A Very Prairie New Year

“Pay attention. Be astonished. Tell about it.” — Mary Oliver

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The last week of the year is a good time for reflection. I’ve been thinking about all of you; the wonderful readers who have joined me on this virtual prairie hike adventure.

Belmont Prairie, Downers Grove, IL (January 2022).

Eight years ago this week in December of 2014, I wrote the first post for Tuesdays in the Tallgrass. About 40 people joined me for that initial post, mostly family and close friends, who encouraged me by clicking “follow” and then, reading each week.

Dark-eyed junco (Junco hyemalis), Crosby’s backyard, Glen Ellyn, IL.

Thanks to so many of you who love prairie and the natural world, this week the “odometer” ticked over to 1,000 followers. In the world of social media, of course, that’s small potatoes. But not to me. Each of you are an important part of this virtual prairie community.

Kaleidoscope of sulphur butterflies (Colias sp.), Nachusa Grasslands, Franklin Grove, IL. (2015)

Each week, your readership reminds me of how many people love the natural world.

River jewelwing damselfly (Calopteryx aequabilis), Nachusa Grasslands, Franklin Grove, IL (Summer 2022).

It’s also a reminder of how important it is, as the late poet Mary Oliver said, to “tell about it.” It’s not enough to enjoy the natural world and the prairie for ourselves. Sharing it with others—or as the remarkable Dr. Robert Betz once said—making “a real effort to educate the public about (the prairie’s) importance as a natural heritage and ecological treasure” is an ongoing necessity. If you and I don’t share the wonders of the natural world with others today, how will they make the personal connections that ensure the prairie’s survival in the future?

First prairie hike for this little one, Fermilab Interpretive Trail, Batavia, IL (2018).

What a world of wonders the prairie offers us! When you count the Tuesdays over the past eight years, that’s 416 virtual hikes we’ve made together.

Female northern cardinal, (Cardinalis cardinalis) Crosby’s backyard, Glen Ellyn, IL.

It’s a lot of stories; a lot of hikes. Yet, each week we barely scratch the surface of the diversity, complexity, and marvels of the tallgrass prairie and the natural world. There is so much to see!

Chasing dragonflies at Nachusa Grasslands, Franklin Grove, IL (2017).

Tuesdays came no matter where I found myself. So, we’ve dreamed about prairie together as I corresponded on my travels from far-flung Sicily…

Broad scarlet dragonfly, (Crocothemis erythraea), Santo Stefano, Sicily, Italy. (2014)

… to the deserts of Arizona…

Queen butterflies (Danaus gilippus), Tucson, AZ. (2021)

…. to the mangrove swamps in Florida.

Roseate spoonbill (Platalea ajaja), J.N. “Ding” Darling National Wildlife Refuge, Sanibel Island, FL (2020).

But I’ve learned that I don’t need to travel the world to find marvels. The best adventures are waiting for us in our own backyards.

Cooper’s hawk (Accipiter cooperii), Crosby’s backyard, Glen Ellyn, IL.

Most of our adventures together have been in the tallgrass, of course. Together, we’ve explored remnant tallgrass prairies, national prairie preserves, cemetery prairies, planted prairies in parks, and large tracts of Nature Conservancy prairies.

Wild bergamot (Monarda fistulosa), Crosby’s backyard, Glen Ellyn, IL.

We’ve investigated birds on the prairie and at the backyard feeders…

Red-bellied woodpecker (Melanerpes carolinus), Crosby’s backyard, Glen Ellyn, IL.

….as well as turtles, snakes, butterflies, bunnies, bees, beetles, coyote, opossum, beavers, muskrats, and anything else that flies, buzzes, or hovers. As I’ve learned more about prairie pollinators and prairie plants, you’ve cheered me on, gently corrected my wrong ID’s, offered ideas on your own favorite places, and said an encouraging word or two at just the right time.

Male calico pennant dragonfly (Celithemis elisa), Schulenberg Prairie, The Morton Arboretum, Lisle, IL (2020).

You’ve hiked with me through some difficult times, through my cancer diagnosis and recovery; through a new knee that got me back on the prairie trails again; and through a medical issue that sidelined me for several months this fall, unable to do much more than photograph the prairie plantings and the garden in my yard. Your encouragement and comments have been an important part of the healing process.

Monarch butterfly (Danaus plexippus) and ruby-throated hummingbird (Archilochus colubris) on non-native zinnias (Zinnia sp.) in Crosby’s garden, Glen Ellyn, IL (2019).

As a former bookseller, I couldn’t write about prairie here without also writing about the books I love. Over the years, we’ve rounded up a yearly list of favorite and new prairie books each season, a tradition I’ve come to enjoy (and I hope you have, too!). And, as I’ve penned this blog, I’ve written or co-authored three additional books, all of which took inspiration from the discipline of writing this weekly missive. Every one of you has played a role in my books, because your questions and comments informed and encouraged those writings.

Chasing Dragonflies (2020, Northwestern University Press); The Tallgrass Prairie (2016, Northwestern University Press); Tallgrass Conversations (2018, Ice Cube Press, with Thomas Dean).

As I write this note to you at the end of 2022, we continue to navigate a world-wide pandemic. Here in Illinois, during the holidays, we are experiencing a “triple-demic” of RSV, flu, and Covid-19. Another daunting aspect of life in 2022 is the lack of civility and care for each other that the news headlines trumpet daily. Sometimes, the world feels like a scary place. But whatever a week brings, I always feel the joy of knowing this little prairie community is here on Tuesday, ready to share with me in the excitement and delight of a virtual hike.

Eastern fox squirrel (Sciurus niger), Crosby’s backyard, Glen Ellyn, IL.

“To know fully even one field or one land is a lifetime’s experience,” wrote the Irish poet and novelist Patrick Kavanagh. To know the tallgrass prairie—or even the small plantings in my suburban yard—would take several lifetimes. But what an adventure it is!

Cooper’s hawk (Accipter cooperii), Crosby’s backyard, Glen Ellyn, IL.

