Five years of guerrilla prairie restoration on a highway right-of-way in Chicago
Hey all, I've been sitting on this project for years and finally feel ready to talk about it.
About five or six years ago I started messing with a strip of IDOT land in Chicago. B/c of costs I'm only using seed and hand tools, but I've managed to convert a few thousand sq. ft of it into established prairie/meadow.
It started with cleaning up litter with my family, then throwing seed bombs, then trying to figure out why the seed bombs wouldn't grow. Somewhere along the way it turned into something I really enjoy doing and get a lot of satisfaction from. I've been expanding it, and started a second nearby plot. We're now at 42 observed species, nearly of them native. Now I'm working with a local community org to try and turn it into something a bit more official. Fingers-crossed.
The lowlights: teasel, canada thistle, bindweed for starters. So much pulling and bagging!
The highlights: the explosion in color & life in what was otherwise a patch of invasive nothingness.