December 9, 2009 at 7:07 am (botany, history (human), mammals)
Tags: common cattail, marsh, Mayslake, muskrat, orchard, raccoon, Salix babylonica, Typha latifolia, weeping willow
by Carl Strang
There are several small marsh areas at Mayslake Forest Preserve. One of them was dug to provide fill for constructing the parking lot. Last year the vegetation was relatively sparse, but this year the parking lot marsh has a dense growth of tall common cattails.
That marsh contains two large mounds, the dens of muskrats. Muskrats last winter lived in tunnel dens they dug in the bank. The difference has me thinking that perhaps the mound nests, constructed from cattails, are a preference. The muskrats did not need to go to the trouble to build the mounds, but did so anyway. An alternate possibility is that the density of muskrats has increased there, so more dens are needed.
Another marsh, near the stream, also was dug originally to provide fill, this time to elevate a foundation for the chapel when the site still was a Franciscan retreat center.
There is one likely muskrat mound in this marsh as well, but I will need to see it closely after the water freezes to be certain. The area recently was highlighted by the beautiful yellow color of the weeping willows.
The orchard is on the mansion grounds not far from that marsh. In a recent post I mentioned how deer have been dining on apples there. I failed to comment on a raccoon trail that also leads to these fruit trees.
While other animals also use trails of this size, the masked mammals’ big flat feet and routine travel pattern produce this distinctive sign of their presence.
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October 13, 2009 at 5:50 am (botany, ecology, history (human), methods)
Tags: Acer saccharum, beech, Carya, Culver, Culver Military Academy, dry forest, Fagus grandifolia, fish hatchery, hickory, Larix laricina, Marshall County Indiana, Maxinkuckee Moraine, mesic forest, Moore Lake, oak, original land survey, Quercus, savanna, soils map, sugar maple, swamp, tamarack, The Nature Conservancy, Union Township
by Carl Strang
Yesterday I began to recount my study of what my home township in Indiana was like in the 1830’s, before Americans began to transform it from wilderness to a predominantly agricultural landscape. Here is a more detailed line drawing of the final map.
The surveyors’ description provided enough information for me to rough out the map. Getting to the final version required another step. I acquired a soils map of Marshall County, and looked for correlations between soil types and vegetation categories as the surveyors described them. A specialist might have done it differently, but for my part I was satisfied that the correlations were good enough to draw the detailed boundaries of vegetation areas by combining the surveyors’ records with the finer-scale soils map.
Of the various communities defined by woody plants, swamps are the ones most absent from today’s Union Township. The characteristic swamp tree was the tamarack. Here is some foliage of that species, which is unusual in that it is a deciduous conifer.
I remember seeing a tamarack tree at the old state fish hatchery that was formed out of the south end of Moore Lake, but that tree died years ago and I know of none surviving in the township today. There are bits of shrub swamps here and there.
A relatively moist (mesic) forest occupied much of the east half of the township, on the rolling Maxinkuckee Moraine. Sugar maples and beeches were characteristic trees, though not necessarily the dominant ones. A remnant of this forest is preserved by the Culver Military Academy in its Bird Sanctuary.
Dry forests and savannas were dominated by oaks and hickories, which grew on more sandy soils. They represent a continuum, with the forests shading the ground fully in the summer and the savannas’ trees scattered enough that prairie-like vegetation grew between them. A forest of this type was the site of the town now known as Culver. Gradually over my lifetime I have noted the passing, one by one, of the town’s largest surviving old oaks that were part of that forest. Dry forests persist mainly in the many “wood lots” preserved by the township’s farmers.
I am grateful to all the individuals and organizations, from private landowners to The Nature Conservancy, who have made the commitment to preserve and restore these reminders of the wilderness that once was.
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October 12, 2009 at 6:24 am (botany, ecology, history (human), methods, restoration)
Tags: Culver, Houghton Lake, Lake Maxinkuckee, Lost Lake, marsh, Marshall County Indiana, Moore Lake, pitcher plant, prairie, presettlement vegetation map, sedge meadow, sundew
by Carl Strang
The places we live and work all were wilderness at one time. National parks, state parks, and nature preserves protect and restore areas intended to represent the landscape as it was before large scale agriculture began the sequence of alterations that have brought us to the present day. A number of studies have produced maps showing, in some detail, what the counties of northeast Illinois looked like 200 years ago. In the late 1980’s I decided to do the same for my home area, Union Township in Marshall County, Indiana. Here is a watercolor rendering of my results.