At the end of 2022 I want to say thank you. Thank you for reading. Thank you for giving me a bit of your time each Tuesday morning. Thank you for the constant stream of well-wishes; of “shares,” and “retweets” and Facebook reposts. Especially thank you to those who take time to click the comment button from time to time and say how much you love prairie, or if you enjoyed a particular post or photograph, or that you want to recommend a book title. Maybe you sent me a link to an interesting website, or you have an idea about how to get rid of buckthorn or honeysuckle, or you wanted to share a “prairie recipe” or tip. Thank you for being a community.

Shooting star (Dodecatheon meadii), in bloom at Beach Cemetery Prairie, Ogle County, IL, on an outing with the Illinois Native Plant Society (2022).

Most of all, thank you for getting outside. If you live in prairie country, thank you for hiking the prairies. For planting prairie in your gardens. For volunteering on a prairie, or dedicating your professional life to caring for prairie, or sharing prairie with a child. Thank you for photographing prairie and sharing prairie with your friends. If you live in a different part of the country, or the world, thank you for admiring prairie and for caring for the natural world, as I know some of my readers do from across the miles. My prairie may be your forest, or wetland, or river. We are all stewards of wherever we find ourselves.

Trail over Willoway Brook, Schulenberg Prairie, The Morton Arboretum, Lisle, IL (2015).

As this year of prairie hikes comes to a close, thank you for caring. Knowing you are out there continues to be an inspiration to me, through the light and dark places as we hike the prairie trails, wade in the prairie streams looking for dragonflies and damselflies, watch for bison…

Bison (Bison bison), Nachusa Grasslands, Franklin Grove, IL. (2021)

…and explore the natural world together.

Ebony jewelwing damselflies in the wheel position, Schulenberg Prairie, The Morton Arboretum, Lisle, IL. (2017)

As the poet Mary Oliver wrote, “Paying attention: This is our endless and proper work.”

Regal fritillary butterfly (Speyeria idalia), Nachusa Grasslands, Franklin Grove, IL. (2021)

What a joy that work can be! I can’t wait to hike the trails in 2023 together.

Schulenberg Prairie, The Morton Arboretum, Lisle, IL. (2016)

Happy New Year! See you next week on the prairie.

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Mary Oliver (1935-2019), whose quote opens this last post of 2022, wrote compellingly about experiencing the natural world. In New and Selected Poems, she writes: “When it’s over, I want to say: all my life / I was a bride married to amazement.” Yes.

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Join Cindy for a Class or Program this Winter

The Tallgrass Prairie in Popular Culture—Friday, January 20, from 10-11:30 a.m. Explore the role the tallgrass prairie plays in literature, art, music—and more! Enjoy a hot beverage as you discover how Illinois’ “landscape of home” has shaped our culture, both in the past and today. Offered by The Morton Arboretum in Lisle, IL; register here.

Nature Writing Workshop— Four Thursdays (February 2, 9, 16, and 23) from 6-8:30 p.m. Join a community of nature lovers as you develop and nurture your writing skills in person. For more information and to register visit here.

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Illinois Prairie needs you! Visit Save Bell Bowl Prairie to learn about this special place—one of the last remaining gravel prairies in our state —and to find out what you can do to help.

***Note to readers: All undated photos were taken this week.

August at Nachusa Grasslands

“I love to roam over the prairies. There, I feel free and happy.”—Chief Satanta

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It’s one of those picture-perfect days for a quick trip to Nachusa Grasslands. Sunny, cool; a few puffy cumulous floating in the sky. Bison graze around the corral area, or rest in the tallgrass.

Bison (Bison bison), archives.

I’m not looking for megafauna today, however. I’m looking for small stuff. My hope is to walk three of my dragonfly routes and see if anything is flying. Odonata season–the time of year I chase dragonflies—is winding down.

On one route, I see nary a damsel or dragon. There are plenty of wildflowers, like this Common Boneset.

Common Boneset (Eupatorium perfoliatum).

Boneset was once used medicinally to reduce fevers, both by Native Americans and early European settlers. It’s nectar and pollen attract bees, butterflies, and other pollinators, and it serves as a host plant for several moth caterpillars, including the Ruby Tiger Moth.

Nearby, Ironweed laces the prairie with purple.

Common Ironweed (Vernonia fasciculata).

The crunch of plants under my feet are a reminder of the drought we’ve experienced in parts of Illinois this summer. Even when I strike out on seeing dragons and damsels, and my data sheet is empty, the hike is never wasted. There is so much to see!

Showy Goldenrod (Solidago speciosa).

Every route, every trail leads to new discoveries.

Nachusa Grasslands in late August.

Still, I’m a bit discouraged by that blank data form. I head for the next route. The pond is almost empty…

Pond and stream with adjacent wetlands at Nachusa Grasslands.

…only a Common Green Darner and a pair of Twelve-Spotted dragonflies hanging around. A couple of Common Whitetails. A damselfly or two. And then—I spot it! This pretty little damselfly: the Citrine Forktail.

Citrine Forktail (Ischnura hastata).

Look at those colors! Like a dish of sherbet ice cream. Later, at home, I read up on this species in my “Dragonflies and Damselflies of Northeastern Ohio” (a good field guide for Illinois!) and learn that the Citrine Forktail may be “irruptive” and “appear at newly mitigated wetland sites.” Notice the orange stigma, in a unique place for damselflies. At only .9 inches long, these tiny damsels blend in well with the rushes and sedges in our prairie wetlands.

Citrine Forktail (Ischnura hastata).

I also read in Dennis Paulson’s “Dragonflies and Damselflies of the East” that there is a population of this damselfly in the Azores that consists only of females. They lay eggs which are all female! It is the only parthenogenetic Odonata population in the world. Cool! Supposedly, they can remain into November in the Midwest, if temperatures stay warm. I find two more as I hike. I hope they’ll hang out here for a while longer.

Big bluestem (Andropogon gerardii).

There are other treasures to be found today. Deep in the wetlands, as I search for damselflies, I find the tiny skullcap in bloom. There are three different species at Nachusa—I’m not sure which one this is.

Scullcap (Scutellaria spp.).

I admire it for a bit, then continue my route. The American Cornmint, crushed under my rubber boots, sends out a delightful tang. The air is refreshed with the fragrance of menthol.

