Conservation Campus Wetland and Watershed Seminar at Wolf Road Prairie Presenters/Opening Comments Q and A Plant Propagation and Transplanting Demonstration Wolf Road Prairie and Buffer Restoration Field Trip Wrap Up Session

Questions and Answers Transcript of Discussion Topics - Prairie House Nature Center Q. What is the present status of water quality in Salt Creek and Addison Creek? A. Swano - In the 1960's, a sign was posted on Salt Creek warning people not to go near the water. Today, as a result of the Clean Water Act, Salt Creek has come back from the brink. Much of Salt Creek, the creek floodplain and uplands are publicly owned. This is protecting the watershed and open space and providing for recreational trails. The Salt Creek region is also known as the Salt Creek Greenway. Addison Creek is located in a light manufacturing area. The real pollution load comes from first flush as rain and snow melts wash oil, pollutants and de-icing chemicals from streets and cars into the creek. There are about ten sewage treatment plants in the Salt Creek Watershed. The sewage is treated quickly, but in times of big rain events, raw sewage goes into the creek. Water levels rise quickly during these storm events as runoff from paved surfaces rushes into the creek. This often causes flooding and associated property damages. We are not sure how long the water remains a health risk after the rains stop. The Illinois EcoWatch program trains volunteers to monitor rivers, prairies and forests and to some extent urban areas. I collected micro-invertibrant samples from Salt Creek and this year I have come up with some good water quality indicators. I also collect in Bemis Woods in a wide meander and gravel area with riffles. When you pick up a shallow pan of water now, it is fairly clear. Salt Creek is also becoming a recreational amenity for canoeing and fishing. Q. What is the difference between point source and non-point sources of pollution? A. Swano - Point source is a point of known emission like a factory. Non-point can be road salt, fertilizers and chemicals from lawns that run off the urban landscape into surface waters and filter into wetlands and watersheds. Q. What is a good way to educate people about paved surfaces and alternatives? I am from Dominican University, and we are dealing with the issue of paved surfaces. Dominican is using an interlocked system that is porous and better than gravel. A. Pizzo - We need to develop momentum behind porous paving alternatives based upon success stories so public officials feel confident to consider these new concepts. An example might be a parking lot that is slightly sloped that uses porous paving. Even brick drives and patios percolate water through the brick. Porous surfaces are also easier to repair because only the damaged areas need to be repaired. Also bioswales that funnel water into a swale and then eventually into a storm sewer are effective. The open bottom cools and cleanses the water before it flows into a creek or river. We need to identify more success stories using porous paving and promote the benefits. We also need to consider the economic component of porous paving supply and demand. Municipalities seek proposals using traditional paving methods. They need to be made aware of alternatives so they can ask for information about these new ideas. They need to request their engineering consultants to learn about alternative materials and seek competitive bids using these materials. The bidders will claim it is more expensive, but with a larger market demand, the cost would quickly become more competitive. You also need to look at long-term costs, not just installation costs. Paying for the costs of flooding later is much more expensive than installing porous paving surfaces at the beginning. The Water Reclamation District has experimented with different systems such as swales instead of islands between parking lots. We need to find examples which exist and work and take these projects to elected officials and decision makers. Q. At the local official level, hard engineering is required by ordinances. Is there research available that would help give engineers and officials more confidence in use of porous materials for water control? A. Pizzo - Yes. The Northeastern Illinois Planning Commission, Center for Watershed Protection, has studies that demonstrate that the saturation of the area below paved porous surfaces does not become unstable. You do not have to move water away from paved areas quickly. You can allow for percolation and still have stability. We are still in the learning curve on this issue and need to know the effects of our climate on paved surfaces, like rain followed by freezing. Q. What about the economic benefits of using native plants instead of turf grass? A. Pizzo - We were asked by Illinois Tool Works to make their site more ecologically friendly. As a rule they pay $4,300 per acre per year to maintain turf grass. This comes to $120,000 over a 20 year period. Now they are thinking of converting their corporate campus to native plants at a cost of $30,000 per acre for 20 years. I have a spreadsheet that compares the cost of native ground cover versus turf grass, and it is definitely less expensive to manage native ground cover. These comparative costs of now versus later maintenance should be put to taxpayers. Q. How do you rate golfing on courses with natural areas? Doesn't it make it harder to find your ball? A. Pizzo - I personally find that playing a course with natural areas out of play makes me a better golfer, and I actually lose fewer balls as a result. And golf courses with natural areas out of play are much less