President's Letter

Matt Jennings
December 7th, 2009

Sometimes good work brings good luck, and so it is that GBTU may have a chance to help out with some very interesting habitat restoration work right in our own backyard. I was wearing my ever-stylish GBTU ball cap while helping out with Cub Scout buckthorn eradication recently when Rebecca Grill of the Highland Park Parks Department asked what I knew about fish habitat in the ravines along Lake Michigan.

Wow! I have been surreptitiously scouting these same ravines, and picking up information on possible historical data relating to fish habitat. Furthermore, I knew I had a knowledgeable ally in Illinois Council Chair and ravines enthusiast, Ed Michael. A meeting was quickly set and we toured the two ravines with parks staff and Sara Creque of the Illinois Natural History Survey. In the end there was plenty to suggest these sites could definitely use some attention that TU could have a role in.

The first step in restoration work is getting a baseline of data. So, here is our current status. TU volunteers will do twice monthly monitoring at nine monitoring sites on two ravines applying standards laid out by Parks Department personnel. With the hope of gathering supportive data that could be used to one day restoring and protecting some rare and beleaguered habitat right here in Northern Illinois.

These opportunities don't come around often, and this would be groundbreaking work for a TU chapter to be involved in. The Great Lakes are the single largest repository of fresh-water cold water habitat in the world, and protecting them is paramount to our mission. I am excited that we have this chance to do this important work and I look forward to what it could bring to GBTU and our partners.

We are looking for individuals that wish to commit to the monitoring efforts. Let's see where TU can go when GBTU leads the way!

Matt Jennings President Gary Borger TU