Mar 9, 2009 Comments Off
Restoration Underway at Tandy Hills
You may have seen my post last Friday about the best places to get some nature in FW. Well, I took my own advice Saturday morning and headed out to Tandy Hills Natural Area to go for a hike and some fresh air.
While we were there, we ran into Don Young and Jenny Conn from the Friends of Tandy Hills, and they introduced me to the crew led by Michelle Villafranca, of the city’s Urban Forestry department. (I met Michelle last year when Jenna volunteered to help our neighborhood tree program get free trees from the city for planting in the easement along the street.)
Michelle described the work they were doing, which is that they’re going through the Natural Area and clearing out invasive and non-native tree species so that the grasses can recover and native plants can have a chance to gain some strength.
Too many of the trees you see when you go out there are invasive species — often something used as an ornamental plant in landscaping that’s escaped and started to reproduce like crazy in our wild areas.
The difference between the last time I was there and how some areas look now is amazing! It may not be immediately obvious, but imagine this area being choked with small trees, all competing for scarce light and also choking out native species. Now there’s room for the grass to grow again!
Hundreds or thousands of years ago, this kind of mechanized labor wouldn’t have been necessary. Lightning strikes and droughts would have burned out small trees before they had a chance to establish themselves, and the grasses that make up the prairie would recover more quickly, keeping things in balance. Since we immediately put out any fires today, even in wilderness areas, those natural processes don’t take place, and areas like this become forever changed. Thanks to Don and his passion, we’re finally starting to see the order of things set right.
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