males will clasp just about anything that is were so large and the peepers were so 'toad-sized and toad-shaped and try to mate Northern leopard frog, Rana pipiens small, Mr. Schreiber convinced himselfwith it.' If what it has grabbed is a fellow These are larger frogs (to about 4" or the loudest call went with,the bigger frog.male toad, the one on the bottom will IOcm)which have a special frog Anyway, that was back in 1792, so we cangrunt. Then the one on top looks a 'little anatomical feature known as "dorsolateral allow for his lack offield observation.confused, but lets go!' Toad eggs'hatch folds" which are extra folds of skin that Herpetology (an as yet-unnamed science)into little apostrophe- run like parallel racing was in those days a pursuit of the

" sized black tadpoles stripes from their eyes unappreciated in malarial, mosquito-that do the frog thing , to their rear ends. infested swamps and wetlands, without theand swim without Someone once told me benefijs of antibiotics or insect spray.legs, then get hind that this extra skin Sometimes, we forget how far we'velegs, then front legs, comes into play when come.then metamorphose they leap: which they Leopard frogs also spend a goodly ,into toads. Newly do superbly, and portion of the summer away from water. Itransformed toads are usually just as you've was on a nature walk one time where theabout 1/2 inch long. ' . gotten your first guide got all excited because he thoughtWhen walking 'glimpse. It has been he was seeing meadow jumping mice andthrough the grass, said that the tastier they.turned out to be Rana pipiens. Atthey are about the you are, the farther least he was right to Phylum.size of wolf spiders, you jump. I suspectand move in a similar these frogs are very

, fashion. Pseudacris tasty. They are calledcrucifer leopard frogs because

Western chorus • Spring peepe,rthey have spots. Infrog,Pseudacris this species, the spotstriseriata Illustration by Ellin Be'!Z ' are rounded and have'

These are the noisy little frogs heard light borders and are Scatteredin two orearly in the spring in many small vernal three irregular rows between theponds, ditches and other transitory ponds. dorsolateral folds. Near Chicago are otherIndividually, males sound likethe noise species of the genus Rana ("frog" in Latin,-made by rubbing a finger over the small

Bullfrogs and green frogs, Ranacatesbeiana and Rana clamiiansmelanota

'These two species are so oftenconfused that I'd highly recommendherpetologists not to identify any unless inhand. .After the first few, you'll begin tosee the field characters, and soon you'll beidentifying them as they plop in the pond. '

continued-on page 10.

Prairie Projections 9 Voltune VI, Number I, February 1993

Amphibians, ;romp~ge 9 Acknowledgements

Some people say "bullfrogs are bigger"and identify anything over about 3" (7,6em) with no pattern as bullfrogs .. So far sogood, but how do they tell a large green

. frog from a small bullfrog? Here's thesecret. .. Bullfrogs don't have dorsolateralfolds, greenfrogs do! Otherwise, thegreen frog just looks like a downsizedbullfrog. Both species have prominenttympana (which is the big eardrum just.behind their eyes), two front feet, two very Suggested Readings:webbed back feet, and come in all thesame fashion nature colors: green, gray, . Conant, Roger and Joseph T. Collins.brown and black. Bullfrogs are sometimes 1991. Field Guide to Reptiles and.found in larger bodies of water and are Amphibians of Eastern and Central Northmore likely to be in rivers than greenfrogs. America. Third edition. Houghton

Mifflin ce; Boston, MA. 450+xviii.- (About $25.00 hardcover, $15.00 paper)

- Thanks to: Kenneth S. MierzwaThomasG. Anton, and Robert Sliwinski for alltheir help; and to Karen Holland, editor of·this fine publication for giving my warpedsense of humor an outlet. It is very rarethat I get to enjoy writing, usually what Ihave to do must be dry, dry, boring stuffthai is as little fun to read as it was to

. write.

