I’m walking in a still wintery landscape in Walworth County. Kiera Theys with Geneva Lake Conservancy is my guide. Her organization is on a mission to reestablish oak trees in this region.
Before European settlers cleared and farmed the land here, oaks defined Walworth County’s landscape.
“So, it’s approximated I believe only 17% of our pre-settlement oaks actually still remain within Walworth County,” Theys says.
This parcel, where we’re walking now, features a dazzling kettle pond surrounded by oak forests and savanna, but looks can be deceiving.
We walk past huge mounds of buckthorn and honeysuckle, which were recently removed by volunteers. This land is thick with the stuff and that’s hard on oak trees.
“Our oaks, they require a lot of light to reaching the forest floor to develop and be competitive compared to other tree species,” says Jordan Winkenbach with American Bird Conservancy, or ABC.
ABC is working with Geneva Lake Conservancy to protect oak trees in Walworth County.
“This is the case not just here in Walworth County that we have these magnificent large diameter old oak trees, but looking in the understory we don’t see a lot of young oaks developing,” Winkenbach says.
ABC developed a management plan to eradicate the invasive plants that threaten oak trees. Winkenbach says it’s worth the effort.
“They’re widely considered keystone species. They support the rest, the foundation of the ecosystems they comprise .So not only are they the structural element in oak-dominated ecosyostems, but they are disproportionately valuable to a long list of wildlife species,including many bird species,” Winkenbach says.
Kiera Theys with Geneva Lake Conservancy peers up at a magnificent white oak. She hopes the landscapes she helps steward will benefit future generations and future ecosystems.
“We’ll kind of pick and choose other less desirable tree to clear out and then we’ll go ahead and add in the oak saplings. And hopefully they’ll thrive in their new environment and then 200 years from now some new ones that look the same,” Theys says.
About 30 minutes drive northeast in the Town of Waukesha, Paul Meuer is hoping to use trees to make farmland more environmentally friendly. Meuer is the land protection manager with Tall Pines Conservancy.
We’re looking at a farm field near the Fox River.
“We planted over 2400 individual tree plantings, mainly focusing on elderberry and aronia,” Meuer says.
Aronia is black chokecherry and actually both of these species are shrubs, not trees, but they are perennial.
That means their roots will help reduce runoff that would otherwise impact the stream below. In a few years time the established elderberry and aronia will bear harvestable fruit.
Early next fall, Meuer will be adding trees to the mix: American plum, chestnut. “And one I’m most excited about is actually pawpaw. So, pawpaw is a native fruit and technically we’re slightly north of its native range, but because of the change in range in climate hardiness zones, I guess there’s a silver lining to that in that pawpaw might actually become a viable crop here,” Meuer says.
Meuer is out to demonstrate that folding shrubs and trees into an agricultural operation is not just productive but is literally good for the earth.
“Creating pathways for the root to allow for water to infiltrate into the ground instead of running off. So, we’re building soil with the cover crops and the trees,” Meuer says.
These 240 acres belonged to a family that donated them to Tall Pines Conservancy. Meuer says he’s carrying out the donor’s vision.
READ: Record-breaking warm winter intensifies efforts to transform Wisconsin's agricultural landscape
“So when she donated the farm to Tall Pines she wanted to see agroforestry be a component of that and thinking of this as a demonstration site for other conservation practices,” Meuer says.
He hopes to show this model can be part of a climate solution.
