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Wild Things 2025

The Wild Things Conference Returns Saturday, March 1, 2025 - SOLD OUT

We’re thrilled to welcome you again to learn and share your expertise with our community. We’ve put together an exciting lineup of workshops and sessions from regional and national experts, plus meet & greets, video content, exhibitors, and sponsors. With over 140 presentations and discussion panels to choose from, the in-person program engages a diverse range of topics, research, and skills, and plenty of opportunities to meet with friends, old and new.

Thank you as well to our sponsors, scholarship supporters, and exhibitors who are all helping to make this another tremendously successful Wild Things.

Tickets for Wild Things 2025 are sold out. For additional information on the 2025 conference, visit wildthingscommunity.org.

**PLEASE NOTE: Some details are subject to change.**

NOTICE: Please be advised that photos and videos will be taken during Wild Things 2025. By attending, you consent to be photographed, filmed, and/or otherwise recorded. Your attendance on this event constitutes your agreement to the use of any resulting media by Friends of Illinois Nature Preserves for promotional, marketing, or any other purpose in perpetuity, without further approval or any compensation.

Robin Solomon

Morton Arboretum

Education Program Guide

Lisle, IL

https://mortonarb.org

About me

I am relatively new to the Education Program Guide position at Morton Arboretum and I am eager to learn. Five years ago, I took a Naturalist Certification course (over several months) through Kane County. I thoroughly enjoyed the experience and annually attend programs and perform volunteer restoration work and related services to maintain my certification and increase my knowledge. I am thrilled to have joined the Morton Arboretum Learning and Engagement area as an education guide for students of all ages and from both suburban and city neighborhoods. Now starting my second full-season with the arboretum, I strive to learn more; to connect with the programs I have taught at Morton; and to help me understand the wide variety of topics I have yet to learn and to teach as an environmental educator. I know I have a long way to go! Opportunities like this conference and other seminars, classes and courses are important and necessary so I can educate students and adults of any age to make our world a better place for today and tomorrow -- while inspiring individuals and groups to be environmental champions.

9:00am CST

Opening Plenary: Ode to Joy - A life with dragonflies Rooms 21-25 & 30-34Marla Garrison

10:15am CST

Bat Conservation is Human Conservation. Room 48Lara Sviatko Neurodiversity and Birding Rooms 54, 56, 58Jim Giocomo • Ashley Hendee Climate VIP's: Increasing youth engagement in climate education by making it personal Room 42Jessica Stevens Planting the Future: Teaching Kids to Appreciate and Protect Native Ecosystems Room 45Michelle Bolander The Humble Bumblebee: Pollinator Powerhouse Room 44Robert Sullivan Beavers As Ecosystem Engineers Room 28Rachel Schick Siegel • Jeff Boland-Prom Ecology of Oak Masting Cycles and Red-Headed Woodpecker Behavior: How Weather Drives Acorn Production and Wildlife Dynamics Room 29Anastasia Rahlin • Addy Yoder

11:15am CST

The Interdisciplinary Art of Nature Journaling Room 28Carrie Carlson Chicagoland Botany: A Perspective Room 47Bill McKnight Updating the Illinois Big Tree Register (IBTR) Room 41Christopher David Benda Becoming a Watershed Warrior Room 43Gary Swick • Courtney Boe • Katelin Shields Johnson Just Add Water – Restoring Shallow Wetlands for Wildlife Rooms 55, 57Lisa Woolford • Eric Mollahan Restoring oak ecosystems: goals and techniques Rooms 30, 31Christos Economou Birds in the Garden: Creating & Enjoying a Bird Oasis Room 44Pam Karlson

12:00pm CST

Lunch Break Rooms 21-23 & 32-34

12:30pm CST

Come for the Raptors, Stay for the Message - Strategies in Building Connections in our Communities for Conservation Room 29Nabeel Rasheed • David Felice Launching the Illinois Native Plant Conservation Alliance Room 28Brian Charles Inclusion Strategies for Early Childhood Programs Room 49Sarah Blazer • Kelly Reina • Jill Damato Enhancing the benefits of community gardens for pollinators and people in Chicago Room 45Andrea Flores Native plant migrations and contemporary range boundaries in relation to ecoregions and climate change Rooms 30, 31Will Overbeck Shifts in timing of spring and fall events over 29 years in an Illinois forest Room 26David Zaya Roll call! Post-invasive cattail management implications for seeding of native species and habitat for waterbirds Room 50Madeline 'Madi' Palmquist • MacKenzie Michaels Cook County Birding Big Year: A Story of Passion, Disappearing Birds, and How We Save What's Left Rooms 52, 53 - Avian Collective presented by Illinois Audubon SocietyTarik Shahzad Lessons From The Reintroduction of State-Endangered Blanding’s Turtles Rooms 24, 25Callie Klatt Golba • Gary Glowacki • Kathryn McCabe • Richard King Looking in the wrong place: locally-extirpated species of deer mouse finds refuge in degraded habitat Room 42Angelica Bahena • Adam W. Ferguson • Arielle Parsons • Zoe Leone • Molly M. McDonough