Conclusion

Smith, Philip W. The Amphibians andReptiles of Illinois. The Illinois NaturalHistory Survey, 607 East Peabody Drive,Champaign, IL 61820. Article I, Volume28, November 1961. Available as a boundreprint for $5.00 theIast time I checked.The nomenclature is out of date and you

·will need Conant and Collins too, but it isthe only publicationon Illinoisherpetofauna.

·Ellen Beltz has written extensively for CHS's. monlhly bulletin and other herpetologicaljournals. She comribiaes six columns a year tothe color magazine of Herpetology, Vivarium.She is a student of biology at Northeastern "Illinois University where she also edits thestudent newspaper. This is Ellin's firstconiribuiion to Prairie Projections: The sequelto this article will appear in our next issue.

If you find any amphibians that aren'ton this list, photograph it if you can andcontact Tom Anton, who is doing a herpsurvey on North Branch sites (708-869-8219). When you find amphibians that areon thislist, please write down the date,

• time, temperature (approximate is o.k.),species, and precisely where you were.Then passthis info along to Tom, too~ Ifyou find reptiles and amphibians withinthe Chicago region, outside of the NorthBranch, and want to report your fmdings,please send copies of your field data to meat: 1647 North Clybourn Avenue,.Chiqlgo, IL 60614-5507. Photographs (ortape recordings of frogs) are preferred toactual specimens. Eye

EyelidNostril Inner eyelid

Typanurn Dorsolateral foldsFemur

·TibiaTarsus

':

Illustration by Ellin Beltz

Idealized frog with diagnostic characteristics highlightedPrairie Projections 10

Through the weeks of deep snowwe walked above the groundon fallen sky, as though we didnot come out -of root and leaf, as thoughwe had only air and weatherfor our difficult home.

But nowas March warms, and the rivuletsrun like birdsong on the slopes,and the branches oflight sing in the hills,slowly we return to earth.

"Wendell Berry

Behold, my brothers, the spring has come,The earth has received the embraces of thesunAnd we shall soon see the results of thatlove!

. Every seed is awakened and so has allanimal life.It is through this mysterious power that wetoo have our beingAnd we therefore yield to our neighbors,Even our animal neighbors,

- The same right as ourselves, to inhabit thisland.

Sitting Bull

Volume VI, Number 1,February 1993

Brower, from page 1Compass: I have some concerns aboutrestoration. How effective do you think itreally can be? Is the technology advancedenough to really recreate a wetland?

David Brower: I think it is. Of course,you can't recreate everything that wasthere in the first place, but you canrecreate as much as you can find out aboutwhen you think about all the things thatare still flying in the air to recolonize, thespores to start with, you can begin to settlein and start a new ecosystem. One of theimportant things is to give nature a chanceto heal. Sometimes that means standingback, sometimes it means you've got tohelp. Maybe it takes' some arrogance tothink we can help at an, but ithinkrestoration can work. There is so muchthat we have spoiled, at least we can getour own interference out of the way.

Compass: I guess my concern,particularly with wetlands, is that we don'ttrade natural wetlands for artificialwetlands, What do you say to those whowant to make these kinds of deals?

Brower: I say, if you want to build onthis wetland and give us another, build theother first and build it so well that youwant to build your stuff over it. That's mycomment.

It's a derivative of what I used to say, about the Grand Canyon. You can buildall the dams you want to in the GrandCanyon, provided you build a separate andequal Grand Canyon somewhere else first.

Compass: Td like you to comment aboutthe problems we 've had here in Chicago 'opposing a third airport at Lake Calumet, -

, on some choice wetlands and prairie land.

Brower: I'm very against that airport. I 'know there has been some talk of wantinga national park there. I'm not against a tryfor it If you can make a go of it, fine.Possible, though, what you need is abiosphere reserve. Not enough peopleknow what a biosphere reserve is and 'what

Prairie Projections

it can do, and we've got to let more peopleknow about that

Compass: Could you expand on that?

