The McHenry County Conservation District introduced a bison grazing area in December at Pleasant Valley Conservation Area in Woodstock. Could Horizon Farm be next?
The McHenry County Conservation Foundation has received a $36,000 grant from the Illinois Department of Natural Resources to help fund its ongoing restoration efforts at a newly created bison grazing area in Woodstock.
The grant will help pay for the conversion of 90 acres of cornfield into prairie land, and for other enhancements inside the bison grazing area. Late last year, the conservation district partnered with Ruhter Bison to bring six bison to Pleasant Valley Conservation Area.
The bison, which historically played a key role in the ecology of prairies and grasslands, are used as a natural land management tool to benefit breeding birds and other wildlife.
“The bison will do the work of managing the prairie in a far more natural and beneficial way for wildlife,” said Brad Woodson Manager of Natural Resources, McHenry County Conservation District, in a statement in December. “It is so important to prairie habitat to have grazers as another restoration tool in land management. Grazers like elk, deer or bison are essential to enhancing the diversity of a grassland habitat – they help keep the balance of habitat structure and species composition of the prairie. We are looking forward to seeing the result.”
Read on here.
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