On a beautiful Sunday morning, Seth McGee, Biocore Laboratory Manager, led a band of 9 Friends to experience the Prairies. As we walked up the hill past Bill’s Woods, Seth paused for a public service announcement: how to identify poison ivy, growing along the roadside, by its alternate leaf attachment. Box elder, which can also exhibit three leaflets, has leaves that are attached opposite from one another. Eve Emshwiller related that the jewelweed, growing abundantly nearby, is reputed to relieve the skin irritation caused by poison ivy. When we reached the Biocore Prairie, Seth told how Ann Burgess and Curt Caslavka got permission for UW biology honors program students to learn ecology by restoration of this badly degraded land, beginning with 3/4 acre in 1998. By 2016, the land under restoration had increased to 12 acres, making it the largest laboratory on campus. Seth compares this highly manipulated living laboratory to an Erlenmeyer flask. As one example, he showed us a map of the prairie with the dates of burning identified for individual 20m2 areas. While it is recognized that fire is essential to prairie restoration, this burn study can help to determine the optimum frequency of burning. Seth showed us some of the other student research projects and identified the plants in bloom, including Michigan lily (Lilium michiganense), bee balm (Monarda spp.) and milkweed. He concluded with a thorough comparison of Prairie dock (Silphium terebinthinaceum) to Compass plant (Silphium laciniatum). The Prairie dock’s large basal leaves are covered in rough hairs that trap moisture and the drying wind. Its leaves stand upright and act as big “solar panels”. The Compass plant leaves, which rise higher, are deeply lobed to withstand the drying effects of sun and wind. As we thanked Seth for showing us the Prairie, Roma Lenehan pointed to a pair of cedar waxwings searching for their own nest site in the Prairie. Report and photos by the Friends host Doris Dubielzig.
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My first day…as a water quality monitor—Doris Dubielzig reports: "In our first year as a Lake Forecasting Steward with Clean Lakes Alliance, the Friends recruited a team of volunteers, each of whom committed to collect near-shore data twice a week for a month. Our site is the floating pier at the boat launch on University Bay across from parking lot 60. Steve Sentoff was the first to make observations, beginning shortly after Luke Wynn, Watershed specialist for CLA, trained our 7 member team in late April. Nicole Miller and Genevieve Murtaugh continued in June. I had signed up for July. On Monday night, I drove to Nicole’s home, where she handed me the Instruction Book, the digital thermometer and the turbidity tube. Today was my first day to make and record the seven visual observations and three measurements. Gisela Kutzbach, ever inquisitive, joined me as I struggled to read my notes from the April training. We had the pier to ourselves this morning. I checked that the plastic tapes marking the boundaries of our observation area, 50 feet on either side of the pier, were still attached to their shrubs, and encountered a handsome catbird in the process. On the pier, above water about 3 feet deep, I turned on the digital thermometer and held it shaded by my body to read the air temperature, 81.9F. Then I dropped to my knees, stretched out my arm and held the thermometer probe upright in the water. To my surprise, the water temperature, which Steve had recorded at 45 degrees on April 29, and Nicole at 67 degrees just 8 days ago, was now 80.1 degrees F! Gisela and I observed the water clarity at knee depth (Good—thank you zebra mussels), wave intensity (calm to small ripples = 1), waterfowl (none), and number of people in the water (none). For Surface Algal Bloom, we saw patches of algae near the pier and next to the shore. In addition, we saw patches of floating plants—duckweed (Lemna) and strands of milfoil. Finally, I dipped the 120cm turbidity tube into the lake at the 3 foot level, filled the tube to the top, and removed it to the shade of a nearby tree. Peering down the vertical tube, I could clearly see the Secchi disk on the bottom, and recorded 120cm, the maximum value. The clarity is all the more impressive, given that Nicole was unable to make a turbidity measurement 6 days ago due to a blue-green algae bloom that ringed the Lake. I am pleased to be part of the community of Yahara lakes water quality monitors and very grateful to have such an enthusiastic team to share the responsibilities of collecting data. In August and September, Olympia Mathiaparanam, Genevieve Murtaugh and Matt Chotlos complete the data collecting season, which extends to the end of September."