Brower: 'the biosphere reserve idea cameout of the United Nations Decade on Manand the Environment; and they're alloverthe world. For example, in what was theSoviet Union, biosphere reserves hav~ themaximum protection. They don 't evenwant you traveling there unless you are ascientist. But that's not what we do here. 'A biosphere reserve area in theAdirondacks, for example,also includescities and factories. The idea is 'that youzone an area, and you try not to increaseany further the encroachment onbiological diversity.

" ... before you trash~anything else, goback

and see what you can doto fix what you've 'trashed alreacjy.

That's restoration. "

The biosphere reserves can includeprivate property as well as city, county,state, fed, any agency, so long as certainperformance standards are adhered to. 'The first criterion is that you may riot, inyour brief tenancy on this piece of earth,diminish the biological diversity of it, andI don't mean keep one of each for the Ark.Keep the populations viable populations.

I'm trying to get legislation written andenacted for a national biosphere reservesystem. We didn't care much aboutnational parks until we got the nationalpark system. We had the parks for 60years before we got the system, and thesystem began to show the power you need,the, critical mass, so that we could makethe national' parks a more permanent part

11

of our future. You need the same thingwith the biosphere reserves.

If we get that, and we begin to buildthese systems, then we move away fromthe current philosophy of what we oughtto save and move toward the philosophy,of what else do we want to trash. And I

. think if we ask people how many placesdo they want to trash, you'll fmd theycome up with a very short list. If youcome up with a list of the places you wantto save, that means that everything else isup for grabs. That can't be any more-we've done enough of that. '

Compass: So you're proposing peopleturn their whole point of vie.w around.

,

Brower: Yes, turn it around. What elsedo you want to trash? And before youtrash anything else, go back and see whatyou can do to fix what you've trashedalready. That's restoration. That's where~ou can put your energy. Anybody cantrash. Can you fix it?

If you want to restore, you want cluesabout- what you want to restore to. wtUu'sthe nearest you can come. Like they say,when you're lost, you go back to the lastknown landmark. We don't have to goback to prehistory. We go back to whenwe last knew what was there and try to 'rebuild that and. then let those forms'succeed. Succession goes on. Evolutiongoes on. It didn't stop. Creation is stillgoing on.

There are lots of restorations going onin various parts of the world, but we don'tknow enough about them. We've got toget a restoration central operating. Once 'we start restoring more places, we'll getanew value of what the environment isworth. If you start pricing it according towhat it takes to build back what you'vedestroyed, that's going to be a big number.Otherwise they don't put in any number atall, or hardly at all.

Sugges-ted Readings: '

Encounters with the Archdruidby John McPhee

For Earth's Sake by David BrowerWork in Progress by David Brower

Volume VI, Number I, February 1993

man Beings, from page 1

could be unfixed by decomposition.as if nature was doting upon those

y land plants. They accumulated. n in excessive amounts and grew

they fell over of their own weight,y partially decaying, destined to formmassive coal beds characterized by the

Carboniferous period. About 125 millionago, the concentration of

ospheric carbon had fallen to near theel at which carbon fixation/ '

decomposition rates were about equal, and. the formation of coal essentially ceased.

As carbon was being mined from theatmosphere, contributing to the cooling ofthe earth, the continents were beingformed by the breakup of Pangaea: Anextensive system of mountain rangesbegan to form. The Rockies burgeoned.The continents drifted apart and furthernorth. As land masses shifted, rippled,

kled, and broke into pieces, potentialhabitats became more numerous.Temperate climates began to becomesuperimposed on high plains. The world;once characterized by large, woody,evergreen plants growing in a warm,humid, carbon dioxide-rich environment,~ giving over in many areas todeciduous trees, with perennial and annualassociates adapted to drier climatemediated by a change of seasons. A newdiversity of plants and animals began toinhabit the developing arrays of nooks,

. crannies, and climates. As dry airdeveloped and complex weather patternsevolved, lightning began to occur whenthere was no rain. Scarcelylf) millionyears ago, the early grazing animals andgrass-like plants were beginning todevelop. ' '

