Palos Restoration Project - Blog

McMahon Woods & Fen August 1, 2026

8/6/2026

Saturday April 1, McMahon Woods & Fen
Another weekend that started with buckets of rain (Joe Neumann could well have been humming that) led to a minimal turnout i.e. Joe and Rosie. True warriors! Your correspondent had every intention of going - truly - the sump pump thought otherwise.
So Joe and Rosie did their best pulling melilotus, an act to be repeated the coming Saturday, probably for the final time this season. If you don't get it now you'll have to wait 'til next July, so come on out!

McMahon Woods & Fen July 25, 2026

7/30/2026

Saturday July 25, McMahon Woods & Fen
We had another small group of volunteers, back on McMahon Prairie for Melilotus alba/white sweet clover. This is a plant that has a long life cycle; our first visit this year was June 6 and the plants were small, with very few showing flowers and most no more than knee height.

Almost eight weeks have passed since then. While I missed last Saturday, I was pulling sweet clover at the Sundown Meadow prairie two days ago, and the early plants have now shed their leaves, gone from flower to seed and dropped most of that. Some of the sucessor plants are taller than me, with multiple stems that resist pulling, while the smallest, most recent ones are no bigger than our first targets from early June. Truly the gift that keeps on giving.

So we return and get some more of it, probably do the same the following Saturday. While it seems like a drag, visit the site in mid-summer and see all the great natives that are threatened by this ornery invader. Makes it worth the effort.

Cap Sauers Holding July 18, 2026

7/23/2026

Cap Sauers Holding Saturday July 18
We had a small group Saturday morning, the day after 48-hour stretch of extremely bad air quality. Saturday was only a wee bit bit cooler than the preceding week. Still, a small turnout which is typical in mid-summer - hats off to those who showed up.

White sweet clover was Margaret's primary target and we're now at the point that it's flowered and dropping seed, so it's necessary to pull and bag, then dump the bag's contents on a compost pile. The persistence of this invasive makes any project a multi-year endeavor and I salute the tenacity of those volunteers (Can't take credit for myself on this one as I was on a site walk elsewhere.)

Our Sunday at Black Partridge was canceled due to a wind shift which pushed air quality back into the danger zone. Wildfire smoke is becoming a regular concern now, one I don't see dissipating any time soon.

McMahon July 11, 2026

7/15/2026

McMahon Woods & Fen Saturday July 11
We were another small group on Saturday - looks like the love of pulling Melilotus alba hasn't reached the general population - yet. I can see it coming.

So we continued to expand the cleared area and continued to build our little compost pile into something more substantial. While Charlie, Rosie, Doug and I pulled, Joe was off with his backpack sprayer, two tanks in the morning and he planned to do a third after lunch. The man is relentless.

Next week we'll be at Cap Sauers, on Saturday July 18 and Black Partridge on Sunday July 19. By the time we get back to McMahon we may be nearing the end of the season, when dropped seed becomes the rule rather than the exception. Almost sad when time comes to close the book on melilotus season.

July 4, 2026

7/8/2026

Owl Walk at Spears Woods
Last week I went to Spears for my second owl walk of the year. On a hot night we still had 20-25 people, and we outnumbered the owls by 20-25. Still a good walk; Claudia, the leader took us on a loop that landed (by design, it turned out) at the edge of Boomerang Slough as the sun dropped below the horizon.

At that point we beat a pretty quick retreat, with mosquitoes coming out in full force. Remember the good old days of summer drought? Ha! Can't ever make us happy.

Kayaking on Tampier Lake
My favorite solo kayak spot is Tampier Lake: big enough to paddle an hour or more without retracing paths, deep enough your paddle isn't dragging or hitting rocks, and never too crowded unless you go on a weekend.

Last Tuesday was fun, with enough wind to stir some small waves and keep things from getting boring. I was testing a hull repair after hitting some rocks in low water on the Des Plaines a few weeks back - stiill getting water so back to the garage for more repairs.

We didn't have any restoration scheduled in Palos last weekend; with the heat and rain that filled much of the week our stewards were prescient.

My town of Palos Heights had its annual parade Fourth of July Saturday. It's always a pleasure to sit with neighbors from a couple doors down and watch the closest thing to a small-town parade that you'll find in an urban megalopolis of six or seven million.

Fire trucks, sirens blaring, Shriners on mini-Model Ts, middle-school and high school bands, local businesses tossing candy to the kids, all good vibes on a day when citizens of a divided nation looked like we were groping for some shred of common ground.

Will we find it? Time will tell.

Away from the petty acts of humans, in natural areas our native plants grow and provide sustenance to the animals that sing and buzz and reproduce and die. We do all of that too and hope it's for a greater purpose.

