One acre at a time: Barrington’s Citizens for Conservation reconnects the suburbs with Illinois’ Prairie State origins

Every Thursday and Saturday morning, Matt Van Acker puts on his work gloves, grabs his curved hand saw and leaves his home in Barrington on foot, walking south across a vast swath of open marshland. Often, he is accompanied by the distinct bugle call of a sandhill crane flying overhead.

Finally, cresting a small hill, Van Acker arrives at an overgrown patch of invasive buckthorn where several other people already are at work sawing away at the stubborn, woody plants. Soon, the group of volunteers will replace the European shrubs with native prairie plants, driven by a vision of what the land might have looked like hundreds of years ago.

“In the long run, it’s going to be a good change,” said Van Acker, who began volunteering with Barrington-based Citizens for Conservation a few years ago when he first looked out his window and saw the restoration crew. “I get to gaze across the prairie and see the progress.”

The natural area near Van Acker’s home is one of 14 locations managed by Citizens for Conservation, a volunteer-run nonprofit that is slowly but surely transforming the 777 acres in its care from open fields and abandoned farmland into native prairies, wetlands and savannas.

The task is easier said than done — especially with limited insight into what that acreage looked like in the past. The group’s primary references include photos from 1939 county mapping data, public land survey notes from the 1830s and clues from the land itself.

“As we restore, we look across the landscape to see what’s there and we look at the soil,” group Vice President Jim Anderson said. “The intention of CFC is to go slow and get it done correctly.”

Though the progress is a slow march, 12-year volunteer Steve Smith said one of the reasons he’s come to enjoy conservation so much is how tangible the work is.

“If anybody told me 12 years ago I would find conservation and stick with it, I would’ve told them they’re crazy,” Smith said with a chuckle. “It’s a wonderful way to connect the dots (of nature).”

Since first trying out a workday all those years ago, Smith said he still learns something new about ecology and restoration each day.

“Every time you ask a question, there are 10 questions after that,” he said.

Despite nearly 50 years under its belt, Anderson said the group as a whole also is mindful that they don’t know everything.

“As restoration ecologists, we still don’t know what we’re doing. We’re learning all along,” he said. “By bringing back the heart of the system, we’re hoping we’re bringing everything along.”

Illinois, still known as the “Prairie State,” has lost more than 90% of its original 21 million acres of prairie to agriculture and urbanization. By creating small pockets of restored land amid the developed suburbs, the group hopes to pitch in and fill the gaps where surrounding forest preserves aren’t active.

Much of that work is inspired by species of prairie plants and animals that are endangered or threatened.

At the group’s largest preserve in Lake Barrington, three birds from Illinois’ list of “species in greatest need of conservation” nest — savannah sparrows, sedge wrens and, every year since 1998, sandhill cranes. The preserve — Flink Creek Savanna — is home to four oak and hickory groves, as well as more than 200 species of grasses, sedges and wildflowers.

The critical nature of restoration and conservation work is magnified through the lens of climate change, Anderson added.

In Illinois, where average precipitation has increased by 5% to 20% over the last century and the number of 2-inch rain days has increased by 40%, native landscapes such as oak communities and prairie are invaluable for their ability to absorb rain and reduce erosion, flooding and stormwater runoff.

​​Though the conservation group’s land is not open for public use — its wide swaths of land are specially reserved for wildlife — it regularly invites people out for bird walks, seed collection workshops and student field trips.

Between its “Fourth-Graders on the Prairie” program and high school internships, the nonprofit has built a strong relationship with its local school district. Alongside its twice weekly restoration workdays, it also hosts native plant sales and monthly community education programs.

• Jenny Whidden is a climate change and environment writer working with the Daily Herald through a partnership with Report For America supported by The Nature Conservancy. To help support her work with a tax-deductible donation, see dailyherald.com/rfa.