The new grasses and sedges had two .key features. Their growing tissues were 'at the base of the plant rather than at thetop, which adapted them to grazing.Their dry autumnal foliage provided ~

Prairie Projections

excellent fuel through whichspontaneouslightning fires could race. By about twomillion years ago, it is likely that the 'vegetation in whole regions of the earthwas subject to regular fires,

Carbon was still being fixed annuallyboth above and below the ground; it couldnot quickly decompose In the drierclimate. That which the grazing animalsdid not unfix through digestion was 'frequently unfixed by fire. The carbonfixed in the deep fibrous root systemseither remained unoxidized or was unfixedthrough microbic digestion, contributingto the development of organic-rich soils .For the first time in over 100 millionyears, atmospheric carbon was beingextracted in net amounts.

By the advent of the Ice Age, the 'co-evolution of human beings, grasslands,and grazing animals was well underway,and a new pattern of carbon cycling wasestablished. Large fertile plains andbottom lands were created in the wake ofthe last glacier. The soils were nutrient-rich and the grassland quickly re-inhabited

, recently glaciated regions. These landscontained all the elements' necessary tosustain early Human Beings: cereals andhuge herds of slow-moving grazers,replete with their big bones, hides, furs,and meat. The Human Being began tomanage the land to optimize these

• resources, and began to become aprofound factor in the evolution of life on

12

earth. The well-being of the Earth and theHuman became inextricably linked inwhat Father Thomas Berry has called the"Ecozoic."

Some agriculturally-oriented cultures,instead of hunting the grazing animals,corralled them"near settlements. Insteadof seeking nuts, berries, and grains, theycultivated them. With the advent ofagricultural, sedentary people, a smallgroup of plant species evolved-andadapted to activities characteristic of suchpeople; routirie soil mixing, soilcompaction.concentration of nutrients, 'and heavy grazing. As these activitiesintensified and civilization spread acrossthe arable lands of the earth, so also didthis group of plants. All 'organisms carrywithin their genes the physiological,morphological, and behavioral factorsnecessary to survive in the ecologicalcontext wherein they have evolved.

Some of these peoples in areas theworld over became wealthy in their .accumulation and storage of food andsupplies. It seems that the more wealththey amassed and the more they felt freeto waste correlated with the extent towhich they regarded themselves"civilized."

When the people ofthe Old Worldbegan migrating to the New World, theinevitable clash of cultures began; eachcharacterized by, a radically different landethic. The extent to which the struggle for

Volume VI. Number I, FebruaryJ993

I

\

"

land occupation and natural resources tookplace between the two cultures mirroredthe competition between the Old Worldand the New World floras.

The flora and fauna which co-evolvedwith the aboriginal people in the Chicagoregion were adapted to a people whodefmed themselves in relation to theirland.

The ancients from early westerncivilization had the idea that every placehad a Genius. A Genius. in the early senseof the word,' was a tutelary deity, a spiritguardian of a place, There was a -recognition that every place was uniqueunto itself, quite apart and different fromall other places on the earth, and that theway the world worked in that place wasgoverned by its guardian.

Some people seemed to understand thatplaces were different everywhere theywent, and that they had to be attentive tohow things were there and acknowledgethe Genius. Other people becamefiubristic with their own influence on theland and ever less respectful of therealities. And when they ignored therealities, the Genius became disappointedand no longer provided them locally withthe bounty of the earth. So the land 'became depleted and they moved on ordeveloped technologies which brought in 'resources from remote areas, deferring

, accountability for their actions.In the Chicago region at the time of

settlement, there was still an abundance ofliving things in this special place west ofLake Michigan. There were plenty ofgrazing animals, ple~ty· of meat, plenty of

the deep-rooted prairie species, and seepedclear and mineral-rich into the prairieswales and streams at a metered rateduring the growing season. The land wasfull of water and the streams ran fresh andwere full of fish. On the average, about 35inches of precipitation falls each year over

, every square, inch of this watershed; 35·inches per year can evaporate off of everysquare inch. Sincethe landscape was ableto hold the water until it could evaporateor be transpired, the Illinois River had anegligible discharge into the Mississippi atits mouth, even though it drained morethan half the state of Illinois.

