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LUREC Restoration Work Days

The monthly restoration work day was held at LUREC on Saturday, July 13. Eleven volunteers, braving the mosquitoes and other wetland creatures, focused on clearing some of the damage from the intense rain storms of late June. The volunteers cut up a large 3-stemed box elder that blew down in the wetland.  Fortunately, it was a tree that was intended to be removed. The root system had been partially torn from the ground, and the trunk lay horizontally with the roots and attached soil vertical.  As the volunteers started cutting away the upper branches, the roots and lower trunk began to rebound, bringing the lower trunk into an upright position.  Box elders are full of surprises!

The prairie flowers are being watched with great interest and anticipation following our spring burn.  Some of what has been seen in the area just off Country Cloud Road includes:  Butterfly Weed, Prairie Coreopsis, Pale Purple Coneflower, Wild quinine, White Wild Indigo, Golden Alexanders, Purple Joe Pye Weed, Great St. John’s Wort, Panicled Trick Trefoil, Mountain Mint, and Culver's root.

Butterfly Weed

Culver's Root

Written by Roberta Lammers-Campbell