After some days of unsettled weather, conditions briefly improved and we were able to conduct a major savanna burn. This burn is a vital part of our savanna restoration program…

Yesterday Kathie and I spent a couple of hours surveying the areas on the south slope that burned last Thursday. The coverage was very good, virtually 100% in most areas.The…

Getting prescribed burns done requires a lot of planning, appropriate weather, and a good crew. Because of the cold March, our burns have been considerably delayed, but yesterday everything came…

There are lots of ways of creating fire breaks, but the fastest and best is with a tractor. For the small prairie remnants that we burn here in southern Wisconsin,…

Winter seems to keep hanging on this year, which is bad for burns but good for brush work. Yesterday a group of Madison Audubon volunteers worked at Arlington Prairie, a…

Oak grubs are small trees with multiple stems. They arise from oak seedlings whose tops are killed by fire. Oaks are uniquely adapted to fire and grubs may remain alive…

Today was the first day in months that I have been able to get to the top of the ridge. The last week of sunny (although cold) weather was responsible…

Some of the south- and west-facing woods are essentially snow-free, and are starting to show patches of green. Everything that I have seen has been bad, nonnatives that are probably…

I'm gradually learning the intricacies of ArcGIS, and I have now used the new 2010 Dane County air photo as a basis for creating a new management map of Pleasant…

I finally found time to put together a summary of the tree database we finished a few weeks ago. Thanks again to Heisley and (especially) Amanda for their hard winter…