As a result 0/ the past 150 years 0/civiUzation, this bound/ulland has beentransformed into row-croppedagriculture, cities with muid-storybuildings, and sprawling suburbs.

The remaining vegetation resides inhighly managed parks or sidewalk'planters. Little of the land can hold water,"Nature," now consists of hedgerows,.vacant lots, golf courses, and parks.

Perhaps one of the landscapes mostillustrative of this disconnection from the

, natural world is the "corporate campus" asit has developed in the last half of thiscentury. It is typified in the Chicagoregion by vast, but otherwise lifeless tractsof closely mowed Kentucky blue grass,"installed" as one might a carpet, overclayey subsoil. The once deep topsoil isfirst scraped away and stockpiled, theintricate connection with the lowerhorizons destroyed. The "soil"js then

, spread back thinly over the compactedclay. Kentucky blue grass, with its fine,

densely matted, shallow.•iJ..J:t"\,~J~ , root system, cannot

~~ .==~~Ia':;mns

'. robes, plenty of bones for tools, ,Precipitation percolated deep into the soilalong the many root channels formed by,

,Prairie Projections

.water off nearly as

efficiently as concrete during rain storms.Such landscapes drain rainwater quickly,causing it to leave laden with herbicides,

13

pesticides, and fertilizers, to detentionbasins. The filthy water then is meteredinto our streams.and rivers acting as alethal injection into the life's blood of thecontinent.

Since water is not compressible andflows downhill, its volume increases in 'areas remote from its source, There oftenisn't room, so engineers and scientistsrecommend a hole, referred to either as adetention ora retention basin. ,The wateris released at a "scientifically" calculatedrate, and accumulates with other suchwaters from throughout thewatershedtobecome roiling surfeits of floodwater. Itempties finally into the Gulf of Mexico,where it contributes to a whole array ofdegradations to that once bounteous sea.

EXcept in the rare stream, tumor-riddencarp and goldfish are the principalinhabitants of our waterways. Few of ournative fish can be sustained in suchwaters. To us a river is a straight, steep-banked, mud-sided thing that has grocery ,carts and doll baby heads in it when it'sdry and is a muddy, frothy torrent withcarp roiling in it when it's full. It hasbecome nothing more or less than arunning sewer.

Even among modern civilized people,there appears to be a vestige of acceptancefor trees. But trees have become more like .living room decorations. They are plantedin rows, trimmed to have lollipop-likecrowns, and rarely planted in landscapesas seedlings. Such trees live aconceritration.camp existence for a fewyears, then die. They are replaced withmore from the nursery. There are manynurseries.

The corporate campus "look" has alsobecome the sought-after ideal for thehomes of civilized people, and isemulated.' We have become too

. comfortable living with only inanimate

Illustration by Robert Greer

Continued on page 14

Volume VI, Number l , February 1993

Human Beings, from page 13

things, arid tragically uncomfortable livingwith life. In the suburbs, when the.••.•...••.••.•.•.•trees drop their autumnalleav~s

grass, people immediately deploy"leaf blowers" as if the trees hadsomethingdirty on their yards.

.....ea are gathered quickly, stuffed into. bags, and sent off to a landfill. Butlandfills are getting too full and

are being advised, reluctantly, totheir grass clippings and leaves.is no longer room for "yard waste:'

e are becoming confused. Thereto be no acceptable alternative to a

without life. .

Perhaps it is as old Chief Lodgeskins1IUlSed: "The white man doesn't seem to

w where. the center of the earth is.Only the Human Beings know~ and there

en't many Human Beings." .

