Restoration Basics

Humans have always had the ability to take plants and animals from their native habitats and introduce them to new lands. That is true today more than ever before, with our ability to rapidly move people and things all around the world. Increasingly it is recognized that some of these “foreign” species, both plant and animal, can have devastating effects on native ecosystems.

How do we know what the landscape looked like before European settlement? Without records that give us a complete picture, we rely on a number of sources. One source comes from the public land surveys of the 1830’s.

Under the dense shade of buckthorn and other invasives, much of the groundlayer – the flowers, grasses and sedges – has died out. What’s left are the common plants (those that can tolerate disturbance) or sometimes, just bare ground. Seeds are essential to restoring the diverse understory of healthy natural areas.

Fire is an essential component of many North American ecosystems. The plant and animal species of our Midwestern grasslands and woodlands have existed with these fire ecosystems for hundreds of thousands of years, selected for success by characteristics that make them well adapted to fire.

Because of weather conditions and forest composition, the large destructive fires that occur in the west are not possible in our preserves. Instead of highly combustible resinous pine trees, our woods are populated with broadleaf deciduous trees, whose fallen leaves provide much less flammable fuel. In fact, the flames in our woodland burns are often low enough that an individual could simply step over them.

An important part of restoring health to natural lands is keeping track of progress. There are many different questions we might ask – one would be what is happening to the plant community. Plants are the foundation of a natural system, the underpinnings that provide the animal inhabitants shelter, food and a place to reproduce.