American cornmint (Mentha canadensis).

As I hike, I almost stumble over a monkeyflower.

Monkey Flower (Mimulus ringens).

I crouch to take a closer look. The bees are working it over.

Unknown bee on Monkey Flower (Mimulus ringens).

Not far away are stands of Purple Love Grass. What a great name!

Common Water Plantain (Alisma subcordatum).

I scan around it for damselflies, but come up empty.

As the day gets hotter, and I continue walking my routes, my steps slow. The better to notice the hummingbird working the jewelweed.

Ruby-throated hummingbird (Archilochus colubris) on Spotted Touch-Me-Not or Jewelweed (Impatiens capensis).

Or the Springwater Dancer Damselflies in the mating wheel.

Springwater Dancer damselflies (Argia plana).

A Variegated Meadowhawk patrols a stream, moving at such a fast clip I can barely get the ID, much less a photo. These are one of Illinois’ migratory species, and also, as Kurt Mead notes in his field guide Dragonflies of the North Woods, one of the most difficult to net. I content myself with having a stare down with a male Springwater Dancer damselfly.

Springwater Dancer damselfly (Argia plana).

Along the shoreline, a cranefly sits motionless.

Cranefly (Family TIpulidae, species unknown).

Sometimes, people mistake them for dragonflies. You can see why! But look closely. Nope.

The last portion of my final route involves climbing to a high overlook. Look at that view!

View from Fame Flower Knob.

My legs ache, and I’m hot and sweaty despite the cooler temperatures. It’s been a good day. So much to see.

Fame Flower Knob.

After a week of depressing headlines, a few frustrating work issues, and crazy heat and humidity, today has been a respite. I came to Nachusa feeling empty. I’m leaving with a sense of peace.

Wildflowers and prairie grasses in August.

Thanks, Nachusa Grasslands.

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The opening quote is from Chief Satanta, Kiowa Tribe (1820-1878). Read more about him here.

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All photos in this week’s blog were taken at Nachusa Grasslands, Franklin Grove, IL.

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Join Cindy for a class or program!

September 9, 9:30-11 am– in person–“The Tallgrass Prairie: Illinois Original Garden” Oswego Hilltoppers Garden Club, Oswego Public Library. Please visit the club’s Facebook page for guest information, event updates pending Covid positivity in Illinois, and Covid protocol.

September 27, 7-8:30 p.m.–in person–“The Tallgrass Prairie: Illinois Original Garden” Arlington Heights Garden Club. Please visit the club’s website here for guest information, event updates pending Covid positivity in Illinois, and Covid protocol.

If you enjoy this blog, please check out Cindy’s collection of essays with Thomas Dean, Tallgrass Conversations: In Search of the Prairie Spirit. Order from your favorite indie bookseller, or direct from Ice Cube Press.

Tallgrass Conversations

5 Reasons to Hike the December Prairie

“A sense of wild is engendered by awareness, a sense of connection with and deep understanding of any landscape. The pavement of any city side street wriggles with enough life to terrify and delight us if we choose to immerse ourselves in it.”—Tristan Gooley

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Brrrr! It’s bitter cold—-as it should be in December. The added hours of darkness make it seem more arctic. Whenever the sun shines during these short-lit days, I follow it, cat-like, from room to room, hoping to absorb as much as possible. Soon, the Winter Solstice will arrive, and with it, the return of longer hours of sunshine.

On our Christmas tree, I hang dried orange slices, backlit by the tree lights, which turn the fruit to stained glass. Anything for more light. Color. Beauty.

December darkness is relentless. The pandemic has shadowed this month with more than the usual gloom as well: limiting our activities, sapping our spirits.

For these reasons alone, it’s a great time to get outside. Walk the tallgrass prairie trails. Enjoy brief moments of sunshine, or even a bit of fresh air if the day is gray. Undecided? Worried that it’s too chilly? Here are five more reasons to hike the December prairie.

1. Unpredictable sightings. I walk the local prairies regularly, yet I never fail to see something that surprises me. This past week, a belted kingfisher rattled from the prairie pond, amusing me with its call—and its “hairstyle.”

Not far away, a partially dismantled osage orange fruit lies on the tallgrass trail, appearing as some alien Christmas ornament.. Despite its name, it’s related to the mulberry, not the orange. I’ve seen them here before, but they always give me pause. So strange!

Nearby, in a stand of tall goldenrod, a plant displays two types of galls on one stem. Huh! That’s a new one for me.

You can see the ball gall–maybe two of them? —topped by the rosette or bunch gall. Nice to see the insects are sharing housing arrangements. It was a big year for goldenrod—-and galls—on this particular prairie.

Piles of cut branches are everywhere; the sign of ongoing maintenance to keep woody shrubs and trees out of the tallgrass. It appears staff or site stewards tried to whack back this persistent tree.

What a stubborn will to live! You have to admire its determination.

2. That peculiar slant of light. December has a certain type of light unlike any other month; low and piercing.

When the sun breaks through the clouds, the prairie ponds and wetlands dazzle; almost too too bright to look at directly. The light turns the landscape monochromatic in places.

The sun scrolls through the sky, hugging the horizon and leaving the grasses and forbs alight.

Aster seeds, seen in this light, may be more beautiful in December than when they were in bloom.

Their puffs of brilliant white brighten gray days.

3. The sounds of winter. As I type, half-asleep at the kitchen table in the early hours, a THUNK snaps me fully awake. A Cooper’s hawk is perched outside, scanning the area for breakfast. Looks like it hit the window—ouch!—but missed its prey. No wonder the feeders have been mostly empty all morning.

I watch the hawk preen its feathers, then hop down and sift through the prairie dropseed planted around the porch. Looking for voles, maybe? Or a frightened sparrow? It’s the hungry season for hawks. After a few minutes, it flies away. The backyard is quiet for a long time afterwards.

Out on the prairie edges, juncos flit from tree limb to limb, their wings shuffling through the dry leaves. Geese honk their way over the tallgrass, headed for a nearby empty soccer field.

There’s a sound of water running. Listening, I feel the tension in my muscles loosen and I relax. Water music has that effect on us. The brook runs free and clear. And, I imagine, cold.