I was reminded of that project by Scott’s excellent recent post on Houghton Lake in his blog, Through Handlens and Binoculars. Houghton Lake is the small lake closest to the map’s upper left corner. Recently it was acquired by The Nature Conservancy, and is getting the attention needed to preserve the rare plants and vegetation communities that have persisted there.
My mapping study began with a visit to the County Surveyor’s office in Plymouth, the county seat, to copy the original survey notes. Two different surveyors explored the local wilderness in 1834 and 1836, marking out the land on behalf of the federal government for purchase by American farmers. The 1836 survey covered the Indian reservations east of Lake Maxinkuckee, the township’s largest lake. That land became available to eastern farmers after the forced removal of the Potawatomis via the Trail of Death in 1838.
The surveyors’ main job was to mark the section corners and quarter-section corners (a section is a square mile). They also described the land, so that potential buyers back east could make informed choices. For example, after passing through what is now the center of the town of Culver, on Maxinkuckee’s west shore, surveyor David Hillis wrote, “Land rolling. 3d rate. Hickory etc.” Usually the description was dispassionate, but sometimes a surveyor revealed the sweat and discomfort of the experience. After crossing an extensive marsh at the south end of Maxinkuckee, Jeremiah Smith allowed, “In Sec. 34, at 1.20 (an) inlet 80L. wide coming from S.E. A nasty place.”
One of the surveyor’s helpers blazed and inscribed two “witness trees” at each section corner. The surveyor wrote down the species of tree along with its distance and direction from the corner. The tree species suggests to us what kind of vegetation community occupied that corner, and the tree’s distance from the corner hints at how close together the trees grew in that spot.
The surveyors also were careful to map the edges of lakes and rivers. In Union Township only Lake Maxinkuckee and Lost Lake, off its west edge, still have their 1834 outlines. Houghton Lake, and Moore Lake beside it, today are remnants of the larger water bodies they were in the early 1800’s. Two other lakes in the west-central part of the township no longer exist. They were shallow and easily drained for agricultural purposes before 1900.
Plant communities described by the surveyors as “wet prairies” or “marshes” were extensive mixtures of cattail marshes, sedge meadows and wet to moist prairies. Some of these featured insect-eating plants, the pitcher plants and sundews. See Scott’s post for photographs of some of the botanical beauty preserved around Houghton Lake. I’ll continue this account tomorrow.
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August 7, 2009 at 6:17 am (botany, history (human), plant-eating insects)
Tags: blue lettuce, Cacalia atriplicifolia, early goldenrod, Eupatorium purpureum, Eupatorium rugosum, Helianthus hirsutus, hispid sunflower, Lactuca floridana, leaf miner, Mayslake, pale Indian plantain, phenology, purple Joe Pye weed, Solidago juncea, white snakeroot
by Carl Strang
The list of flowering plants I have encountered at Mayslake Forest Preserve has grown to an impressive length. I look forward to next year, when I will be able to compare the first flowering dates between years. As I mentioned in an earlier post , flowering dates indicate the biological impact of climate in a given year. Today I will add to the list of native species blooming in woodlands.
A sure harbinger of autumn is the first of our goldenrods, appropriately named early goldenrod.
A magnificent towering beauty is the pale Indian plantain. This one once was rare and local, but restoration stewards enthusiastically have spread it to appropriate habitats across the county.
The blue lettuce is a beautiful plant topped with spreading arrays of blue flowering heads.
One that shouts to you from a distance with its large yellow flowers is the hispid sunflower.
Two species in the diverse genus Eupatorium have made their appearance in Mayslake’s woods: purple Joe Pye weed,
and the notorious white snakeroot.
The last plant was established, decades after the fact, as the one responsible for milk sickness. In some but apparently not all populations of white snakeroot, the plants produce a defensive poison which, when eaten by cows, becomes concentrated in their milk. Few herbivores consume this plant. One exception is a leaf miner .
Among the people killed by milk sickness in the 1800’s was Abraham Lincoln’s mother.