See also summary of all Citizen Science Project sponsored by the Friends Photos Gisela Kutzbach. ![]() The Class of 1918 Marsh “Symposium” led by John Magnuson Nineteen attendees appeared on this rainy afternoon to learn the history, nature, evolution and challenges of the Class of 1918 Marsh with the skilled educator John Magnuson, Director Emeritus of the UW Center for Limnology. The turnout included several wetland experts, and the tour became a symposium with their frequent contributions and discussions with John and the group.This Marsh, lying between the UW Hospital complex and Picnic Point, faces probably the most severe challenges of the Lakeshore Nature Preserve’s ecosystems. John Magnuson explained how the marsh water and ecology are challenged by road salt runoff, primarily from
Sedge expert Libby Zimmerman identified an Eleocharis species and several species of Carex, including bottlebrush sedge. She explained how reed canary grass, which is planted to reduce erosion and stabilize stream banks, forms rhizomes, making the invasive plant difficult to remove. At the “pier” on the east side, a thick stand of cattails, fronted by reed canary grass, prevents easy access to the Marsh’s open water. In the early 1970s, Libby’s husband, the late Jim Zimmerman, spearheaded the movement to restore the Marsh. ![]() David Liebl, an expert on stormwater runoff management, explained how storm water drains, from the Medical Research buildings and Children’s Hospital roofs, into the Marsh’s south inlet, and how another storm sewer, beneath the pavement we stood on, serves as an underground river connecting the Marsh to other campus water bodies, including the Pharmacy School pond. Dave reported that the highest salt contributor to the Madison Metropolitan Sewerage District is actually from our home water softeners, and recommended replacement of time-based softeners with models that soften relative to water usage. ![]() Roma Lenehan, birding expert, distributed copies of her checklists of the Preserve birds. During the walk, she pointed out
![]() Photographer Arlene Koziol documented the activities. The tour concluded at the observation deck on the north side of the Marsh, where we could barely view the pond beyond the wildly hybridizing cattails that have steadily grown over the past 40 years into the Marsh’s open water. There John discussed some of the strategies to restore and sustain this urban wetland gem, including dredging, cutting cattails and fluctuating the Marsh water level (low in winter, high in spring). John bemoaned the fact that he had not seen a muskrat in the Marsh in years, because they could consume cattails. Suddenly, Libby spied a young muskrat, in the marsh below the railing, nibbling on a cattail leaf. While we watched, a second baby muskrat emerged from a nearby watery hole. And then a third, a fourth and a fifth! We were all enchanted with the little muskrats, eating the cattails. What a glorious finish to this very satisfying “symposium”! Report by Friends host Doris Dubielzig ![]() This tour of cultural landscapes on the campus of the University of Wisconsin-Madison was led by Aaron Bird Bear, Assistant Dean for Student Diversity Programs in the School of Education. Aaron Bird Bear has ancestry among the Diné and is an enrolled citizen of the three affiliated tribes (Mandan, Hidatsa, Arikara). The walk began at the Memorial Union, at the second floor foyer of the main lounge, the original main entrance to the building. Fourteen of us listened as Aaron Bird Bear began with an introduction to the over 12,000 years of human occupation of the lands of UW-Madison, which is located on the traditional homelands of the Ho-Chunk Nation. At the entrance to the Memorial Union we learned about a part of UW-Madison history that is still little known even to long-term members of the community: the “pipe of peace” rituals that accompanied graduation ceremonies from l89l to l940. In these peace pipe events, large groups of European-American students pretended to be Native Americans, using stereotypes of rituals, regalia, and dialect. The Memorial Union was built in the middle of the early 20THCentury period of dominance of these ceremonies, and the peace pipe was featured in the official seal of the Union. In addition to hearing about these strange and nearly forgotten peace pipe rituals we also looked up at the ceiling of the foyer at the paintings of a dozen Indian warriors with feather headdresses, yet another stereotypical example of how Indigenous peoples were depicted at the time the Memorial Union was built. We learned that Picnic Point includes the oldest evidence of human occupation in the local area (Dejope, name meaning “four lakes” in the Ho-Chunk language). Picnic Point includes evidence of human occupation at least l2,000 years ago, when the four lakes were a connected into one larger lake. We made stops at two of the historical markers on campus, beside North Hall and Social Sciences. At each of these we discussed how these markers depict local and regional history through the point of view of white settlers, not of Indigenous peoples. The emphasis of these plaques