Ice laces the edges.

I think of the legions of dragonfly and damselfly nymphs waiting under the water to emerge. So much life unseen! Water on the prairie—whether pond, brook, river or wetland—-is ever-changing. Never dull. Always interesting. There’s always something new to see, no matter the time of day, or the season of the year.

4. Those December skies! What will each day bring? Steel gray scoured clouds, snuffing out the sun? Burnished blue cloudless skies, warming up the 20-degree temperatures? Veils of milky cirrus?

Or wind-combed clouds, streaming toward some destination far away?

This week, the prairie’s night skies will fill with meteor showers, the best holiday light show of all. By night or by day, the prairie is a front-row seat to the life of the skies. Don’t forget to look up.

5. That feeling of well-being that a good prairie hike brings. Clear your mind of Zoom meetings. Inhale the fragrant smell of December—frozen earth, wild bergamot seedheads, the tang of ice and decay. Turn off the news. Put paid to politics. Silence your cell phone. Go for a prairie hike.

You’ll be glad you did.

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The opening quote is from Tristan Gooley, who has authored many books on reading and navigating the landscape. Thanks to my son and daughter-in-law for the boxed gift set of Gooley books—I am enjoying them immensely. Check out Gooley’s website at The Natural Navigator.

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All photos copyright Cindy Crosby and taken at College of DuPage Natural Areas, East Prairie, unless tagged otherwise (top to bottom): unknown vine with berry from invasive honeysuckle (Lonicera japonica); author’s Christmas tree, Glen Ellyn, IL; belted kingfisher (Megaceryle alcyon); osage orange (Maclura pomifera); ball galls (Eurosta solidaginis) and rosette gall (Rhopalomyia solidaginis) on tall goldenrod (Solidago altissima); unknown tree sprouting; last leaves; prairie pond; COD East Prairie and line of osage orange trees (Maclura pomifera); unknown aster (Symphyotrichum sp.); Cooper’s hawk (Accipiter cooperii), author’s backyard, Glen Ellyn, IL; Canada geese (Branta canadensis) flying over COD East Prairie; Willoway brook ice, Schulenberg Prairie, The Morton Arboretum, Lisle, IL; East Prairie skies; East Prairie skies; bench at COD East Prairie.

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Please consider giving the gift of books this holiday season! Support writers, small presses, and independent bookstores. Through December 31st, you can receive 40% off The Tallgrass Prairie: An Introduction (2016) and Chasing Dragonflies: A Natural, Cultural, and Personal History (2020) when you order directly from Northwestern University Press. Use the code HOLIDAY40 at checkout. At regular price, order Tallgrass Conversations: In Search of the Prairie Spirit (with Thomas Dean) from Ice Cube Press (2019). Or order these three books from The Arboretum Store or your favorite indie bookseller. Thank you, and happy reading!

Looking for Light on the Prairie

“The…world becomes even more beautiful the closer you look. All it takes is attention and knowing how to look.” – –Robin Wall Kimmerer

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What stories does a feather have to tell?

Jeff and I are hiking Belmont Prairie; our last hike, it turns out, for a while. As we follow the shallow stream to where it disappears…

…the feather comes into focus at my feet. It looks unreal, with its polka-dotted edge and its graceful arch. Such a lovely silken feather, lying in the mud. I wonder. Who did it belong to? Later, I text a photo of it to a birder friend. Downy or hairy woodpecker, he tells me, most likely. I wonder at the stories this feather could tell.

Once, this feather embodied flight. It provided warmth and waterproofing. Now, it is grounded. Soon, it will disappear into the prairie soil and be unremembered. Except by me.

I’ve felt sad this week. A deep grief. There has been so much loss.

My usual remedy for sadness and uncertainty is to go to “my” prairies and walk, journal, and think. But the options for hiking have narrowed this week. My prairie stewardship is on hold because of our shelter in place orders. One prairie where I lead a regular work group is closed. Another, requires extensive travel, and I’m no longer comfortable with the idea of driving 90 miles each way. Scientific research and monitoring is halted until the end of the month. Or longer.

And now, a walk on Belmont Prairie—not far down the road from where I live—is becoming an adventure of the sort I don’t want. Narrow trails. Too many hikers.  Each of us is painfully aware of not getting too close to the other.

Today, instead of enjoying my walk here, I feel tense.  A hiker appears in front of me, wearing earbuds. I step deep into the tallgrass and we smile at each other as he passes. Too close. Another arrives on a bike. Seeing me, she veers away. A bridge requires single file passage. Because there has been no prescribed burn due to the shelter in place, it’s difficult to see someone until we almost run into each other.

This, I come to understand as I walk, will be my last hike here for a while. Looks like our backyard prairie may be the best place for Jeff and me during the next few weeks.

Later, I try to sit with my grief over yet another loss. The loss of beloved places. I try not to ignore my feelings. Not set them aside. But I let myself feel this grief for a few moments. It’s slightly terrifying. My old ways of coping by “going for a hike on the prairie”  are no longer available. I realize I have a choice. I can be angry at what’s closed off to me. I can be depressed at what’s been taken away. Or…

I can be grateful for what I do have.

I don’t want you to think I’m being Polyanna-ish about this. I’ve been mad this week, and I’ve been sad. I mourned when my  stewardship work was put on hold; and cried again when my other prairie was closed to visitation, science work, and stewardship. These were good decisions by good organizations—made for the health of people. But tough for those of us who love a particular place. Each loss hurt—to not see the emerging pasque flowers bud and bloom, to miss the first crinkled shoots of wood betony pushing through the prairie soil. To not watch the killdeer return. The emerald scrub brushes of newly-emerging prairie dropseed will be long and lush before I’m hiking those trails again.

The solace of these familiar and beloved places is no longer available to me. I can choose to continue to be unhappy about this.  Or I can take account of what I do have.

What I do have is a backyard. I have my walks. ‘Round and ’round and ’round the block we go each morning, Jeff and I, soaking up the surprisingly diverse natural world of our neighborhood. Grassy lawns full of common wild violets, our Illinois state wildflower.