McMahon Woods June 27, 2026

7/2/2026

Saturday June 27, McMahon Woods & Fen
We had another smallish group on the prairie for another day of melilotus alba (white sweet clover) removal. It's grown bigger over the last couple weeks and still was mostly pulled without a problem. Sometimes the multiple stem plants are problematic but I felt we did all right.

The joy of this task is the plants you encounter on the prairie, with something new blooming each visit. Two weeks ago it was grey-headed coneflower, this time I saw my first monarda and pale purple coneflower of the season. Beautiful!

Nature Walk at Sagawau
Not many showed up for this walk, unfortunate as naturalists Lorrie and Alexia did a stellar job, taking us to the prairie for thier recent blooms, which included lead plant and Culver's root that marked my first sighting of the season. They provide so much good information and share it so a layperson can understand it - Lorrie's description of the mechanics of a glacier's movement was terrific, as one example.

We appreciate Palos Park Mayor Nicole Milovich-Walters joining us for this walk.

Cap Sauers June 20, 2026

6/25/2026

Cap Sauers Saturday June 20
Before we reached the work site Margaret took us for a delightful tour, starting on the green trail to an area we've cleared copious amounts of brush in recent years, then heading south (I think...) until we reached the blue trail in another familiar spot, not far from Visitation Boys Camp location.

Along the way we spotted numerous native plants, some of the highlights being purple milkweed and fire pink. Invasive targets were reed canary grass and non-native thistles, each facing the fate of decapitation when found. I had to leave before we got into the swing of things, word choice intentional here.

McMahon June 6 & 13, McClaughrey Springs June 7, 2026

6/18/2026

We'll do a double post today since last week's fell by the wayside.

Saturday June 6 & 13, McMahon Woods & Fen
On the 6th we had half a dozen or more, in addition to the Palos Resource Management crew who helped Joe with backpack spraying. The rest of us pulled white sweet clover which was the earliest I've tackled this; the plants were quite small and few had begun flowering. This was quite a warm day - a harbinger of summer which arrives Sunday, officially at 3:24 am.

I missed the 13th due to another commitment and suspect by the time we get there again - this weekend is Cap Sauers - the sweet clover should be much larger and actively flowering. This is a truly tough one to eradicate with the seed bank able to produce new plants years after seed drop.

Sunday June 7, McClaughrey Springs Woods
On what might be Diana's last workday until fall we chased both garlic mustard and Dame's rocket, two members of the mustard family that have mastered the art of growing in our woodlands. The garlic mustard was past flowering but still hadn't dropped much seed so it was fair game, and its cousin was easier to find still holding a lot of flowers. We did all right.

Spent a couple hours on the 13th helping volunteers remove invasives, including mullein and burdock, with machetes. Gotta say, the release that you get swinging that tool is right there with tossing woodies on a fire!

Paddock May 30, McClaughrey Springs May 31, 2026

6/4/2026

Paddock Woods Saturday May 30
Small group of volunteers on this beautiful Saturday morn, a couple of us arriving late after visiting the recycle event at Sagawau. There was still garlic mustard out there, still in sufficient numbers to bring a group out chasing it.
The flowers are almost all gone from the GM, as well as most of the lookalike plants like sweet cicely. This makes

McClaughrey Springs Woods Sunday May 31
This was more a Dame's rocket party than garlic mustard hunt, with the former pest doing far too well in the area fronting Mill Creek. One consolation is what seems to be a reduced garlic mustard population. Perhaps we'll see the same with Dame's rocket as we continue to remove it the next couple years. Sunday Diana plans to work father wast in the preserve, near the La Grange Road underpass, so we'll meet at Swallow Cliff Woods North.

Paddock Woods May 23, 2026

5/28/2026

Paddock Woods Saturday May 23
We had a smallish, decent group of volunteers for this garlic mustard (GM) hunt, and after one false start your roving reporter arrived to find the volunteers deeper into the woodland than we normally get. Does this mean we're pushing the GM population farther back? I certainly hope so.

At any rate, we were able to find more than enough of the little invader to keep us busy and allow fairly frequent trips to the compost pile. Most of the flowers are gone by now making them a little harder to spot, and most of the flowers are gone from the lookalikes as well. Bottom line; ample targets still present, hoping they hadn't dropped too much seed before we got there.

Sunday at Swallow Cliff
was supposed to be more of the same but the weather deities had other thoughts, rolling a rain front through our area at around 7:00 am which didn't move out until after 10:00. Yes, we could have outlasted it, but that might have been Mr. Jan and one other volunteer, and then I wouldn't have had the time needed to drive out to Sunrise Greenhouse in Grant Park, buy a few more herbs and veggies, and then spend the rest of the day planting edibles in the yard.

Thank you Jim D for the tip on this very large greenhouse. You also gave us the chance to drive a stretch of corn country, which moves farther away each year with exurban sprawl. And I got to hang with my homey which is the best!