is on the settlers’ "hard experience of colonizing the rugged west" and that Black Hawk “retreated” while being “pursued” by militia through the area in 1832, both plaques ignoring the long occupation of the area by the Ho-Chunk nation. Aaron summarized the history of the forced treaties from 1829 to 1837 that were intended to remove the Ho-Chunk people from Wisconsin. White settlers first wanted the lead mines of the Ho-Chunk, and later their agricultural land as well. Despite several forced marches of Ho-Chunk people to different areas west of the Mississippi, many of them kept resisting by coming back to their ancestral homelands in Wisconsin, where Ho-Chunk people continue to live today. Overlooking Lake Mendota on Observatory Hill, we learned that the current forested areas along the shore are a recent change. Previously the area was much more open, as it was maintained by Indigenous people as a bur oak savanna by fire ecology. A number of bur oaks exist on campus that are old enough to have begun their lives while the Ho-Chunk were maintaining the land as savanna. We ended the tour at the effigy mounds at the western end of Observatory hill. These are a couple of the extant mounds on the lands of UW-Madison; many of the mounds having been destroyed in the construction of campus buildings. Although marred by sidewalks, the two effigy mounds can easily be seen on observatory hill, a large bird effigy and a unique two-tailed water spirit (previously labeled a two-tailed turtle in some sources). Here we learned more about the history of mound building over more than 2000 years in Wisconsin, and the destruction of most of the mounds in the few centuries since the arrival of European Americans in the area. We came away with a much better understanding of the history of campus lands. Images of the Observatory Hill mound group, including historical images of the two-tailed water spirit can be found here: http://www.wisconsinmounds.com/ObservatoryHillMounds.html. More information about >12,000 years of Indigenous history at the preserve can be found here: https://lakeshorepreserve.wisc.edu/native-americans-and-the-preserve/. Summary prepared by the Friends host Eve Emshwiller. Dave Harring, aka Captain Dave, helped lead the not-quite-three-hour tour with emeritus professor John Magnuson, former director of the UW Center for Limnology, using two boats for the group of twelve. Both were tremendous hosts with an outpouring of joy and sharing their love of the lake with us. As in previous years, they surveyed the entire lake edge of the Preserve. Magnuson discussed the history, geology, flora and fauna observed along the shore, as well as writings about Lake Mendota, research and many more subjects.
On a beautiful afternoon before Memorial Day, seven Board members of the Friends of the Lakeshore Nature Preserve and two UW students led 15 guests on the 4th Sunday Bird and Nature Outing. Beginning at the entrance to Picnic Point, the leaders demonstrated, over 11 different stops, how the group inspires people to connect to and care for the Lakeshore Nature Preserve. The tour was informative for everyone, including the Board members! It was convenient that at just about 3:00pm, after seven stops, we reached a point where people who had had a long enough visit could return to the entrance. Most decided to spent extra time in the Preserve on this memorial afternoon, completing the full tour of 2 1/2 hours, covering just a bit under 1.5 miles. Stop 1: UW Student Macy Peterson explained the operations of the UW Bat Brigade. This citizen science project is supported with a $1000 stipend from the Friends. Stop 2. On the edge of Bill’s Woods, the Friends first project, Friends Secretary Paul Quinlan identified trees and spring ephemerals. Stop 3. At the UW Grounds compound, President Steve Sentoff explained the problems with the storage of materials and the truck traffic through the Preserve. Stop 4. Gisela Kutzbach, Membership Chair and Webmaster, related how the Friends provided volunteer labor for and funding of the Heritage Oak project, and how the recreated savannah connects Bill’s Woods to the Biocore Prairie. Stop 5. Alder Levin, recent UW graduate, described how the Biocore Prairie is used as a teaching laboratory and as a site for undergraduate research projects, including her own award-winning study on first flowering dates of prairie plants. Stop 6. Gisela Kutzbach and Tom Morgan explained the bluebird house project, which monitors the number and kinds of nesting birds and their eggs. They showed the group a tree swallow nest in one of the bluebird houses. Gisela also summarized the Friends efforts to attract Purple Martins to the Preserve, with the installation of a house with “luxury condominiums” for the social, cavity-nesting birds. Stop 7. Steve Sentoff reviewed the history of the East Savanna and the use of fire to encourage young oaks to thrive over invasive buckthorn. The Friends are contributing up to $7,500 toward the salaries of five Prairie Partners Interns, who are working in the Preserve each Thursday this summer. Last week the Interns pulled garlic mustard from the East Savanna.
