The Arboretum is a very special setting for educating and inspiring the public to be a part of conservation. Visitors can have an up-close encounter with nature as they explore our woodlands, wetlands, prairies and river corridors. Our staff researches, manages, monitors and improves these habitats all while offering engaging experiences that highlight the value they offer. As a teaching tree museum, we strive to uncover these important secret treasures of nature and share them with our guests for awareness.
Conserving habitats offers many crucial benefits for native plants, wildlife and overall ecosystems. Habitat restoration directly supports our native bees, birds and butterflies that we all rely on as pollinators. The value of these landscapes are very clear and the proof of this is in the numbers. Our prairie restoration has grown by leaps in bounds in the past several years. Within many of these prairies, our amazing butterfly monitoring volunteers have now dedicated over 20 years of citizen science monitoring. Our citizen scientists have discovered new species and have also documented many other species while at our Red Barn Reserve. These are some of the amazing results you can see right here on our grounds, but the work we are doing here also has impacts across Ohio and soon will be in practice in sites across the eastern US.
All of the research and effort put forth is thanks to the support of our members, guests, our donors, volunteers, interns, residents and staff. So far, we have made a lot of progress but still have work to do. We have a long way to go to ensure future generations prompt success. We continue to rely on our supporters to aid with the vision we want to see for the future. In the coming years, we plan to continue planting at least 500 trees every year and we also hope to restore or enhance at least 2 new acres of pollinator habitat each season.
You might ask yourself, how can I help make a change? To start, we must recognize that our dependence on our natural world starts right here in our own backyards. Conservation is a vital key to the success of our lands flourishing. With this, we focus on growing, planting and sharing this information with the public. We all have a hand in this and together, we can take action and make conservation happen every single day. Plan your next visit to The Arboretum for any questions you may have or to spark ideas for your conservation efforts!