An elder once admonished a peopleho were becoming distant, who were no

ger attentive, if you will, to the Genius:The God gave your fathers and iheirchildren a land that flows with milk and

ney. For the land is not where you sowseed. as a garden of herbs •.but a land of

. and valleys which drinks rain waterfrom the heavens. It is a land which theeyes of God are always upon. from thebeginning of the year to the end of theear. Take heed to yourselves, tha't yourteart be not deceived and you turn aside.

The God will shut up the heavens. and .sere will be no more rain, and the land

no longer produce fruit. and the landmilk and honey will dry up. Well,

civilized people have been quite obliviousthe way the world works and have

aside. The land i~ no longer able toThe land of milk and honey is

gup.It's a profound metaphor.but civilized

le feel they have risen aboveetaphors. These metaphors were the

.es the elders told the young ones, sothey might understand the strictures of

Genius: When the Shawnee elder putcareworn hand on the shoulder of the

g one and said: The world is ridingthe back of a turtle ... If you endanger

~ turtle. you endanger the world: The

Prairie Projections

youth could understand that the turtle livesin the river. it the water becomes dirty ordries up, the turtle's life is in danger. So

, goes the turtle, so go the people.Civilized people, clever and brilliant in

their hubris, blast off into space, look.down on the world and see that it's not

. riding on the back of a turtle. The truth is:The position of the earth is actually 93million miles from (he sun, around which .it revolves. its velocity and centrifugalforce maintaining the distance •.and thereobviously is no turtle. Our desperate .search for the ultimate scientific answer isa naive attempt to contrive the ultimatefinitedefinition for a world that'is pur 'together with infinities .. Evidently, abelief has arisen that scientists can replaceelders, that knowledge equates to wisdom.

In 1795, about half of the people of theShawnee nation were forced to leave theirhomeland in Ohio. The Shawnee, likemany aboriginal people, called themselvesthe "Human Beings," as opposed to thoseother people that lived over there, such asthe Wyandot and the Delaware. Theshamans, the elders, the keepers of themysteries, the story tellers, carried withthem the combined knowledge of all the"Shawanasee" who had lived before inOhio. They knew where the bisonwatered, the elk roamed, the edible plantsgrew, and the salt licks were. Theyunderstood bow to be obedient to theGenius. so that the land could drink therain and remain rich with milk and honey.Alexander Thorn, in his book Panther inthe Sky. described the angst experiencedby the Shawnee elders, who knew well theway the world worked in the forests ofSouthern Ohio. But they knew nothing of

. that far and distant land, where the Illinoiswere the Human Beings and the Shawneewould be the others. Of course, theShawnee dispersed along the western trailsand the Human Beings of southern Ohiodisappeared from the earth.

1 once thought that referring to one'stribe as the Human Beings was a quaint,chauvinisiic notion. ltl ow 1see that it .represents. one. of the most profoundtruths of humanity.

Human Beings defined themselves inrelation ~ the land wherein they lived.

14

They understood that there were limits,realities. One was not free to dirty thewater and plunder the fertility of the soil.They were immediately accountable forsuch behavior. Human Beings did notthink of themselves as gods. They werecomfortable with the ancient stories, theways o,f the elders, with the ones who .carried incorrupt wisdom .ibelieve there is a rebirth of the

Human Being. Late this century, someIllinoisans began to discover that remnantpatches of the ancient living earth still ~remained. People developed a kind ofempathy for these places, a visceral sense

. that these places had stories to tell. The .people recognized that there resided inthese lands something thai was worthhonoring and rehabilitating. Fifteen yearsago, along the North Branch of theChicago River, there was a rebirth of theHuman Being, a primitive, adolescenttribe. These Human Beings calledthemselves the "Land Stewards," .