expensive to maintain. Some of the early attempts to introduce natural areas in golf courses have poor results. But that is because wildflower mixes were used that were not indigenous to the specific site. Now we match the palate of flowers to the site for better results. For example, if you plant California poppies in Illinois, it is like putting a penguin in Florida. The survival rate is very poor. Q. How restricted is the geographic area in which native plants can be introduced? A. Murray - Most of what you hear under the guise of genotype is a philosophical stance based on Darwin's use of variation for adaptation and natural selection. If you use natural selection, you need to stay very close to the set of conditions where the plant grows best. Given the variation of our natural areas, you can either say that a plant can only grow in a certain place or take the longer-term view which builds on variability within a natural area so that the conditions of the area will quickly sort out what grows in that place. At Wolf Road Prairie and buffer, we decided we do not put any plants in that came from seed sources other than Wolf Road Prairie. The exception to this is for species no longer physically here but that once occurred in the preserve, such as Riddell's goldenrod, which we know was here 15 years ago. So we use seed sources from nearby populations and are reintroducing the species to the site. There is no right answer. But the locally adapted plant is constrained, and it will survive well as long as the conditions remain the same. Variability gives options for adaptation. Q. Are you interested in maintaining the local genetics or in having variability for long-term survival? A. Pizzo - There are lots of holes in the historic records. In Michigan on a project site we were working on we decided to introduce purple coneflower because it was growing in surrounding areas and because it is pleasing. I have introduced plantings from Iowa and Wisconsin to Illinois. I try to look at the big picture and a free flowing system. There had to have been movement of gene pools in pre-settlement times. Wind can move seeds a long way. But there is a distinction between a former cornfield being restored and Wolf Road Prairie, and the restoration techniques are very different in these two worlds. In a high quality natural area like Wolf Road Prairie, you work with the species on site and remove invasive species so native species can thrive. In a cornfield restoration to native landscape, all the native species have been destroyed, and restoration involves eliminating exotics and introducing new native plants. We just built an 8 acre wetland near DeKalb. It was solid reed canary grass to start with. Once we eliminated the reed canary grass, wetland birds returned. Monkey flower showed up where there was none before. And the seed of monkey flower is like dust. You can put 400 seeds in a dot. I can only think that the waterfowl brought seeds in and the plant began to grow because conditions were conducive to its habitat needs. We are finding all sorts of new plants growing in the wetland following the removal of reed canary grass. Q. What about cool weather grasses? If you went to the temperate zone of Asia, what would you find? A. Pizzo - There are some dry prairies known as the Steppes in Georgia (formerly the Soviet Union). The grasses there have been associated with farming for a long time. Reed canary grass was a hay grass in Europe and was brought to America for hay production by immigrants. It has a niche in the European ecosystems as it evolved there. But here it is like sand in the crankcase. Nothing eats it, and it starts growing in spring before native plants and grows later in the season. So it has a longer time to spread and take over. That is why we remove it from our native ecosystems. Q. With globalization, are we going to have to monitor for everything? A. Pizzo - We need to understand the earth better which requires monitoring. We have to watch ecosystems and when we see something invasive moving in, we must act to remove it. Most invasive plants are coming in from botanically related industry, including arboretums. They are in the business of propagating plants and introducing new plants. But accidental introductions are now getting to be relatively rare. For instance, you cannot bring in plants in your suitcase at the airport. But escapes introduced through industry can wreck havoc such as the Asian longhorned beetle and the zebra mussel. We have to keep in mind that the most genetically successful species are the ones that evolved here. You can have a garden of native plants that looks beautiful. We currently have a concept of a Martha Stewart garden as the only beautiful garden, and we have to adapt from that image and educate people about the benefits of a native plant garden. If you plant and maintain a native landscape, you have wildlife in your own backyard. And people love butterflies. Q. Are there still plans to bring bison to Nachusa Grasslands? A. Pizzo - The preserve is not quite ready for them. The current size is about 1,500 acres, and land is still being acquired. Insects are being introduced. There may be plans to introduce prairie chickens and elk. Q. How soon can you introduce transplants after using Round Up on reed canary grass? A. Pizzo - The same day. We sprayed a turf grass lawn with Round Up, waited an hour for it to dry, drilled seed into the turf and within 6 weeks we had new plants. Round Up does not move in the soil. I am interested in converting lawn and minimally disturbed ground and using herbicide as the main controlling mechanism. Q. Do you have recommendations