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June 11, 2009 at 11:24 am (botany, history (human))
Tags: alfalfa, annual bedstraw, bittersweet nightshade, Chrysanthemum leucanthemum, Coronilla varia, crown vetch, English plantain, European highbush cranberry, Galium aparine, Mayslake, Medicago sativa, Melilotus officinalis, multiflora rose, ox-eye daisy, Plantago lanceolata, Potentilla recta, red clover, Rosa multiflora, Solanum dulcamara, sulfur cinquefoil, Trifolium pratense, Viburnum opulus, weed, yellow sweet clover
by Carl Strang
Time to catch up on the weeds at Mayslake, as many more have begun to bloom. Remember that here I am using a very broad definition for “weed,” that includes the meanings of undesirable plant, plant not native to the area, and plant with a weedy life history strategy . An example of a native plant in the last category is annual bedstraw.
The rest of today’s species are imports. Two are from Asia, and perhaps it is no coincidence that these two both had specific agricultural uses. One is alfalfa.
The only place I have seen alfalfa at Mayslake so far is in a location that once held a dairy farm, and I wonder if this plant’s history traces to that operation. The other Asian weed also very much meets the definition of “undesirable plant.”
Multiflora rose was widely planted as a thorny hedge, decades ago. Too late people realized how uncontainable this shrub is, and I have gotten many a piercing while trying to remove it from places under my protection. The rest of today’s weed list comes from Europe, and most probably were hitchhikers. One exception is red clover.
Another, European highbush cranberry, is planted widely as a landscape shrub.
Crown vetch has been planted in an effort to control erosion and enrich the soil cheaply in highway construction projects.
Like multiflora rose, it has become a problem plant because it won’t stay put. As far as I know, the remaining European species were incidental rather than intentional imports. These include ox-eye daisy,
sulfur cinquefoil,
bittersweet nightshade,
English plantain,
and yellow sweet clover.
So far I have not seen white sweet clover at Mayslake.
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March 22, 2009 at 11:19 am (archeology, history (human))
Tags: archeology, Butler Woods, Fullersburg, Fullersburg history, mystery structures
by Carl Strang
It’s time to conclude my series on Fullersburg Forest Preserve history and archeology. Time to put on the pith helmet one last time and check out a mystery. And if you can cast light on it, I will appreciate the assist.
If you take the informal dirt trail clockwise around the edge of Butler Woods from Rainbow Bridge, it will take you to the Hairpin Turn.
Shortly after you go around that turn you will see a branch of the trail heading right (east) and up the hill. At the top of the hill is a trench, dug no doubt for some agricultural purpose. It’s not a glacial feature.
Just below that trench is a trio of concrete structures whose function at present remains a mystery. These include a 25-foot-long, arc-shaped low wall built of 2’x2’ concrete blocks, one of which is being shifted as a large white oak grows in behind it.
This arc’s concave side faces south, and in the focus of that arc 30 feet further south there is a bunker-like structure 8’ wide, 7’ deep, and 3’ tall, open on the south side with some dolomite flagstones stacked in the bottom, an old decaying piece of lumber on the ground, a few red bricks scattered on top, and an iron ring set in the center of the roof piece on its south edge.
This bunker is dug into the side of the hill. Brookfield Zoo educator Jim Ritt has made the interesting suggestion that the structure was designed for dynamite storage. Its orientation away from farm clearings and buildings to the north that show on the 1939 aerial photo is consistent with this hypothesis. Back, now, to the trail. On the north side of that trail, roughly in line with the center of the arc and the bunker and 10 feet north of the wall, the third structure is a 3’ circular piece of concrete with a rectangular slot through its top that is about the length and depth of one of the wall’s elements.
The axis of that slot is in line with the bunker. These objects are within a string of older trees that are visible in the 1939 photo. Incidentally, piled in a refuse heap a short distance north of there, just south of the swamp and east of the Hairpin Turn, is a rusting tank of the sort used for heating oil in a home furnace, along with two rusted crushed objects which may be identical tanks, and a wheel still bearing its tire.
So that’s where I’ll end this topic, at least for Fullersburg. There are some other archeological features on that preserve I haven’t mentioned, but I’ll leave them, along with the ones I never found, for your own discovery.
