A grassy field along West Jackson Street in Macomb might look like just another vacant lot. But some people see it as a blank canvas to be filled with wildflowers and ornamental grasses.
“When we look out at this area, we see an area that has so much more potential. The opportunity to do more than what it’s doing right now,” said Tara Heath, County Extension Director for Henderson, Knox, McDonough, and Warren counties.
Extension is collaborating with the Illinois Department of Transportation to turn the roughly one-acre site into a restored prairie habitat.
IDOT is providing the site along with its resources and equipment, and the extension service will contribute its knowledge and volunteer force.
“IDOT is interested in restoring habitat to its natural state. It provides soil stabilization opportunities. It’s habitat for insects, birds, and pollinators,” said Brittany Gavin, the department’s District 4 Roadside Manager.
The land is an IDOT right-of-way that’s on the east side of the extension’s offices in Macomb. Gavin said IDOT acquired the site when U.S. Highway 136 was being widened.
“This is kind of a rare gem for us to have,” Gavin said. “We do have other excess rights-of-way across the state that are typically pullover rest areas and things of that nature.”
She said they haven’t done much with the site besides mow it.
The plan calls for a mix of native plants. The field will have mowed pathways for educational programs.
“We can get those participants into the pathways so that they can see up close and feel and touch the plants as well,” Heath said.
She said there isn’t much prairie left in Illinois, so it’s important to keep pieces of it when possible.
“I think it’s also important so that we provide some spaces for insects and birds and the food web as a whole,” Heath said. “We’re not only going to make this space beautiful, but we’re going to improve the environment while we’re doing it.”
Heath said they will use the extension’s network of volunteer master gardeners and master naturalists to seed the site this fall. She said fall is the ideal time to put down seeds for native plants because they need the cold and wet of winter before they germinate in the spring.
She said native plants are slow to establish themselves in a landscape, but once established, they have extensive root systems that help them survive droughts, prevent erosion, and clean groundwater.
Gavin said the prairie’s pollinating insects will help with the gardens outside the nearby extension offices.
“Our apple trees, our fruit trees. You name it. It’s all connected,” Gavin said.
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