April

| Programs

Our First Native Plant Sale was a Great Success!

Thanks to your enthusiastic participation, nearly 750 additional native plants will be growing in our communities this Spring!  The money we raised will provide resources to help us bring in expert speakers and create demonstration gardens in parks and schools.  Together we’re making the West Cook Wild Ones Wildlife Corridor a reality. Watch for details on pick-up and plants we’ll have available for last-minute shoppers on May 17 at the Oak Park Conservatory.

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Don’t Miss Doug Taron this Sunday!

Butterflies of the American Prairie
By Dr. Doug Taron, Curator of Biology, Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum
Sunday, April 13, The Priory Campus of Dominican University, Room 259
7200 W. Division in River Forest, IL (corner of Division and Harlem)
2:30-4:30 pm

ButterflyDoug Taron, is Curator of Biology at the Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum. As part of his duties, Doug manages Butterfly Haven, the only permanent, year-round exhibit of live butterflies in Illinois.  He is active in butterfly conservation research in the Midwest, and is currently breeding swamp metalmarks, regal and silver-bordered fritillaries, and Baltimore checkerspots in the lab.

The talk,  titled Butterflies of the American Prairie, explores the butterfly species of northeastern Illinois, their life cycles, and their ecology, with special emphasis on the relationship between caterpillar food plants and habitat. Digital images showcase local species from urban environments, prairies, wetlands, and woodlands and document regional butterfly conservation efforts being undertaken at the Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum in Chicago.

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Save the date

West Cook Wild Ones member Maria Onesto Moran has offered to throw a party at her beautiful store, Green Home Experts, 811 South Blvd in Oak Park, to mark our first year as an official chapter—and we have enthusiastically accepted!  Mark your calendar for May 18th at 6 PM.  Help us celebrate our many successes and choose the things you would like to see happen in the future.  It will be quite a festive event and a great opportunity to have fun and meet new friends who share your passion for the joyful work of bringing biodiversity back to our gardens.