Lawns–some full of diversity, others chemical-ed into monocultured submission. Some are power-edged sharply along sidewalks with volcano-mulched trees, aggressively brought to obedience.

Others are softer, more natural. An eastern-cottontail munches clover in one yard against a backdrop of daffodils. We hear loud cries, and look up as sandhill cranes fly over, somewhere above the bare silver maple limbs etched across blue skies and altocumulus clouds. Like stained glass windows to another world we can only dimly perceive.

In the cracks of the driveways and the sidewalks blooms a tiny flower. I’m not sure if it’s early Whitlow grass or common chickweed. My iNaturalist app isn’t sure of the ID either. I count the petals, and when I return home, consult my field guides. Chickweed has five petals, deeply cleft—which look like ten at a glance, my guide tells me. Early Whitlow grass, I read, has four petals, deeply cleft, looking as if they are eight petals.

Chickweed it is!

As I walk, I think about the backyard that will be my “hiking spot” for the foreseeable future. When we moved in, and I met our neighbor Gerould Wilhelm, co-author of Flora of the Chicago Region, I asked his advice. What was the best way to learn native plants of our area? He told me, “Key out one plant in your backyard a day, Cindy. By the time a year has passed, you’ll know 365 plants.” It was great advice, and I took it—for a while. Then I quit. Now might be the time to put my backyard ID into more regular practice.

I walk through my yard, looking. Over there in the prairie patch—new growth of rattlesnake master and shooting star. And —oh no—buckthorn! Garlic mustard has infiltrated the prairie patch, pond, and garden beds. While my attention was elsewhere doing my stewardship work removing invasives the past few years, these bad-boy plants crept into my yard.

As I slosh through the wetter areas of the yard, I’m reminded that our house is on the downslope of three other homes in our suburban subdivision. Water, water, everywhere. Our raised beds have helped us solve the problem of growing vegetables in the “swamp.” My little hand-dug pond, sited at the lowest point of the yard, holds some of the water and provides great habitat for western chorus frogs, dragonflies and damselflies, and marsh marigolds which came into bloom a few days ago on the perimeter.

One of the outflows of all this water is the mosses that accumulate.  But what kinds of mosses? With mosses on my mind, I ordered a  “Common Mosses of the Northeast and Appalachians,” recommended by Dr. Andrew Hipp.  (If you haven’t checked out his thoughtful and intelligent woodland blog, give it a look!) Mosses are…. difficult. I begin with a simple moss that appears in the cracks of our neighborhood sidewalks and backyard patio.

I follow with a photo of a moss from my Belmont hike.

Hmmm. It’s a good book. But I can see identifying mosses is going to be a challenge. There’s no instant gratification, and it’s a lot more difficult than ID’ing the chickweed. But, it’s a potentially absorbing activity that I can look forward to over the next few weeks in my backyard. I like having something new to focus on that’s available to me.

After a while, I put the mosses book aside and sit in a patch of sunshine. A cardinal pours out his heart to his lady-love. Goldfinches chitter and chat, then swarm the thistle feeder, resplendent in their brightening plumage.

It’s good to feel a connection with my backyard. A kinship with the natural world.  ID’ing mosses—feeling the warmth of the sun, listening to birdsong—reminds me that I’m not alone. I needed that reminder right now.  You, too?

We’re in this together.

Keep looking for the light. It’s there.

Keep watching for signs of hope. Pay attention.

Hope and light are all around us. We only need to look.

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The opening quote is from Robin Wall Kimmerer’s (1953-) Gathering  Moss: A Natural and Cultural History of Mosses (2003). She is best known for Braiding Sweetgrass, but her earlier book is still my favorite.

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All photos copyright Cindy Crosby (top to bottom): downy or hairy woodpecker feather, Belmont Prairie Nature Preserve, Downer’s Grove, IL; stream trickling to an end at Belmont Prairie Nature Preserve, Downer’s Grove, IL; gray-headed coneflower (Ratibida pinnata), Belmont Prairie Nature Preserve, Downer’s Grove, IL; trail by Belmont Prairie Nature Preserve, Downer’s Grove, IL; raccoon (Procyon lotor) tracks, Belmont Prairie Nature Preserve, Downer’s Grove, IL; footbridge over the stream through Belmont Prairie Nature Preserve, Downer’s Grove, IL; Jeff hikes Belmont Prairie Nature Preserve, Downer’s Grove, IL; Canada wild rye (Elymus canadensis); Belmont Prairie Nature Preserve, Downer’s Grove, IL; common blue violet (Viola sororia sororia); silver maple (Acer saccharinum) with sky and clouds, author’s neighborhood, Glen Ellyn, IL; common chickweed (Stellaria media), author’s neighborhood, Glen Ellyn, IL;   bee balm (Monarda fistulosa), invasive Queen Anne’s lace (Daucus carota) and native rattlesnake master (Eryngium yuccifolium), Belmont Prairie Nature Preserve, Downer’s Grove, IL; marsh marigold (Caltha palustris), author’s backyard pond, Glen Ellyn, IL; unknown moss (but hopefully not for long!), author’s neighborhood, Glen Ellyn, IL; unknown moss (but hopefully not for long!); Belmont Prairie Nature Preserve, Downer’s Grove, IL; goldfinches (Spinus tristis) at the feeder, author’s backyard, Glen Ellyn, IL; rattlesnake master (Eryngium yuccifolium), Belmont Prairie Nature Preserve, Downer’s Grove, IL; sun halo over author’s backyard prairie patch, Glen Ellyn, IL: unknown rock on my neighborhood walk, Glen Ellyn, IL.

Thanks to John Heneghan for help with the bird feather ID.

*****

Cindy’s Speaking and Classes

Cindy’s classes have moved online! For updates on classes and events, please go to http://www.cindycrosby.com. The next “Tallgrass Prairie Ecology” class online begins in early May through The Morton Arboretum. See more information and registration  here. The website is updated to reflect current conditions. A free spring wildflower webinar is also in the works! Watch for a link on Cindy’s website, coming soon.

