With so many things I want to talk about, I wasn’t sure what I wanted my first blog post to be. But I figured the best way to start was to let readers, present and future, know where I’m coming from….
I think there were really two things that got me on track for my Earth-saving career. First, I spent a lot of time exploring the Big Rock Creek downhill from my childhood home. Second was that my father took me outdoors a lot. Between Boy Scouts and family outings, I was out on a camping trip every month of the growing season. I grew to love being out in nature – and especially fish and any sort of aquatic creature.
I started volunteering and working in conservation in high school. I joined workdays to pull garlic mustard and cut buckthorn at local nature preserves. I found summer work as a Seasonal Naturalist at Red Oak Nature Center. It was mostly maintaining facilities, mowing weeds, and cleaning-up snake poop, but I also got to lead nature programs and develop informational signs.
While earning my B.S. in Ecology from the University of Illinois I was introduced to prairies. My first prairie tour was a life-changing experience. We saw 8’ tall grasses (big bluestem) and bizarre plants with huge leaves the size of turkey platters and textured like sandpaper, and floor stalks about a finger-width in diameter, but 10’ tall, with little sunflowers on top. I became enamored, and took a leadership role in the student prairie restoration group, Red Bison, then followed that up with an ecological restoration internship.
During this time I became enchanted with the beauty of the prairies, woodlands, savannas, and wetlands of the Midwest. But I also became aware of how almost all of these natural ares have been destroyed or degraded. This sparked my passion for working in ecological restoration and to reestablish native plants where they have been lost within the human landscape.
After graduating in 2000, I took the role of the Volunteer Steward for a local woodland, Busey Woods, and continued to volunteer in prairie management with Grand Prairie Friends. In 2003, my wife and I moved to Flagstaff for me to study for my Master’s Degree in Forestry at Northern Arizona University, home of the Ecological Restoration Institute. But we soon found ourselves longing for the verdant prairies and mighty oaks of the Midwest. After I graduated, we moved back, and a few months later my wife’s career moved us to one of our favorite cities: Madison.
I worked for two different ecological restoration contractors for the next two years. In 2008, I decided to found my own company, Good Oak Ecological Services. I started with a compact car and a $400 trailer that I had to build myself from a kit. Good Oak’s dual focus on restoring natural areas and sustainable landscaping with native plants was successful. I steadily grew the company to having about a dozen employees, over 100 clients, and roughly $1M in annual gross income.
I was able to work on many, many projects that I was proud of over the years. But, as the business grew, I spent less time in the field doing what I loved and more time in the office. The stress of managing an increasingly large and complex business caused me to start developing health issues, and limited my time with my wife and young daughter. The pandemic was the straw that broke the camels back. In mid-2021, I had to take a leave of absence to manage these health-induced stress issues. I spent much of the next several months on the couch, exhausted, and the road to recovery was much longer than I had anticipated.
I decided to sell the company to then Senior Ecological Land Manager Evan Nelson, who had been running the organization in my absence, and now continues the good work with the great team there at Good Oak. The sale went through late in 2024.
Shortly thereafter, I founded Red Head Ecological Consulting so that I could get back to the work I am so passionate about. With this new endeavor, I want to focus on educating people about ecological restoration and sustainable landscaping. I plan to do this through public speaking, consulting, and reaching out through social media such as this blog. I’ve got a couple of book ideas that I’ve been sitting on for 10-15 years that I’d like to find time to finally write. I’m excited to get out and do the work – whether that’s work for clients or finding time to volunteer!
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