Stop 8. Across from two linear mounds, Ethnobotanist Eve Emshwiller explained the different kinds of earthen structures that the Mound Builders created in Wisconsin and how the Picnic Point mounds are especially old. Stop 9. MJ Morgan, Editor of the Friends newsletter, and her husband Tom have begun a project collecting and identifying lichens in the Preserve. Their work is especially important because very few Preserve lichen specimens are in the Herbarium and the unusual plants are in decline due to environmental degradation. Stop 10. Matt Chotlos, UW Student Board member, described the Friends’ participation in Water Quality Monitoring with the Clean Lakes Alliance. He demonstrated how water clarity is determined with a turbidity tube, and explained how to distinguish green algae from blue-green algae (cyanobacteria). Stop 11. At the entrance to Picnic Point, Doris Dubielzig, Field Trip Coordinator, showed one of the areas that the Friends had planted in 2018 during our annual Spring Planting. She expressed the Friends’ hope that the Class of 1918 Marsh, across University Bay Drive, will benefit from restoration efforts to return it to a sedge meadow community. Doris Dubielzig, the Friends host for this field tri, coordinated this special Board Walk and provided the report, Photos by Doris and Gisela. The 2019 Wildflower Planting Project along a new path to the Biocore Prairie from the Frautschi Point Parking lot was a great success. Despite the heavy overcast sky and with rain predicted later in the morning, 16 volunteers came out ready plant, adding much cheer to this day and planting joyful sights for summer visitors. The five designated planting areas, plus a sixth area at the parking lot, were cleared of buckthorn about three years ago. For the last two years, speckled sunlight reaching the forest floor again encouraged wood flowers seeds in the ground to sprout. Thus, the project planners—a team of Friends and Preserve staff—could be assured that additional plantings will be reasonably successful. The plants ordered were divided into six batches, each batch selected to be most suitable for planting in a specific plot area, considering the amount of sunlight and slope direction and soil moisture. Monitoring the plantings this and next year will help us further improve the management of spring planting projects. ![]() Our team included volunteers recruited at field trips and on Earth Day, as well as 4 past presidents of the Friends: Ann Burgess, Janis Cooper, Glenda Denniston, Doris Dubielzig, Gisela Kutzbach, Roma Lenehan, MJ Morgan, Tom Morgan, Biss Nitschke, John Pfender, Holly Regan, Marj Rhine, Steve Sentoff, Monica Sentoff, Will Waller, Trisha Zhu. Bryn Scriver of the Preserve Staff supervised the planting. We used the efficient predator spades to plant the wildflowers with minimum disturbance of surrounding soil. When it started to rain around 11:00 am, the bulk of the plants was in the ground, and we left the rest for another day. See the full list of plants at Projects. We gathered for a quick round of refreshments with fruits, cheese and baked things. There was much satisfaction about enhancing this restoration area of Frautschi Woods with native flowering plants, sedges and grasses. The rain gently watered the new plantings. Photos provided by Glenda Denniston, Gisela Kutzbach, Bryn Scriver. Added: On May 24, the remaining plants were planted by Preserve seasonal staff in the designated plots. ![]() On Wednesday May 15th, twenty Friends and bird lovers ventured into the Preserve with Roma Lenehan in search of migratory warblers. Beautiful weather and bright sunshine provided the perfect environment for chasing these fluttering migrants through the high canopy of Frautschi Point. Many of the warblers we encountered on the walk were traveling from warm wintering grounds in Central and South America; passing through Madison on their way to northern breeding areas. Madison bird lovers rejoice during this brief migration window because it offers a chance to see many different warblers in one location. Every day brings new species arrivals, making birding during this season especially exciting and adventurous. On this morning, fifteen species of warblers were identified. It’s evident that warblers love the Preserve just as much as we do. Among the highlights of the Warbler Walk was an encounter with the rare and endangered Golden-winged Warbler. Roma explained that this species is experiencing a rapid and severe decline due to habitat destruction and hybridization with a similar species, the Blue-winged Warbler. It was evident that the opportunity to see and learn about such a rare bird was special as the “Oohs” and “Ahhs” rising up from the birding group prompted passing joggers to crane their heads in curiosity. The 15 warblers identified were Nashville Warbler, Bay-breasted Warbler, Blackpoll Warbler, Northern Parula, Golden-winged Warbler, Blackburnian Warbler, Yellow Warbler, Black-throated, Green Warbler, Common Yellowthroat, Chestnut-sided Warbler, American Redstart, Tennessee Warbler, Palm Warbler, Magnolia Warbler. A full list of the 56 species of birds identified on the two-hour walk is below. All along the hike, Roma shared her vast knowledge about what the birds do, where they came from, what their behavior means, what their calls sound like, and how/where best to spot certain species. Attendees were treated to a fun and educational morning and got to see many exciting and colorful spring migrants. New birders on the trip learned that searching for warblers invariably leads to staring straight up into tall trees where these elusive creatures flutter about. Seasoned birders joked about having “warbler neck”. Beginner or veteran, all attendees left this Friends walk knowing that warblers are one pain in the neck that’s well worth it. Report and photos by Seth McGee, Friends host for this event.
