Restoring Native Habitats to Urban Landscapes
Deanna Geelhoed, Kara Smit, Mike Ryskamp, and Dr. Dave Warners
Increasing urban development typically eliminates natural habitats, resulting in a loss of
biodiversity. Higher levels of biodiversity are important for maintaining ecosystem resilience and productivity the more species the healthier the ecosystem. Attempting to find a way to include habitats for native birds,
bees, and pollinators amidst a thriving city, Grand Rapids has made a push for more greenspace1. At Calvin we
have been addressing this same issue, motivated by our desire to be thoughtful and careful stewards of God’s
creation. Out of this same motivation Biology Professor Dave Warners and Calvin’s Director for Community
Engagement, Gail Heffner founded the organization Plaster Creek Stewards (PCS), which seeks to restore health
and beauty to our local Plaster Creek watershed through efforts of education, research, and restoration
projects. This summer we have been conducting research for Plaster Creek Stewards, and we have also been
working alongside them on restoration projects throughout the watershed.
Our society's obsession with the manicured lawn has contributed to a loss of native plant species and
the organisms they host, increased soil compaction and water runoff, heavy fossil fuel inputs from lawn
chemicals and maintenance efforts, and other associated costs to creation. Our goal for this project is to find
the best method to restore an area of lawn to native habitat, more specifically to shortgrass prairie. Last
summer student researches Ian Noyes, Katey Westergren, and Emma Vautour designed and installed a
shortgrass prairie on campus. Through our combined efforts we hope to find the most successful approach to
this type of restoration so that the lessons we learn can be implemented in other areas of low- or nontrafficked lawn at Calvin, as well as other appropriate places in the Plaster Creek Watershed.
Our research has consisted of evaluating the success of the native plants used in the shortgrass prairie
restoration. The prairie was designed to include 60 half-meter squared quadrats. Each quadrat was planted
identically with the same five species. The first variable introduced was that half of the quadrats were rototilled
before being planted. The second variable was soil quality. We used sand:organic compost ratios of 50:50,
70:30, and 90:10 with each ratio randomly assigned to a quadrat. There are 10 replicated quadrats of each
possible combination of the two treatments from which we collected growth data this summer.
As we had expected, we have seen that the native prairie plants prefer the sandiest soil treatment.
However, rototilling did not appear to benefit all the plants. Lance-leaved coreopsis, a short-lived perennial, did
prefer the rototilled soil treatment, but rototilling did not seem to influence the performance of the other
species. However, data collection is ongoing and will continue in 2015, so more analysis is needed before
confident conclusions can be drawn.
Having previous job experience in a gardening greenhouse, I was very excited coming into the summer
to learn about the native side of horticulture. It was not easy, however, to make the switch from thinking about
exotic plants to native ones. In traditional gardening, aesthetics are everything. But when gardening with
natives, it’s about so much more. I found myself frustrated when most of the flowers that I thought were
beautiful turned out to be invasive or weedy. The longer I worked on the project though, my definition of
beautiful changed. Now I can see through the eye-catching blossoms to the other benefits of the plants:
erosion control, water filter, trophic support, and so on. I am so thankful for the opportunity to work with
Professor Warners and PCS and to learn about the importance of native restoration. -Kara Smit
Personally I find this work very reviving. PCS is a great organization to work alongside. I value their
methods of research, education, and working directly to restore the watershed. It’s safe to say gained more
than research experience during this summer. I’ve improved my knowledge of local botany, plant propagation,
efficient group leadership, and broad as well as critical thinking. Seeing the fruits of such hard work
contributed for the vision of PCS is very gratifying. PCS is an awesome illustration of what successful restoration
can look like. I hope to go into restoration ecology as a career. -Deanna Geelhoed
1
"Green Grand Rapids." (n.d.): n. pag. Grcity.us/. Mar. 2012. Web. 23 July 2014.