Initially, Land Stewards relied heavily. upon expert ecologists add natural

scientists to advise them on how tomanage and curate these natural areas ofthe North Branch. But it soon becameapparent that these latter-day shamans hadonly a limited awareness and fragmented

. knowledge of the realities of the place.Products themselves of modemcivilization, these scientists often seemedto lack an empathy for the land, and theirtraining had not equipped them to .integrate the Human Being with the land.There was much disagreement amongthem and there was much dogma whichSeemed to conflict with what the LandStewards observed. As years passed, the

. Land Stewards attended to the sacred .place of the North Branch. They studied itand learned about the life there. They sawhow theland responded to their care,noting what kinds of attention broughtforth life and what kinds caused the landsto give up life.

.The Human Beings of the NorthBranch began to assume a gentledominion over the land, not a dominanceor god-like rule, but a stewardship. Evermore shrewd in their observations, theybegan to manage the land according totheir own, experience. They studied the

Yolume VI. Number l , Februaryl993

, '

[

land and its life intently. They drew fromthe-knowledge of scientists. They drewfrom the stories of the native plants andanimals themselves. The Stewardsindexed success by the extent to which lifeflourished and the fecundity of the landsof the North Branch burgeoned. In area'swhich remained neglected, they noted thecontinued diminishment of native flowersand butterflies. Erosion progressed andwaters ran muddy.', The Stewards also became aware that 'the North Branch lands were 'quite special.That this place really wasn't like any otherplace they knew. While at first similar toneighboring lands, the uniqueness of theNorth Branch became apparent as its biotaflourished and as these Human Beingsfound the center of the earth. There was

, the recognition of a long-forgotten Genius:It was a land left 10,000 years ago by thelast glacier, located about five miles westof a great lake in the middle of acontinent, on soils developed over tillderived from Niagaran dolomite. It wassituated about 800 miles north of the Gulfof Mexico and exposed to dry, desiccatingwinds out of the west in the summer andArctic outbreaks in the winter. The land

, and its living associations were uniqueunto themselves, and this uniqueness was

. being drawn from the earth by theStewards of the North, Branch.

A few years ago, there were just a fewhundred Land Stewards in Illinois. Nowthere are over 5,000. These are peoplewho are becoming Human Beings in anancient and time-honored sense, of theword, people who are becoming connectedto something real, something' 'incorruptible. When the North BranchStewards travel south in Cook County tothat far and distant Palos Hills, wherethere is now another small tribe of HumanBeings, they feel as guests there. Withtheir knowledge of the uniqueness of the

, ,

North Branch, they see easily andprofoundly how different and unique the

, land of Palos Hills is.

It would be easy to conclude, when onecontemplates the massive, brutishdestruction of the earth all around its,that there is no hope, that we are destinedtoface the EourHorsemen: famine,disease, unrest, war.

Prairie Projections

But there is hope. Consider themindset of a farmer oil a sojourn toChicago in 1830. The Sauk ChieftainBlack Hawk was angry. There was nogovernment or market. There was noplow that could even begin to turn theprairie soil, which was mostly too wetanyway. How could he have imaginedthat the land would be in agriculture fromChicago to Denver in a lifetime? But it'was. And it was accomplished by onefarmer. And another. And another, as itbecame perceived to be economicallyimperative. It was accomplished byindividuals who focused on the land wherethey lived.

Imagine a world where Stewardscurated the genetic memory of the placeswhere they lived, where they becameattentive to the Genius. The naturalvegetation.jhe plants and animals of ,northern Illinois, would begin to expresstheir covenant with the earth and the landwould drink from the rains ofthe heaven.Human Beings, place by place, wouldfocus on the rehabilitation of the only floraand fauna on the globe that has a clue howto sustain the self-replicating, livinglandscapes of northern Illinois, the onlyflora and fauna wherein the HumanBeings can see the reflections of theirancestors and imagine the well-being ofthe seventh generation hence. The Human

, Beings of the North Branch, the Palos,Hills, the Poplar Creek, the DesPlaines,and now many other places, would curatethe germmaterial out of whichrestorationists and other Human Beingswould start rebuilding, reincorporating lifeand water into the landscapes aroundthem.

