Grad school staff help protect campus natural areas

Graduate School staff members have recently shown their green thumbs.

With expert advice and guidance, this group of volunteers is putting into action a plan to restore Muir Woods, the tract of flora that stretches along the Lakeshore Path from Helen C. White Hall to the Natatorium.

Students in Landscape Architecture 666, Restoration Ecology, taught by professors Evelyn Howell and John Harrington, made recommendations for the maintenance and improvement of the natural areas on the main campus in the fall semester of 1999. One section of the plan proposes restoring Muir Woods to a native forest setting more typical of southern Wisconsin.

Under the supervision of Cathie Bruner, an administrative program manager at Facilities Planning and Management, the Graduate School staff has been contributing spare time and sweat to help implement this plan.

“The goal is to combine curriculum goals with what the Graduate School staff are interested in doing,” says Bruner.

“The most exciting thing from my standpoint is the staff teaming up with the students,” Bruner says. The whole idea in the Campus Natural Areas is that the curriculum will drive them.”

The students’ plan for Muir Woods sets forth several goals: reducing soil loss due to storm water run-off, clearly defining trail entrances, drastically reducing invasive or exotic plant species and increasing and maintaining native plants.

The grad school staff members have been cleaning up trash, planting native species, seeding for native trees, delineating trails and weeding out exotic plants.

Graduate School Dean Virginia Hinshaw says this is one of several campus and community volunteer service projects in which they participate. In this case, preserving the natural areas on campus is important to aesthetics and personal well-being, she says.

“Our external and internal environments are so important to how we feel,” Hinshaw says. “Throughout campus, there are a lot of places you can refresh your soul.”