1:15pm CST

Nature Talks: Turning Words into Action Rooms 54, 56, 58Brian Ellis Pollen Specialist Bees: Host Plants, Threats, Conservation Rooms 30, 31Heather Holm Assessing Oak Woodland Ecological Integrity and Restorability Room 26Dan Carter Bats: Why we need to conserve them and how you can help Rooms 24, 25Johnny Baakliny • Joy O'Keefe Conservation through time, in time?: Comments on 40 years observing and managing natural lands Room 48Floyd Catchpole Environmental DNA: what land stewards want to know about this new technique Room 49Aster Hasle Plants of Concern: Community Science Rare Plant Monitoring in Action Room 44Christopher David Benda • Gretel Kiefer • Grant Fessler Chicago Black-crowned Night Heron Panel Discussion Rooms 52, 53 - Avian Collective presented by Illinois Audubon SocietyMike Ward • Henry Adams • Brad Semel • Sarah Slayton • Amy Lardner • Jo Fessett • Michael Avara Surveying the Creeks of Cook County Room 46Steve Silic

2:15pm CST

Inclusive Nature Programming, An Experiential Flow Room 29Cassandra Powell • Ayanna London • ZenFrankie Johnson • Rebekah Joy Hall Systemic Racism and Urban Ecology: Applications in Community Science Room 27Joy Bailey • Zelle Tenorio Exploring floral networks for bees, beetles, flies, wasps, ants, and bugs Rooms 24, 25Angella Moorehouse • K.C. Carter Quit Herbiciding Thistles (in Natural Area Restorations) Rooms 30, 31Julianne Mason Bat Tracker Community Science: Insights after Seven Years Room 47Liza Lehrer • Sean Obrochta • Thomas Murphy • Gary Morrissey Birds and Biodiversity: Protecting and Restoring Habitat for Grassland Birds in the Tallgrass Prairie Region Room 44Jaron Cook Northern Saw-whet Owls: Our Secretive Winter Neighbors Rooms 52, 53 - Avian Collective presented by Illinois Audubon SocietyMichael Avara

3:15pm CST

Oak woodland restoration at Somme Woods: summer scything and seeds work make all the difference Room 44Eriko Kojima 2024 Brood XIII Periodical Cicadas Rooms 55, 57Carl Strang

4:15pm CST

24 years of sand hill prairie restoration results in north central Illinois Rooms 59, 60James Alwill Mushrooms of Illinois Rooms 30, 31Andrew Miller The Dark Side of Habitat Restoration Room 26Valerie Blaine 20 years in the flatwoods: challenges, changes, and amphibian conservation outcomes Rooms 55, 57Allison Sacerdote-Velat Guiding Migratory Bird Stopover Habitat Conservation in the Illinois Coastal Zone Room 50Stephanie Beilke Herping as the new birding: Connecting with our scaly friends, responsibly. Room 29Regina Witherell-Poe

5:00pm CST

Closing Plenary/Social Hour/Poster Session Rooms 21-23 & 32-34Joey Santore Effects of interannual variation in climate on breeding bird demography in a postindustrial wetland Rooms 21-23 & 32-34Stephanie Beilke • Lila Fried Glacial topography of the Chicago Region Rooms 21-23 & 32-34Jeff Daube Interactions between Midwest flora & fauna Rooms 21-23 & 32-34Catherine Hu Invasional Meltdown of Plant Communities in Illinois Wetlands Rooms 21-23 & 32-34Coleman Earnest Native plants and pollinators in Chicagoland Rooms 21-23 & 32-34Rika Mizoguchi Photograms of native plants Rooms 21-23 & 32-34Ken Schaefer Supporting Monarch Population Growth in an Urban Environment Rooms 21-23 & 32-34Edwin Quiroz The effect of urbanization intensity on bumblebee-plant network structure and floral resource topological roles Rooms 21-23 & 32-34K.C. Carter The effects of salinity levels on Invasive plant species Rooms 21-23 & 32-34Zaria George • Gabriela Nunez-Mir The impact of competition with pickerelweed (Pontederia cordata) and invasive cattail (Typha × glauca) on the growth of northern wild rice (Zizania palustris) Rooms 21-23 & 32-34Megan Wenner Urban Salt Marshes, Novel Ecosystem Rooms 21-23 & 32-34Payman Rajaie