The plague has reminded us how important human contact is — physical, familial, emotional — and how painful the loss of that can be. We need to be reminded that we are not alone and how we can maintain contact with one another. Thanks to Matt, Brenna, Carolyn, Caitlyn, Becky, and John of Madison Audubon's staff as they create new ways to reach out to our members, volunteers, and friends during these uniquely trying times.
Madison Audubon is not alone either. I thought a review of some of our organizational friends, partners, and allies might make for a few moments of happy reading (and some ideas of some new places to spend time outdoors).
So — onto a neighbor, an old friend and trusted partner, and a new kid on the block with lots of promise.
Photo courtesy of Green-Rock Audubon Society’s Instagram feed (@graudubon)
NEIGHBOR. The Green-Rock Audubon Society (GRAS) covers the two counties to our south. This is a big area with diverse natural resources and habitat. It has significant urban areas in Janesville and Beloit, wide expanses of agriculture (mostly row crops), the Rock River, a major river system, and key interstate transportation corridors. Thankfully this area holds some very cool natural resources, some of which GRAS is laboring mightily to preserve and improve.
Probably the most important area from a bird's perspective is the huge Avon Bottoms managed by the DNR. “Bottoms” refers to a large swath of the property the Sugar River flows through including a floodplain forest. Recently the DNR has added hundreds of acres restored to wetlands and grasslands through the federal Wetland Reserve Program. This area is one of Wisconsin and the nation's most vital for migrating birds and it has plenty of interesting breeding birds, my favorite being the prothonotary warbler because a) it's beautiful, b) Mike Foy, a great DNR wildlife manager, really boosted the population with well-designed and placed nest boxes, and c) the name.
GRAS has an informative, easy to navigate website with excellent photography and maps. Most impressive are sanctuaries they work on. They have six, with another on the way. The reserves are in Rock County and are important bird havens in a very intensive agricultural landscape. Sunny Peace Reserve is not open for a while because of the extensive restorations underway. All the others are open to the public and well worth a visit. Most feature prairie but at Androne Woods, GRAS has preserved and is improving oak woods with some lovely spring, woodland flowers. I'm eager to visit the Gabower-Reilly Reserve with a prairie and the East Fork of Raccoon Creek. It has the most southern population of wild brook trout in Wisconsin (sorry for the constant interest in trout, but there you go).
Speaking of impressive, GRAS does this incredible work, entirely fueled by volunteers. As in no professional, full-time sanctuary staff like Madison Audubon has. They don't have our acreage, but they have hundreds of acres scattered across sites with all the problems and opportunities inherent in trying to run healthy bird sanctuaries. As I read their stewardship accounts, our GRAS neighbors are fighting all our favorite adversaries with reed canary and invasive honeysuckle high on the list. Their volunteers work very hard and scramble for grants that enable them to hire some occasional professional help.
Schurch-Thompson Prairie, owned by our old friends, The Prairie Enthusiasts. Photo by Joshua Mayer
OLD FRIEND AND TRUSTED PARTNER. You might guess this one, The Prairie Enthusiasts (TPE). This organization's mission is to identify, preserve, and strengthen prairies and savannas in the upper Midwest. Some of its key founders and most impressive early achievements occurred in Green County, a most important county in the history of southern Wisconsin conservation. TPE has active chapters in Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Illinois. The Empire-Sauk Chapter overlaps the most with Madison Audubon's territory.
Traditionally, TPE has focused on the acquisition of remnant prairies and intense, volunteer management to restore those remnants to greater health. Once again, TPE has a superb website with maps, histories, management goals, and descriptions of public access and use for each of its properties. In general, TPE allows a wide range of public access and uses on many of its Wisconsin properties — but check the website before visiting any one of them.
Once you do and are ready to hit the road, my recommendation is the Mounds View Grasslands (MVG) between Barneveld and Hollandale. These lands have something of everything: prairie remnants, restored prairies, oak savannas, springs, fens, and streams. It's home to the regal fritillary, an endangered butterfly, and nine native plant species of special concern or endangered. And birds, birds, birds. This has got to be about the best place around here to see the greatest variety and numbers of grassland birds. My goal is to see the Upland Sandpiper there this year.
TPE is expanding its mission and staff to offer more assistance to landowners with remnant prairies while pursuing its goals of acquiring and protecting prairie and savanna. MVG offers an outstanding example of that effort. TPE is pursuing two parcels, the bigger around 300 acres and the smaller 40. That would bring the protected landscape to about 900 acres. Included in the new lands would be superb remnant prairies and an oak savanna.
THE NEW GUYS. A new nation-wide conservation organization has emerged in the last few years, the Backcountry Hunters & Anglers (BHA). Again I recognize that we in Madison Audubon have very differing views on hunting and fishing, but I think this organization has two gifts to offer the conservation community: a) a ferocious dedication to keeping public lands healthy, accessible, and, most of all, PUBLIC and b) youth.
BHA got its start as young hunters, anglers, and hikers responded to the threat to sell, privatize, monetize, and degrade public lands throughout the west. Over the last few years, the organization has grown rapidly and now has chapters across the country — including one in Wisconsin. The focus has remained to protect public lands at the levels of federal, state, and local government across this country. BHA also supports the acquisition of more land throughout the country and at all levels of government.
Their advocacy for public lands is most impressive. They track legislative proposals again at every level of government, provide solid analyses of those proposals and organize local grassroots responses to support, amend, or beat them. Given their history, they excel with monitoring Department of the Interior activity.
Recall "Backcountry" in their name. The founders are Western folks who got way off the road, often on foot or horseback, to pursue their outdoor passions. As a result, many, many of the founders and its members today are young and physically very active. With that they can bring some new perspectives and energy to the conservation movement. The folks attending typical environmental organizations’ meetings are wonderful conservationists and most of us are old. A constant theme on the boards of these organizations is how to attract younger, more diverse members. That's worthy work and we're making progress, but let's get to know a new conservation organization that has a young membership.
A youngster explores Pleasant Valley Conservancy. Madison Audubon photo
BHA members are now scheduling work days like many of those organizations. In Wisconsin they focus on public hunting grounds or fishing areas. We'd recognize their work right away. Most of the time they are battling invasive vegetation and promoting native vegetation just like us on Madison Audubon properties.
Check out the BHA’s spring 2020 journal, which they have opened up for free and public access.
The advocacy angle to this blog is obvious. These days the conservation community needs to work together and support one another more than ever to make real progress in protecting our birds, other wildlife, and the habitat and ecosystems they need.
In these times of fiscal uncertainty, please continue your support of Madison Audubon. But keep GRAS and TPE in mind as they pursue their acquisitions. And the next time you need some new reading material, check out the BHA journal.
Take care of yourself and your loved ones,
Topf Wells, Madison Audubon board member and advocacy committee chair
Cover photo by Drew Harry
