Lake Bluff Open Lands Association
was formed in 1981 by Carolyn Goetz for the purpose of saving a small wetland and white pine plantation from being developed into a housing subdivision. Carolyn’s success led to the eventual purchase of the property by the Lake Bluff Park District and what is now known as the Carolyn Goetz Wetlands Preserve.
Other early milestones include:
The replacement of the bridge crossing Ravine Park at Gurney Avenue which was primarily spearheaded and funded by LBOLA and the Elmer Vliet family.
The planting of native lakefront prairie habitat and cottonless cottonwoods at the Lake Bluff Beach.
The recognition of the importance of a rare prairie remnant off Belle Foret Dr. and the eventual establishment of ‘The Prairie Preserve.’
Multiple Conservation Easements at Crab Tree Farm which insure that more than 100 acres of northern Lake Bluff will remain open and undeveloped ‘in perpetuity’.
Prior to leaving Lake Bluff for warmer climes in 1996, Carolyn and LBOLA fought hard to eventually gain Village permission to restore 35 acres to the south of the new water plant located just west of Highway 176, 1/4 mile west of Green Bay Road.
Lake Bluff Open Lands Association remains an all volunteer grassroots organization. We depend on volunteer efforts for virtually all of our activities and welcome your assistance whenever possible.
With its 2010 registration with the Illinois Nature Preserve Commission as an Illinois Land and Water Reserve, the Skokie River Prairie is today LBOLA’s premier property with numerous rare and threatened prairie wildflowers in abundance – and none of them planted by us — well almost none. The Skokie Preserve is a “restored prairie”, in the sense that the native forbs (wildflowers) and tall grasses now growing there grew from suppressed plants or germinated from seeds that had lain dormant in the soil for several decades.
Our clearing of non native shrubs and weeds exposed them to the sun so they could finally germinate and again retake their place in an environment where prairie and savanna habitat is constantly shrinking. Best estimates are that only 0.1% of the ‘Prairie State’ is recognizable today as either prairie or savanna. In this regard, we’re quite proud to be able include our Skokie Preserve to the additions column.
In 1998, with the Skokie River Prairie well underway, LBOLA turned its attention to another long-neglected parcel that separated LBOLA’s Skokie River Prairie from Lake Forest Open Lands’ properties. The Lake County Forest Preserve’s ‘Lake Bluff Site’ is an 80 acre parcel purchased jointly in the mid-1980s by the Forest Preserve District and the State of Illinois’ Water Resources Department for the construction of a huge floodwater retention basin.
With the Lake Bluff Site’s future in doubt LBOLA nonetheless moved ahead with restoration activities with roughly 15 acres cleared for prairie restoration and many more acres of magnificent old-growth bur oak savanna ‘liberated’ from the invasive non-native understory that threatened its future.
Early 2011 brought welcome news that interminable engineering studies determined the Lake Bluff Site was unsuitable for flood water storage and indications are that the State will sell its interest in the Site to the District. Nothing is yet certain, but LBOLA’s long struggle with proponents of “the big bathtub†plan seems to be drawing to a wonderful conclusion.