Want more prairie? Follow Cindy on Facebook, Twitter (@phrelanzer) and Instagram (@phrelanzer). Or enjoy some virtual trips to the prairie through reading Tallgrass Conversations: In Search of the Prairie Spirit and The Tallgrass Prairie: An Introduction.

The Prairie Whispers “Courage”

“Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms — to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.” —Viktor Frankl

******

I look out my kitchen window at my prairie planting and see something purple. It’s the first hyacinth in bloom. I’m a native plant aficionado, so hyacinths aren’t really my thing—and I planted prairie over the old garden bulbs that came with the house we purchased 20 years ago. But I welcome hyacinths this week. I welcome their fragrance. Their beauty. That purple.

As I look out the window, I’m folding a piece of parchment paper to reuse. I’ve been baking. A lot. Comfort baking, I imagine.  I’m also trying to minimize trips to the store during this time of Covid-19 uncertainty. “Shelter in place” means making the most of what we have on hand.

I think of my grandmother, now long passed, who would have recognized this moment. One of my early memories is of her washing a piece of foil, then folding and putting it away to reuse later. As a child, I scoffed at this, impatient. There is always more than enough of everything, wasn’t there? An endless supply. Little did I know. But she knew.

Grandma also had a victory garden. Long after World War II was over, her garden gave her a sense of food security. Today, I feel a kinship with her as I start vegetable and flower seeds; spade my soil to plant lettuce, peas, potatoes.

I feel the ghosts of my grandmothers in my kitchen as I plan meals using the ingredients I have on hand, plant a garden, struggle with uncertainty, just as they once did during the Great Depression and wars. This March, I’ve remembered—and marveled at—the courage they showed as they lived through times of insecurity, fear, and uncertainty. Courage I didn’t appreciate before. Courage I didn’t really understand when I was a child, or even a young adult. Courage I didn’t understand until now.

I wish both my grandmothers were here so we could talk.. They’d tell me their stories of these times, and I could ask them for advice. As a child, I squirmed when they hugged me. What I wouldn’t give to hug my grandmothers now.

*****

Jeff and I hiked the Schulenberg Prairie Sunday in 50-mph wind gusts, needled by sharp darts of drizzle that stung our faces and soaked our jeans. It was cathartic. And invigorating. We hiked  staying “present to the moment” by necessity—aware of the cold we felt as we  sloshed through the flooded prairie trails.

I noticed the way the black walnut and oak trees were darkened on one side from the slashing rain, and bone dry on the other.

Shadow and light.

The tallgrass is flattened now. In previous years, its tinder would be gone to ashes from the prescribed burn that happens here each spring. For perhaps the first time in its almost 60-year history, this planted prairie I’m hiking through may not see fire when it needs it. A prescribed fire here calls for a team of two dozen people or more working together, and it’s difficult to envision those simple gatherings happening anytime soon. By the time our Illinois shelter-in-place guidelines are lifted, it will likely be too late.

I walked, and I wondered, and I looked. In the savannas and woodlands this week…

…I found sharp-lobed hepatica, nodding in the rain.

Joy!

I’m looking for a different wildflower today, the pasque flower. Its newer scientific name is Pulsatilla patens, synonymous with the older name,  “Anemone patens.” It’s one of the first native wildflowers to bloom on the prairie. “Pasque” comes from the Hebrew word “pasakh,” “passing over.” The flower blooms despite the flames of early prescribed burns, usually during the Easter season (thus the name “pasque” is also associated with this holiday from the old French language.). When the pasque flower blooms, I feel as if winter has passed.

Last year, the few blooms we had were memorable, perhaps for their scarcity.

“Anemone” means “windflower.” “Pulsatilla” means “sway” or “tremble” which the pasque flower does in March and April breezes. Appropriate names for a flower that faces down cold, brutal winds, prescribed fire, and seasonal instability.  Our population of these fuzzy-leaved lavender bloomers had dwindled in previous years; down to just one clump plus a few stragglers. Since then, I’ve sown seeds to re-invigorate our plant population from another preserve.

Would anything be up? Jeff and I slogged through the mud and peered closely. And there! One tiny fuzzed green shoot. And another! Barely detectable in the wind and drizzle.

Life was going on, despite the chaos of the outer world. Nature calmly follows the rhythm of spring. It was a shot of hope in a dismal month. Brave little pasqueflower. It seemed to whisper to me. Courage.

I find myself trying to summon courage for each day. Not for tomorrow, or for next week, but for the 24 hours ahead of me, in which I need to make good choices. Courage right now, as Governor Andrew Cuomo has said in one of his binge-worthy news conferences on Covid-19, means “looking for the light.” I desperately want to be strong, but some days, it’s tough to know where to start. Looking for the light seems like a good place to begin.

Courage.

The courage to get up each morning, get dressed, make a meal. Even if no one sees us.

Courage. The courage to rise each morning and school our children.

Courage. The courage of those who live alone, whether from necessity or from choice—and who ride this season out, bereft of their usual friendships and routines.

Courage. Those who work in a makeshift office in a bedroom, an attic, a basement, or from the kitchen table. We may deliver groceries, work in hospitals, fill prescriptions. We watch our businesses implode, our freelance work vanish, our jobs lost, our retirement savings plummet.

And still. We choose to take the next step. We teach a lesson on weather to our children. Go for a walk with the dog and wave to the neighbors—-neighbors we’ve never seen before until two weeks ago and suddenly have gotten to “know” from across the road—because they are out walking too.  We realize that so much is out of our control.

And yet, the world goes on.

In the midst of it, we find courage to make the choices we can make.  Courage to sit through another online meeting—trying to show up with our best game face, even though we feel like getting into bed, pulling the covers over our head, and not coming out for the next month.

Or maybe the next two.

Courage to be patient with our children as they sense the fear we feel and need us now—and our reassurances—more than ever.

Courage to be kind to our spouse and those we share space with—adult children, older parents, grandchildren. We find ourselves together 24/7, without the distractions of outside errands and activities. Our margin for patience gets slimmer each day. But we dig deep. We find new reserves. Because patience and kindness are the things that matter most. They are choices we can make.

We ask for courage to be patient with those who don’t see this crisis the way we do, and act in ways we find irresponsible—or perhaps, overly-cautious.

