48: Ecological Juxtaposition



Spunky Bottoms, Meredosia, Illinois

M E R E D O S I A,  I L

I pass so few cars heading north from Jerseyville that I start to count them.  There are long breaks between the need to dim my headlights.  I’m near the intersection of the Cardinal and Cub fan-bases and hoping to make it to the banks of the Illinois River in Meredosia right about the time the sun rises.  My headlights provide only a narrow glimpse of the landscape I’m driving through – a nearly tortuous condition for someone who loves to closely watch new lands pass while traveling. 

An hour later, as the morning light moves in, I’m crunching along a macadam road through an expanse of dynamic bottomland farm fields.  Every half mile the road zigs at 90 degrees; then zags another 90 degrees.  It’s a driving delight, especially now that the view expands beyond just the feeble headlight cone.  Illinois is most-known for Chicago, but less-known is that it’s one of the top farming states in the country, and zig-zagging through such impressive fields as the sun rises brings that point home with sledge-hammer-like force here in Meredosia. 

But viewed another way…

These dynamic bottomland farm fields are raping the land.  Scoured cleared of all non-farmable vegetation and doused in weed-killing chemicals, these seemingly idyllic fields are a harsh blow to the natural environment.  Let’s face it, we all need the goods that farms produce but the reality is their products come at a high environmental cost. 

However, the bottomland I’m about to visit has a different story…

Both of the main tributaries of the Illinois River flow through the densely populated suburbs of Chicago.  From their confluence in Grundy County the river flows another 135 miles southwest through the state until it reaches the Mississippi River near St. Louis.  That’s significant distance through a pollutant-generating landscape: 
Urban non-point source runoff. 
Leaching nitrates from farm fields. 
Excess sediment from unbuffered banks. 
Barge discharge. 

And so, the Illinois River near Meredosia needs a little TLC; or rather, a little TNC. 

In 1999, The Nature Conservancy (TNC) acquired Spunky Bottoms - a previously-drained 2,000 acre farmland.  They’ve converted it into a thriving wetland that grows richer in plant and animal life every year and reconnects them to the Illinois River.  In effect, Spunky Bottoms now serves as a natural filter, cleansing the waters of the Illinois shortly before it confluences with the Mississippi.  Its success also attracts scientists from around the country having proven to be an important model for similar projects within the Upper Mississippi River System and beyond.

When I arrive, I find an overgrown parking area, rotting kiosk and flooded access trails - human inconveniences.  But this place is not about human conveniences; it’s about a recovering natural bottomlands.  And that process is clearly on display.  Upon stepping out of my car, the sounds of life abound: the calls of waterfowl and a wide variety of birds fill the air.  These wetlands are thriving.  A herd of whitetail deer scamper as I stand at the overlook.  In stark contrast, just around the corner from this oasis is that zig-zag I just drove in on.  It’s close in distance but worlds apart ecologically.   The success of Spunky Bottoms is loudly audible and visually dramatically. 


To get the most in-depth feel for this property, I follow the least-swamped access trail until it becomes impassable.  It’s only about a half mile from the rotting kiosk, but it does bring me to nearly the center of the bottomlands.  Here, surrounded by flooded trees and grasses, I quietly watch bubbles ooze to the surface.  It’s a witnessing up-close of the amazing cleansing processes that are occurring here.  Standing observantly in the midst of such an environmentally beneficial progression is this trip’s sweet success and joins the list of my life’s finest beatifications.   
To most that pass this property, I doubt they appreciate the bubbling ooze or its stark ecological juxtaposition.  Perhaps it just looks like a swamped, overgrown, unusable farm field.  Spunky Bottoms though, represents much more by providing hints of a new future for the Illinois and Mississippi Rivers; futures of renewed abundance and sustainable health.


LEARN MORE ABOUT TNC’S WORK AT SPUNKY BOTTOMS HERE.
Location: Spunky Bottoms, Meredosia, IL

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