What if corporate campuses startedtaking of that seed, of that holy harvest,'and sowing it back into those brutalizedlandscapes? More and more lands wouldprosper and come to life as the riversbegan to freshen. Imagine if civilizedpeople awakened to the filth anddestruction with which they havesurrounded themselves, and decided it wasdesirable to have life in me land aroundtheir homes, and that the air and watershould be clean ... that the turtle shouldlive. '

Imagine the jobs, prosperity, andcapital formed, as we redesigned and

15

rebuilt agricultural, corporate, residential,and industrial North America intelligently,attentive to the realities with an eyetoward tomorrow and our children.Instead of defming prosperity andindexing growth by the extent to which we 'divest the earth of its natural resources, weflip the way we view the world and startindexing prosperity by the extent to whichwe reinvest in the natural resources of theearth. People become again connected tothe landscape, connected, to something .solid, something incomipt. The ,metaphors, the long-forgotten stories ofthe elders, would again become ,meaningful. What if civilized people wereto become Human Beings?

Can we anticipate the dawning of anew age, or must we acquiesce to the FourHorsemen? I think the answer lies in thegenetic memory of what remains in,northern Illinois and-in the people whohave dominion over it. I think people arefree to make decisions which enable themto sustain the grandeur of the HumanBeing on earth, or choose to makedecisions which render their life style aridculture unsustainable. We can either writethe epilogue of the time of the HumanBeing on earth, or we can write a newchapter to an old, old story. I think this isthe beginning of the-story of the HumanBeings of the North Branch.

Suggested Readings:

Bury My Heart at Wounded Kneeby Dee Brown

The Cry and the Covenant ,by Morton Thompson

East of Iiden by John SteinbeckThe Mountain People by Colin Turnbull ,Panther in the Skyby James Alexander Thorn .

, Gerould Wilhelm, Ph.D. is a Research Field.. 'Taxonomist at the Morton Arboretum. Hecoauthored the third edition of Plants of theChicago Region in 1979. Wilhelm startedworking with Floyd Swink and Ray ,Schulenberg, two of the "grandfathers" ofprairie restoration. in the Chicago area, in1974. Heis currently working on afourthedition of Plants of the Chicago Region, aswell as a book on lichens of Missouri.Illinois,and the Chicago region. This is Ierry's firstcontribution to Prairie Projections.

Volume VI, Numbed, February1993

No, this is not a seed bandit! KarenLaner models proper dust repellentattire while separating seed from

.: chaff at the annual seed mix party.last November.

By Mary Hanlon

Prairie Projections .

Contributing Writers:

Ellin Beltz, Student, Herpetologist: :WriterRick Gabriel, Architect

. Adria Goodson, Account Executive, Leo BurnettTor Faegre, Carpenter, Writer ,

.Karen Holland, Environ. Protection Specialist, U.S. EPALaurel Ross, Field Representative, The Nature ConservancyGerould Wilhelm, Research Field Taxonomist, Morton Arboretum

• . I

Publications Workgroup:Karen Holland. Joel Spears.Barbara Rose, Tom Murphy. Tor Faegre,Adria Goodson. Mary Hanlon, KathyLapinski. Chuck Lapinski. Leslie Borns,

Submit articles and graphics byJuly 23,1993 to:Karen Holland2048 West MelroseChicago.IL 60618312-929-7658

North 'Branch Prairie ProjectP.O. Box 74Northbrook. IL 60065

ADDRESS CORR.ECTION REQUESTED,

The North BranchPrairie Project is a .cooperative effortinvolving TheNature Conservancy,the Chicago Audubon'Society, and the SierraClub, Chicago group.

We manage these sitesas volunteers for theForest Preserve District -of Cook County

-Non-ProfitOrganizationU.S. Postage

Paid at Chicago, ILPermit No. 6632

Prairie Projections 16 Volwne VI, Number I, February 1993