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Eight Fairfield Residents attended a three-day workshop in LaFayette, Illinois, in June to learn more about the native plants of the Midwest. Jeff and Linda Hedquist, Dawn and Billy Hunter, Michael Havalka, Amalia Bright, Colleen Bell, and Jacqueline Signori enjoyed the hospitality of the Ingels family, who own and operate the LaFayette Home Nursery, an 80-acre farm specializing in native plants, forbes (wildflowers), shrubs, and trees.
For this annual event, called the VIP Tour, the LaFayette Home Nursery invites landscape architects, environmental engineers, botanists, forest preserve specialists, and landowners to spend a few days learning about native flora.
The workshop included lectures, a burn demonstration, and on-site tours of original native remnants and reconstructed plantings using Midwest native grasses and forbes. Tours were led by Dr. Gerould Wilhelm, author and noted botanist, formerly with the Morton Arboretum and now the principal environmental scientist for the Conservation Design Institute in Illinois.
The Fairfield participants belong to Fairfield's Growing the Future (GTF), a community-based group concerned with rural development. The group has been sponsoring local workshops on growing and managing native prairie plants. GTF's goals include identifying and preserving Jefferson County's prairie remnants and encouraging the planting of native species. As a result of their efforts, several Jefferson County farmers and landowners have expressed interest in planting prairie.
For years, the Illinois Department of Transportation (DOT) has planted prairie along highways and rest stop areas. This year, with funds available from the Iowa DOT, Growing the Future and the local DOT will apply to participate in native planting for the year 2000 at a gateway to Fairfield.
According to GTF, native landscaping can solve a myriad of environmental problems, including soil erosion and excess water. Native species are not only beautiful but very hardy, capable of surviving extreme temperatures. The root systems of these plants, which can be as much as 5 to 30 feet deep, hold and purify tremendous amounts of water and build up the biomes of the soil, adding nutrients and topsoil to the earth.
During the LaFayette workshop, participants visited a John Deere facility near Davenport planted with native grasses, which, unlike Eurasian blue grass, require neither mowing nor watering. They also visited the Richardson Wildlife Refuge, in Lee County, Illinois, the largest tract of natural prairie in Illinois today.
At each location, Dr. Wilhelm spent time identifying plants. At a few of the original prairie sites that have been burned and resurrected, he was able to identify 50 different plants within a few square yards. "You are now standing in America," he said. "Many people live their lives in Illinois without ever stepping into America! " According to Dr. Wilhelm, 80 percent of everything green in Iowa or Illinois is imported from Europe and Asia.
In Fairfield, Growing the Future holds regular meetings, on the third Monday of each month, that are open to the public. At the next meeting, on August 16, 7:30 p.m., First National Bank Building basement, the speaker will be Carl Kurtz of Prairie View Farms, a successful Iowa prairie seed producer. For more information, contact Colleen Bell at (515) 472-7010.