Courage to bake bread, start learning a new language, clean out a drawer, begin a journal, plant garden seeds, laugh at an old sitcom, watch re-runs of classic baseball games because there is no opening day. Because the crack of a bat, the roar of the crowds— the  memory of what once was normal is something that reassures us. We find humor in situations—-even when we don’t feel like laughing. Why? Because those are choices available to us, when so many other choices are not.

We scrape up our last bit of bravery to find courage to live into the next hour, much less the next day. To think ahead? It’s terrifying. We turn on the news, then turn it off. We need to know, but we don’t want to know.

In a world where once we had so many possibilities at our fingertips —and just about anything we wanted was available to us at the tap of a computer key—we have different choices to make now. How will we live in this new reality? When we look back on this next year—in five years, ten years—what stories are we living out that we we tell our children, our grandchildren, and our friends? How will we use this time we are given? What chapter in our lives will we write? It’s up to us. Today. Right now.

Don’t surrender to fear.

We can choose to love. To be kind. To keep moving forward.

Take courage. You’re not alone.

Together, let’s keep moving forward.

*****

The opening quote is from Viktor Frankl’s (1905-1997) Man’s Search for Meaning. Frankl was a Holocaust survivor and Austrian psychiatrist who lost his wife during their incarceration. A quest for meaning was what Frankl said helped him survive tremendous uncertainty and suffering. “Meaning,” he says, came out of three things: work, love, and courage in the face of difficulty. Read more here.

****

All photos and video copyright Cindy Crosby (top to bottom): Dutch hyacinth (Hyacinthus orientalis), author’s backyard, Glen Ellyn, IL; rolling pin, author’s kitchen, Glen Ellyn, IL; Willoway Brook, Schulenberg Prairie, The Morton Arboretum, Lisle, IL; seed starting, author’s office, Glen Ellyn, IL: flooded trail, Schulenberg Prairie, The Morton Arboretum, Lisle, IL; tree lashed by rain, Schulenberg Prairie, The Morton Arboretum, Lisle, IL; prairie dropseed (Sporobolus heterolepis), Schulenberg Prairie, The Morton Arboretum, Lisle, IL; Schulenberg Prairie Savanna, The Morton Arboretum, Lisle, IL; sharp-lobed hepatica (Anemone acutiloba), Lisle, IL; pasque flower (Pulsatilla or Anemone patens) in bloom on the Schulenberg Prairie in 2019, The Morton Arboretum, Lisle, IL; pasque flower (Pulstilla or Anemone patens) seeds, Schulenberg Prairie, The Morton Arboretum, Lisle, IL; pasque flower (Pulsatilla or Anemone patens) shoots, Schulenberg Prairie, The Morton Arboretum, Lisle, IL; Schulenberg Prairie; Schulenberg Prairie; shooting star (Dodecatheon meadia), author’s backyard prairie, Glen Ellyn, IL; bur oak (Quercus macrocarpa), log on the Schulenberg Prairie, The Morton Arboretum, Lisle, IL; March on the Schulenberg Prairie, The Morton Arboretum, Lisle, IL; western chorus frogs (Pseudacris triseriata); The Morton Arboretum, Lisle, IL; compass plant (Silphium laciniatum); mosses (unknown species, would welcome ID suggestions!); common milkweed (Asclepias syriaca), Schulenberg Prairie, The Morton Arboretum, Lisle, IL; fox squirrel (Sciurus niger), Schulenberg Prairie, The Morotn Arboretum, Lisle, IL; switchgrass (Panicum virgatum), Schulenberg Prairie, The Morton Arboretum, Lisle, IL; bridge over Willoway Brook, Schulenberg Prairie, The Morton Arboretum, Lisle, IL; cup plant (Silphium perfoliatum), Schulenberg Prairie, The Morton Arboretum, Lisle, IL; chalk art, author’s driveway, Glen Ellyn, IL.

****

Cindy’s classes have moved online! For updates on classes and events, please go to http://www.cindycrosby.com. The next Tallgrass Prairie Ecology class online begins in early May. See more information and registration  here.

*****

Have you always been curious about the native landscape of the Midwest, but didn’t have time to read?  Tallgrass Conversations: In Search of the Prairie Spirit (order directly from Ice Cube Press) and The Tallgrass Prairie: An Introduction  from Northwestern University Press (order from your independent bookseller if they remain open or deliver, or from Bookshop or Amazon.com.  I’m grateful for your support for prairie, books, small publishers, and freelance writers like myself.

A Little Prairie Solace

“Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine. Meanwhile, the world goes on…” — Mary Oliver

******

Jeff and I began the hopeful work of garden prep on Sunday. We added a new raised bed and filled it with compost and top soil; then knocked down some old zinnia and tomato stalks in an older raised bed and carted them away.  I spaded and forked in a dollop of compost here, breaking up a dirt clod over there. And then — look! A few sprouting onion sets, missed from the year before. Something alive and growing! So welcome.

In the herb garden, the chives were up. My Egyptian walking onions were vital enough to cut some of the tops and use them in an omelet. The first greens of the year. In the backyard prairie patch, the signs of life were less evident. But I know it’s only a few days  until the life-force of new plants push through the ground. Spring.

As I raked topsoil, we heard a racket overhead. Waves and waves of sandhill cranes.

The cranes, as it turned out, were flying just ahead of a snowstorm that has since blanketed the Chicago region. By bedtime Sunday, the garden we had readied was covered with white. The pond and the prairie patch as well. We woke Monday morning to a completely different backyard that the one we’d gardened in the day before.

Everything looked softer somehow, the harsh edges of unraked leaves and prairie grass stalks in the backyard blunted by snow. The activity and bag-lugging and digging the day before was over now for a while.

I scanned the pewter sky. So silent. The cranes were somewhere north now, ahead of the weather.

*****

On Saturday, the Illinois shelter-in-place order was announced. Feeling unsettled by events, Jeff and I went to the Belmont Prairie for a short hike.

The prairie was empty.

The sandhill cranes flew over as we hiked. It was reassuring, somehow—certainty in the midst of uncertainty. The cranes migration is a rhythm of spring, as dependable as the sun rising in the morning. Knowing that cranes of some species have been around for at least 10 million years is a comfort. Their lives go on.

