Back to the Arboretum

This time I was on the north side of the University of Wisconsin Arboretum.

It hugs the shore of Lake Wingra and three adjoining marshes.

Marshes, gardens, prairies, Oak savanna, woods, and forests come together in relaxing place that combines beauty and education.

The Longnecker Horticultural Gardens includes Lilacs on display that were originally planted in 1935.  They still bloom as do a variety of other flowering trees and shrubs.

More than 2,500 plants including 100 species of Wisconsin native woody plants are on display. 6.000  specimens suited for Madison's habitat vie for attention from the thousands of nature lovers and enthusiasts that visit each year.

Just a few minutes provides a sense of enchantment, but to really experience all there is on the grounds will take a while or several visits to take it all in.

Inside the arboretum, the sounds of the city fade away.  Pedestrians, runners, bikes, and slow - moving cars bring folks in and out of the acreage.  But only walkers, runners, and snow - skiers are allowed on the trails that wind around the various ecological communities. Bikes and cars are limited to the paved paths.
  
Longnecker might be the most photogenic place to be in spring, but further investigation reveals a lot more to see and experience.

Yellowed and weathered reeds of last season's prairie grass still waves in the spring breezes, but beneath come the shoots of new growth.

I'm looking forward to learning and walking through the remnants and restorations of Wisconsin land housed on Arboretum land in the months and years ahead.

It's all, quite literally, a living museum of the land where we live.

The fruit trees with their explosions of blossoms offer one kind of beauty.  The timid Jack - in - the -Pulpit flower another.

When European settlers arrived - they carved lives and a living from the land.  Much of it for the better as acres of land supported, fed, and developed a people.

However, in our haste to get ahead and improve our lot, we occasionally threw out the baby with the bath water.

Because of places like the arboretum, we can see what almost disappeared and ways to re-develop the natural landscape.