The Ballard Nature Center is a glimpse into what Illinois was like before the landscape gave way to cultivation for corn and soybeans. Located between Altamont and Effingham, just off […]
Category: Illinois / regional
Exploring Illinois: Little Black Slough Nature Preserve
On the very the southern tip of Illinois, in the Cache River State Natural Area, you’ll find Little Black Slough Nature Preserve. Well known for its cypress-tupelo swamp, Little Black […]
40% off sale on Exploring Nature in Illinois
Need some Illinois travel ideas? In Exploring Nature in Illinois: A Field Guide to the Prairie State naturalists Michael Jeffords and Susan Post explore fifty preserves, forests, restoration areas, and […]
Exploring Illinois: Garden of the Gods
The Garden of the Gods Recreation Area in the Shawnee Hills is a treat for anyone with a taste for geology. The sandstone bluffs and huge boulders at Garden of […]
Mushroom Monday: Mycena semivestipes
Mycena semivestipes (Peck) A.H. Smith Saprobic on the deadwood of hardwoods; causing a white rot; Usually growing in dense clusters; fall and early winter (but occasionally found in summer and […]
Return of the kind mother
The pre-restoration Alma Mater. Today the famed statue makes its long-awaited return to the University of Illinois campus after a ten-month restoration treatment. Though completed in 1929, the Alma Mater […]
Exploring Illinois: Robert Allerton Park
Robert Allerton Park in Piatt county hosts over 1,090 species of plants and sixty species of breeding birds. The Sangamon river floodplain is the perfect environment for a variety of […]
Exploring Illinois: Apple River Canyon
Apple River Canyon State Park in northern Illinois provides the kind of topography that much of the state would seemingly lack. This Jo Daviess County nature site is featured in […]
Volvariella bombycina, a silky haired and stately mushroom
Volvariella bombycina (Schaeffer) Singer [The cap is] oval at first, becoming bell-shaped to broadly complex or nearly flat; whitish or tinged yellowing to brownish in age; the margin not lined; […]
Fixing Illinois: steering the conversation to the future
In the 1950s, thriving commerce , strong leadership, and geographical good fortune made Illinois one of the most envied states in the nation. The authors of Fixing Illinois: Politics and Policy […]
On Mutinus elegans, a mushroom both slightly naughty and very smelly
Mutinus elegans (Montagne) E. Fischer Usually at least partially submerged in the ground; appearing like a whitish to pinkish or purplish “egg” up to 4 cm high; when sliced, revealing […]
Exploring Illinois: Mermet Lake Conservation Area
In Exploring Nature in Illinois: A Field Guide to the Prairie State, naturalists Michael Jeffords and Susan Post invite you to discover fifty preserves, forests, restoration areas, and parks in the […]