By Cara Green, Easement Stewardship Associate
Legacy’s commitment to continuous professional development helps ensure our staff has the knowledge and skills needed to steward protected lands today and for generations to come. Earlier this month, I had the opportunity to attend a wetland plant identification course at the Seven Ponds Nature Center in Dryden, Michigan. Hosted by the Michigan Wetland Association and facilitated by Dr. Ben VanderWeide, Oakland Township’s Natural Areas Stewardship Manager, this two-day specialized training was offered to me as part of Legacy’s ongoing investment in staff development.
In my role as an Easement Stewardship Associate within Legacy’s land team, the course strengthened my plant identification skills for monitoring conservation easements and evaluating soon-to-be protected properties. While my background is primarily in geology and soil science, my botany knowledge has largely been self-taught through fieldwork, a personal passion for plant medicine, and the guidance of knowledgeable colleagues. I was thrilled to have the opportunity to complement that experience with formal training in wetland plant identification.
Being able to confidently identify wetland plant species is an important part of my role at Legacy, especially when we’re evaluating land for permanent protection. Once a property has been visited by staff and meets our protection criteria, the easement stewardship team returns to prepare a Baseline Documentation Report (BDR)–a comprehensive record of the land’s condition at the time the conservation easement is established. The report documents plant communities, habitats, maps, photographs, and other natural features that serve as the foundation for the easement.
During a BDR site visit, I’m looking at the property in fine detail, navigating every surveyed boundary and natural area. Much of my time is spent with my eyes glued to the ground or the canopy as I carefully identify and document the plant species I encounter. That vegetation inventory becomes an important part of the property’s permanent record, helping Legacy monitor changes over time and ensure the land’s conservation values are protected for generations to come.
Plants help tell the story of the land, of how it may have looked in the past and transitioned over time, and they help to further substantiate the conservation values we protect when we place a conservation easement. Certain plant species are rarer than others, and some are state-threatened or endangered.
The plants that grow on a property also help us identify the natural communities present, whether it’s a wet meadow, prairie fen, shrub-carr wetland, or mesic-southern forest, for example. Wetland plants are especially important because certain plants are considered indicator species–plants that typically only grow under specific soil and water conditions. Their presence helps us identify the type and quality of wetland and better understand its ecological significance.
As wetlands continue to face increasing threats across Michigan, and certain wetland communities are exceptionally rare, accurately identifying these plant species becomes even more important. That knowledge helps ensure our conservation easements identify and account for these important natural features so they can receive the specialized protection and long-term stewardship they deserve!
Spending two days in Dryden for the wetland plant identification course was an invaluable learning experience. We spent hours in the wetlands identifying plants and observing them in their natural habitats.
For every plant we identified in the field, we took a sample back to the classroom for the second half of the training. We looked at the species up close using a hand lens to help see tiny hairs, bumps, leaf patterns, and colors, and we practiced using a dichotomous key to identify the species on our own.
During the course, we identified over 100 plants, reviewed leaf and flower structures, scientific names, how ferns fertilize, and, of course, learned tips on how to identify various wetland flowers, trees, shrubs, rushes, sedges, grasses, mints, carrots, and more! Near the end of the second day, my head was buzzing with knowledge and a thirst to get back onto Legacy's lands to practice my new skills.
Although I’ve only been out in the field twice since this training, I have already seen my new knowledge coming to life, spotting plants in wetlands that I might have overlooked or been unsure of before. I'm excited to continue as a student of the plants, and I’m grateful for Legacy’s commitment to learning–an investment that strengthens our ability to protect, monitor, and steward conserved lands forever!
