Events

West Cook Wild Ones invites all members to our annual member meeting on Saturday, January 31, 2026 at 2:00 pm in the Veterans Room of the Oak Park Public Library-Main Branch.



First, A Little Business: We want to celebrate our accomplishments, plan for the year ahead, introduce new board members and celebrate departing board members. In 2025, we hosted seven education programs, our spring native plant sale enjoyed robust sales, our in-person native garden tour featured twelve beautiful gardens, our grant program helped fund fifteen native gardens, and our membership continued over 300 strong! None of our accomplishments would be possible without our members! Thank you!

Then, A Little Creative Fun: We want to thank you for your support by offering a celebration featuring a plant themed art activity led by local botanical illustrator Kathleen Garness. We will supply the materials and fill in more details soon.

We look forward to getting better acquainted in January! We will have time to chat with each other, and will offer catered snacks and some pretty terrific prizes to give away.



Kathleen Garness Bio

Kathleen's illustrations explore the role of light and space while conveying details about our native orchids. Much of her artwork reflects not only her life-long fascination with orchids, but her field experiences through Plants of Concern's rare plant monitoring program at the Chicago Botanic Garden. Kathleen worked as a commercial artist for over a decade before taking up the banner of natural history art. Morton Arboretum's certificate program of botanical and scientific illustration allowed her to study with some of the best teachers in the Midwest. She has worked with the Field Museum and The Nature Conservancy to produce educational materials for the growing community of natural areas restoration volunteers. A grant from the American Society of Botanical Artists allowed her to introduce botanical illustration to a new and more diverse audience. Participation in the Chicago Botanic Garden's Plants of Concern program offers Kathy a unique window into the connections between ecology and the lure of the beautiful as well as the tensions between wildlife under pressure and the demands of human need. She is author of the Field Museum's Common Plant Families of the Chicago Region and the Dunesland Habitat Guide. A woodland habitat guide is in the works. As steward of one of the Chicago region's highest quality duneland sites, she has had the opportunity to become familiar with these rare and hardy species that call our lakeshores their home.