for starting and planting seeds? A. Pizzo - We are finding that plants do not live alone. They need fungi and bacteria in the soil. The fungi provide nutrients that do not come directly from the soil. So if the fungi are back in the soil, plants do better. When we work in a turf area, we do not want to disturb the soil. Also, we inoculate the seed with fungi so that when the seeds germinate, they get the nutrients they need. We put all our seeds into a product that looks like kitty litter for better germination. We argue against turning the soil. We are just starting to study the effects of microrize in the soil and on prairie plants and are learning about soil structure which refers to the porosity of the soil. In traditional planting, seeds are put deep into the ground. This disturbs the soil and compacts it. Q. What kind of medium are you using to grow your plants? A. Murray - We have started seedlings in two brands of commercial starter mix. Most of our seedlings and plants are grown in Sunshine plug mix 5 that contains 70-80% Canadian sphagnum peat moss, perlite, dolomatic limestone, gypsum and a wetting agent. We have also used Metro mix 360 that contains vermiculite, Canadian sphagnum peat moss, bark ash and washed sand. These starter mixes have replaced our use of 1 part perlite (or vermiculite), 1 part sphagnum and 1 part soil since they retain water without compacting and are cost effective. Growing plants is labor Intensive. We have 400 students at UIC earning a grade in a course. So we have many hands to do transplanting, and we work with plants that are small because they are easier to handle at this stage. We can transplant up to 10,000 seedlings in five days. At Wolf Road Prairie in 1992 through 1994, Carol Murray and I recorded all of the plants found in 5 sites over each growing season. The record was 100 plants and 200 seedlings in a one-foot circle, yet there are still bare spots. I use the 2.5 inch bare spots for transplanting. That is the diameter of a standard bulb planter. You can transplant the year old plants that we grow in 2.5 by 2.5 by 3 inch plug containers into that amount of space, add a little water over the next two weeks and you can expect 80-90% survivorship of transplants at Wolf Road Prairie. Most of the year old plants for transplanting at Wolf Road Prairie buffer have bonsaied. They are root bound, but when you put them into the soil, you get rapid new root growth. Initially most of the plant growth occurs underground. Lush top growth conditions may not be as important as establishing a strong root system. We have been doing a lot of rethinking gardening based on our transplanting experience. This means that we are getting away from disturbing soil. Soil disturbance seems to just encourage growth of weedy species, something we hope to curtail. A. Pizzo - We use flats to germinate plants at my facility and then transplant them into larger trays. In a few weeks we can get them into the ground. I use fertilizer and can have the same sized plant as Dr. Murray gets in two years without using fertilizer. This is root growth, not plant growth. Plant growth occurs in the field. People are just starting to understand and study root systems. The biomass in the root system of prairie plants is about a foot underground, and the roots are very deep within the soil. Q. What success do you have with germination? A. Murray - Germination with each species is very different. You ask yourself these kinds of questions: Should we have one seed per pot or a group of seeds in a pot to simulate the natural process of distribution from a seedpod? Should seeds be planted when they are ready on the plant or should you wait until the next season? Do seeds need dormancy? Any seed will germinate based on viability. Pre-treatment methods give you synchrony. This is probably the answer to dormancy. It is probably not a physiological state. Germination is a developmental thing, and it can take a number of paths. But dormancy many synchronize things so you get a burst. This fits better into our scheduling. The important thing is probably moisture, so seeds have the opportunity to soak up. I like to put hand broadcast seeds out in cold weather so I can rely on freezing/thawing to work the seed into the ground. If you are putting seeds out or drilling them, you don't want to cold moist stratify and then put them through a drill. In a drilled area, you see things coming up slowly over four to five years. At Fermi Lab, the Baptisia came up seven years after planting. Baptisia has a heavy seed coat, so it takes a lot of time for moisture to get through. In one study where we drilled the seed, the plants became vulnerable to fungal infections. There are few seeds that will germinate near freezing, but without moisture, no seed germinates. Everything really has to do with what you want to accomplish and these two basic seed requirements. You will need to address the issues of seed storage. You can use cold moist or dry stratification methods for about a ten week period. You can put seeds out in January although some recommend November. You can produce lots of plants growing them from seed in a controlled environment like a greenhouse. Once seeds germinate under these circumstances, you can easily move young plants into larger containers and water and monitor the plants. After they are at least a year old they can be transplanted into the field with good survival rates. But you have to water them for at least two weeks and introduce them into the ground when the weather is cool. I like to put plants in the ground in April. Return to Seminar opening page return to main page, Save the Prairie Society