The creek flowed through the prairie, winding its way through this remnant as it likely has since time before human memory. Western chorus frogs sang from the wet areas. Creeeeek! Creeeek!

A train whistled in the distance. High—oh so high in the sky—a plane  from O’Hare took off for parts unknown, and I thought of my niece, returning that same day from Australia after a study abroad cut short. How glad I was to know she was on her way home! I wondered—how much longer will planes continue to fly?  Will travel cease, as it did after 9/11? Unimaginable, only a month ago, that we would ponder these questions today.

But life is full of the “unimaginable” right now. I thought of the stories I was hearing from friends; fears for health, for job security, for older family members far away.

Jeff and I walked, and walked, and walked. In the creek, the new growth of cursed crowfoot spreads across the surface of the water.

Deer tracks sliced through the grasses and wildflowers and mud…

….showing where they had made their way through the prairie to drink here. I stepped across the footbridge and peered closer.

Iris speared through the stream. That vivid green! The prairie was coming alive.

I turned from the footbridge and made my way along the path. Would the Belmont Prairie stewards be able to burn this remnant prairie this season? How, when groups of people can no longer gather? Disruption. When will life return to “normal?”

My stewardship work on both prairies where i volunteer is on hold. As it should be.

All the hustle and bustle of tasks I once deemed imperative have taken a back seat to staying healthy.

Keeping others healthy.

And yet. In this midst of knowing so many of the ordinary tasks I take for granted would cease, it felt like a relief to do something—even if “doing something” essentially meant doing nothing. Or at least, less of what I was accustomed to.

****

In our new work-from-home rhythm, Jeff and I went for a walk Monday morning, admiring the transformation of our suburban street. A few houses down, the  neighborhood children—sequestered at home, with schools closed—had made a snowman.

By Monday afternoon, the snow had all but melted. In the wetlands at the Arboretum, the skunk cabbage was in bloom. People were out walking in the neighborhood, desperate perhaps for some fresh air.

My backyard pond, covered with the white stuff just six hours before, was snow-free by 4 p.m.

This new rhythm of our days—the rhythm of sticking close to home—has its rewards. The backyard in close proximity has taken on new significance.  I refill the bird feeders, and marvel at the common but welcome birds that visit. Laugh at a fat robin that attacks the suet, or the herd of mourning doves that peck at the safflower seed. The squirrels even get a pass this week as they scale the feeders—a Herculean task, due to squirrel baffles and other deterrents. Their ability to make me laugh is worth a few pounds of birdseed. The snow this weekend brought out the first truly “gold” goldfinches, which showed up at the thistle feeder in full mating plumage. A change of color. Another signpost of spring.

After our morning walk on Monday, Jeff and I worked from home until supper time. Then, we went for another walk to end the day. We’ve both found that a 30-minute hike helps alleviate the stress that can accumulate when the news of the day feels like…well…too much. These walks are bookends to the day that are helping us establish new rituals of “normalcy.”

Around and around and around the block we walked, oohing and aahing over simple things. The sound of a cardinal singing. Lichens patterning a a tree branch in olive green. We even saw an owl.

What will the next few days bring? We don’t know.  Every day is a new challenge in focus. We choose what we can control: Kindness. Patience. Attentiveness.

Letting go of what we can’t control.

As we walked around the block, we noticed that the snowman, made that morning by the kids down the block a few hours earlier, was now only a memory.

But above that slushy mess, the flowering silver maples along the street signaled the hope of spring. Of a new season.

 

Each day is a new challenge.

Meanwhile, the natural world goes on.

We can still choose to pay attention.

*****

The opening quote is from the poem, Wild Geese, by Mary Oliver. This particular poem has been so widespread and oft-quoted that people tend to dismiss it. It remains one of my favorites. Haven’t read it? Check it out here. You’ll be glad you did. Stay well, my friends.

****

All photos and video taken at Belmont Prairie Nature Preserve, Downer’s Grove, IL;  unless otherwise indicated (top to bottom): garden bed, author’s backyard, Glen Ellyn, IL; sandhill cranes (Antigone canadensis); author’s backyard pond, Glen Ellyn,IL; garden beds, author’s backyard, Glen Ellyn, IL; trail through Belmont Prairie; sandhill cranes (Antigone canadensis); creek through Belmont Prairie; Indian hemp/dogbane (Apocynum cannabinum); round-headed bush clover (Lespedeza capitata) (infected with a virus); cursed crowfoot (Ranunculus sceleratus–thank you Andrew Hipp, for the correction!); thimbleweed (Anemone cylindrica); footbridge over the creek; iris (unknown species); compass plant (Silphium laciniatum); rattlesnake master (Eryngium yuccifolium); pale purple coneflower (Echinacea pallida); queen Anne’s lace (Daucus carota); snowman, author’s neighborhood, Glen Ellyn, IL; skunk cabbage (Symplocarpus foetidus); The Morton Arboretum, Lisle, IL; author’s backyard pond, Glen Ellyn, IL; pair of goldfinch (Spinus tristis) previously taken in April 2019, author’s backyard, Glen Ellyn, IL; Indian grass (Sorghastrum nutans);  owl, species uncertain, author’s neighborhood, Glen Ellyn, IL;  little girl checks out the natural world; wild quinine (Parthenium integrifolium); snowman, author’s neighborhood, Glen Ellyn, IL; silver maple (Acer saccharinum), author’s neighborhood, Glen Ellyn, IL; compass plant (Silphium laciniatum); Belmont Prairie trail.

***

Cindy’s classes have moved online! For current updates on classes and events, please go to http://www.cindycrosby.com.

*****

Have you always been curious about the native landscape of the Midwest, but didn’t have time to read?  Tallgrass Conversations: In Search of the Prairie Spirit (order directly from Ice Cube Press) and The Tallgrass Prairie: An Introduction  from Northwestern University Press (order from your independent bookseller if they remain open or deliver, or from Amazon.com for delivery in April.).  I’m grateful for your support in this difficult time for prairie, books, small publishers, and freelance writers like myself.