![]() Tom Brock, charter member of the Friends of the Preserve and E.B. Fred Professor of Natural Sciences, Dept. of Bacteriology, Emeritus, received an honorary Doctor of Science degree from the University of Wisconsin for his lifetime achievements. Tom Givnish, Professor of Botany & Environmental Studies, initiated the nomination. Brock has progressed through a remarkable career, reinventing himself several times but always innovating and transforming his chosen fields. Professor Don Waller of the Botany department notes in his support letter that Tom Brock's "commitment to his science, developing new knowledge and tools, and applying this knowledge to improve human and natural communities embody the values UW seeks to teach and share with students and other citizens.” With his wife Kathie, also a microbiologist, Tom became deeply involved in conservation ecology. During the 1990s, as residents of Shorewood Hills, Tom and Kathie started volunteer work in what was then called Campus Natural Areas (CNA). Garlic Mustard which they had discovered in the Preserve in 1995, was the motivating factor. They informed the Arboretum of the Garlic Mustard and sent them a check to help get control work started. Subsequently, the Director of the Arboretum Greg Armstrong asked the Brocks to organize volunteer activities at the CNA. For several years, from April 1997-1999, the Brocks led regular Sunday volunteer parties, removing Garlic Mustard and cutting Buckthorn and Honeysuckle. Bob Goodman, Henry Hart, Tom Helgeson, Susan Slapnick, Glenda Denniston, and others joined them. The Brocks also helped the Arboretum, then still in charge of CNA, raise money to support the area and hire Cathie Bruner in 1997 as Field Manager. The Friends of the Campus Natural Areas (since 2005 Lakeshore Nature Preserve) was officially formed on September 19, 2001. Today, Tom and Kathie Brock are widely acclaimed for the restoration of their Pleasant Valley Conservancy property near Black Earth, which has become a model for land managers and a training ground for the next generation of restoration ecologists. See also TOM's BLOG. Tom and Kathie have published (2019) a two volume online book detailing 25 years of restoration, land management techniques, restoration results, and lessons learned (see Pleasant Valley Conservancy website.). "While a young professor in microbiology at Indiana, Tom discovered in 1970 the extreme thermophile Thermus aquaticus thriving in a hot spring at Yellowstone National Park. The discovery debunked a key piece of conventional wisdom in biology — that life could not exist past about 158 degrees Fahrenheit. The bacteria’s heat-resistant DNA replicating machinery, Taq polymerase, was turned into a bedrock of modern molecular biology. In 1971, Brock joined the faculty of the Department of Bacteriology at Wisconsin, continuing his ground breaking research on microbes." See more at UW NEWS. ![]() The PULLERS, from left: Galen Hasler, Glenda Denniston, Olympia Mathiaparanam, Doris Dubielzig, Roma Lenehan, Kennedy Gilchrist, Steve Sentoff, Steve Rasmussen, Karen Nakasone, Gisela Kutzbach, Marcia Schmidt, Monica Sentoff, Seth McGee. Not shown Peter Fisher, Cyndy Galloway, Dan Anderson, Mitch Thomas. Photo by Bryn Scriver. The forecast had been rain, but it turned out to be a warm and mostly sunny afternoon—perfect for enticing our volunteers to come out and help clear the Frautschi Point woods area of Garlic Mustard plants. Roma Lenehan, the Friends great Garlic Mustard warrior, explained that this is an "off-year" with many small plants near the ground, not yet in bloom in their first year. Our strong team of 15 volunteers and leaders Roma and Bryn Scriver, Preserve volunteer coordinator, pulled for 2 1/2 hours. Then our leaders compacted the harvested plants into 6 large bags. These volunteer days in the woods with the Friends are wonderful hours of connecting with old friends, welcoming new friends, learning and sharing and, of course, working a few hours for a great cause. Come and join our Wildflower Planting Party on Saturday May 18, 9:00 am–Noon at Frautschi Point.
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