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March 21, 2009 at 11:15 am (archeology, ecology, history (human))
Tags: Butler Woods, Fullersburg, Fullersburg history, Fullersburg trails, landscape history
by Carl Strang
Two old building foundations are waiting your discovery in northern Butler Woods. The informal dirt peripheral trail crosses one of these,
very close to a roadside sign and boulder which indicate that this was where a hunt club paused before crossing 31st Street in the old days. I wonder if this building might have been a rest shelter for hunt participants. If not, it probably was a farm outbuilding.
The second foundation clearly was a home.
It is located near the 31st Street Stem trail, west of Butler Prairie. The stone boundary of a foundation flowerbed still can be seen. An old trail or drive extends south from the west edge of the house. That this area was agricultural is supported by the presence of drainage tiles in the Butler Prairie area. The north edge of the forested block southwest of this house still can be seen as a straight boundary between older trees, and younger ones that have grown up post-agriculture. Many years will pass before the influence of this stage of Fullersburg’s history disappears from the forest.
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March 18, 2009 at 11:14 am (archeology, history (human))
Tags: Butler Woods, Fullersburg, Fullersburg history, Fullersburg trails
by Carl Strang
In a series of earlier posts I reviewed surviving ruins as well as structures still in use that were constructed by the Civilian Conservation Corps at Fullersburg Woods Forest Preserve. Now is a great time to explore the ruins of Fullersburg, with temperatures warmer and obstructing vegetation not yet in leaf. Today I want to look at some fading signs of events at this preserve that followed the Great Depression, focusing on Butler Woods. Here is a map with place names.
The improvements made by the CCC, plus the limited number of other preserves available at the time, drew crowds to Fullersburg Woods. It was too much of a good thing, and by the 1960’s Fullersburg was regarded as suffering from overuse. The boat house was closed, and that building was converted to the Visitor Center, which opened on May 2, 1973. The addition of other forest preserves eased the pressure, allowing Fullersburg to recover. In 1975, Butler Woods was added via a 30-acre donation by the Butler Company, plus a 40-acre purchase. The 31st Street Stem trail was constructed to connect York Road to 31st Street through the preserve. New trails were developed through the Butler Woods addition. Except for the main trail along Salt Creek and the 31st Street Stem, these have always been dirt paths and are no longer maintained. Most of them continue to be used enough by people and deer that they still can be followed easily. Some railroad-tie steps remain in place where the trail climbs the hill at the end of the Hairpin Turn, and a few unused ties still are piled below there. Slight alterations in the trail route have accumulated over the years, possibly originating when tree falls forced detours. In addition, a new route developed after the 1970s which skirts the northern edge of the preserve along 31st Street. The old trails east of the 31st Street Stem now are almost exclusively the province of deer.
One approach to finding the disused trails east of the 31st Street Stem is to make your way along the south boundary of Butler Prairie. Along the way you may see the drains at each end of the prairie, both eroded over time so they seldom will be reached by flood waters.
Above the westernmost of these drains are concrete pieces that appear to be a corner and other bits of wall.
At the east end of the prairie, in addition to scattered pieces of brick from an earlier age, is one of the old trails, which still (in 2008) is fairly easy to follow southeast from there. Eventually that trail peters out into a deer trail that bends more straight east. With some effort you may be able to find one or both of the old human trails that descended to Salt Creek. These joined the trail you are on just after it curves east, with one essentially going straight south downhill, and the other angling more southwest. Both are marked by clear worn depressions, though fortunately neither has gullied. The more distinct one goes straight down hill. If you look carefully you can see the remains of timbers installed as steps or check dams. The most intact of these timbers is at the bottom of the old trail, which joins the main trail about 20 feet east of a bench.
If you choose to find this trail from this bottom end, note that there is a recent unofficial path angling down from the church parking lot. This joins the main trail at the same point. The historical trail heads straighter north, straighter uphill, and is less obvious. Look for that timber step. The place where the other branch of the historical trail joins the main trail at Salt Creek is obscure. To find it, follow the east bank of the little stream that passes under the main trail a short distance west of the same bench. This is the stream that originated at the westernmost of those two stranded storm drains. 10-20 yards from the main trail, look for the shallow depression marking where the historical trail angles NE up the hill.
