Letter from the Executive Director

Dear Land Lovers, Sketch by Mary (Dustin) Gustafson As many of you know, trees are my primary draw to nature. But I’m also fascinated by many other aspects of nature, including bogs. While my interest in trees continues to lead me to learn all I can about them, my interest in bogs takes me in …

Dear Friends, We Midwesterners have a reputation of being hard workers. I think this is partly because we mimic the land we live on. We follow the lead of the plants and animals around us. Your preserve visits this summer immerse you in green — surrounded with plants operating at peak performance. On a preserve, …

Dear friends, Each day is a victory for ACRES. Life thrives on 7,000+ acres of land because our members, and members before them, chose to acquire each of these acres. And it is a choice. People choose whether or not to support ACRES, ACRES staff and board choose whether or not to acquire each acre, …

Dear friends, Since ACRES protects land forever, I often engage in conversations envisioning what natural areas will look like during the course of forever. We think about how much bigger trees will be in a hundred years, how some lakes will become bogs in a thousand years, how rivers will move. We wonder what plants and animals …

“It’s continuity, it’s peaceful, it’s something you can rely on.” — Dana Davis, speaking about returning to her family’s land. Dana and her husband Duane donated The Walter H. and E. Marie Myers Flowers Creek Nature Preserve and hand-restored farmhouse. Dear friends, Nature is reliable. It reacts, but doesn’t overreact or underreact. ACRES strives to …

Recently, ACRES Land Trust Executive Director Jason Kissel vacationed with his family along the Canadian Atlantic Coast. His trip included jaunts in and around New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island. Jason was so moved traversing the coastline and meeting various folks, he penned the following narrative to capture those experiences for our readers. May …

A land donor recently handed me a box of documents related to their family’s land now owned by ACRES: photos, handwritten deed records from the 1800s, crop history, and other treasures. With box in hand, I was humbled, aware that ACRES is responsible for safeguarding not only the family’s land, but also their memories of …

Dear Friends, ACRES is fortunate to receive major monetary gifts from individuals and foundations. We often highlight these gifts through press releases and within the pages of the Quarterly. Although smaller donations don’t result in newspaper headlines, they are of immense value to ACRES. I want to share two recent examples of donations that had …

What would change if we understood natural lands as more important to us than electricity and cell phones, as crucial to us as clean water and air? Dear Friends, While most people view ACRES’ work positively, they may also consider land preservation as optional. What would change if we understood natural lands as more important …

Dear Friends, Land can produce a seemingly unlimited diversity of plants. Consider a small garden plot. On the same piece of land, sweet corn, green beans, tomatoes, turnips, peppers, radishes, eggplant, and a host of other vegetables or flowers can be grown. Whatever the gardener’s whims, the land accommodates. What seems to me even more …