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March 8, 2009 at 12:28 pm (archeology, history (human))
Tags: history, mystery structures, Waterfall Glen, Waterfall Glen history
by Carl Strang
Earlier I explained why I think it’s important to include inquiries of human history when studying the natural history of the local landscape, and I have illustrated that idea with several examples. Today I want to focus on one of my favorite spots in the forest preserves of DuPage County: the eastern bluffs at Waterfall Glen. To reach this area, park at the Environmental Education Camp parking lot. The driveway entrance to this lot is on Bluff Road, just east of the right-angle turn that marks the south end of Cass Avenue. Pick up a map, or download it from here, then walk a short distance back up the entrance drive to where an unsurfaced trail leads off right. That trail will take you to the bluffs area. As you wander around you should find an old road farther east, still used by Forest Preserve District vehicles, leading down the side of the bluff alongside a ravine.
That road is shown on the preserve map, and its north end connects with Bluff Road.
High up in the ravine that runs along the east side of that road is a place where a now-abandoned side trail crossed over the stream. Shaped stacked stones and a culvert give it an interesting look.
I don’t know the history of these roads. I don’t see the side one, at least, on the 1939 aerial photos but it could be obscure. On the lip of the hill above the west side of the main road (the one still in use) is a curious concrete structure.
It is a 6 by 6-foot square concrete platform. There is a 3 by 14-inch slot on the ravine side that reaches nearly to the center of the square, where there is an inset metal pipe, flush with the surface, around 6 inches in diameter. I have not yet figured out what this structure was. Suggestions are welcome.
If you go down the road to the bottom of the bluff and turn west along the service road it joins, you will pass some large lumps of concrete on the side of the bluff. Their original purpose likewise is a mystery, at least to me.
You can continue west to connect to the regional trail or turn north at the next service drive intersection (the map will help, here), to return to the parking lot.
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February 20, 2009 at 12:16 pm (archeology, history (human))
Tags: Fullersburg, Civilian Conservation Corps, Fullersburg history
by Carl Strang
Visitors to Fullersburg Woods Forest Preserve experience works created by the depression-era Civilian Conservation Corps whether they know it or not. Most of the trails, the parking lot, bridges, dam, visitor center and trail structures were created by workers in the Fullersburg CCC camp. I have shared some of the ruins of other works that no longer are in use, and want to close the CCC chapter with a few more.
The 1937 map that has been our guide to CCC projects shows a number of latrines and “incinerators.” Some of the latrines still are in use, though updated and maintained by the Forest Preserve District. I provided directions to ruins of a latrine and possible incinerator yesterday . Now I want to cover the rest.
We’ll start at Willow Island, which itself probably was created by the CCC , reached by taking the trail north from the Visitor Center and crossing the little bridge.
On Willow Island, the still standing structure at its southeast corner is a picnic shelter, the one on the east side held a well. The spot marked “Incinerator” in the center of the island is our first ruin, a hollow cube of concrete set flush with the ground and bearing 3 holes broken in its top.
A short distance north of that cube is a rusting wire cylinder that once may have been the actual trash burning container.
Please remember not to disturb any artifacts you may find. The figure-8-shaped large channel in the southeast part of Willow Island was dug after the CCC was done, in a since abandoned attempt to provide an area for wildlife viewing.
Crossing back over the Willow Island Bridge and turning west to follow the trail around the Interpretive Trail river bend, you will pass a pump not marked on the map, a tiny shelter, and the functioning latrines shown on the 1937 map. I could not find a trace of the adjacent incinerator. The original support beams of the shelter at the northeast corner of the river bend were rotting, and replaced by octagonal planed beams in 2007. Our next ruin is one of the latrine vaults near the north end of the bend.
I could find only one in the area marked, but tall dense growth of garlic mustard and dame’s rocket obscured much of the ground that day.
We finish in the area of today’s buildings around the north end of the parking lot. Well #2 is not there, as far as I can see. There is an old broken concrete slab where an Incinerator is marked on the 1937 map, across the service road from the west end of the garage.
That concludes our archeological adventure for now. The next chapter will take us into parts of the preserve that were added after the CCC era. But in our current time of economic uncertainty there is something to be said for exploring works that date back to a period that historians still call the Great Depression.
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