Editor’s Essay

Paying Attention

We all do it. Whether it’s letting something spoil in the refrigerator, running out of gas, or slipping on our exercise, we occasionally fail to pay attention.

I think there’s a good reason we say “paying attention.” Everything in life—from our kids to our homes to our natural areas—has a kind of “attention account” into which we must periodically make deposits. When those accounts run low, they send us statements..

I thought of this when the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration uncovered $4 million worth of marijuana at Crabtree Forest Preserve in northwest Cook County. On July 16, investigators found extensive bunkers, a campsite, an irrigation system hooked up to a lake, and 14 growing areas with as many as 38,000 tall marijuana plants.

Granted, Crabtree Forest Preserve is big—1,600 acres is a lot of ground to cover, for anyone. But the Forest Preserve District runs a staffed nature center on the property. The bust was a sign that we—the Forest Preserve District and the nature-loving community—haven’t been paying enough attention.

The district keeps the public off large parts of Crabtree, requesting that visitors stay in a small section along three miles of trail. Maybe that’s warranted. Theoretically, it could save rare nature from over-use, trampling, wildflower picking, and such.

But in practice, in Chicago Wilderness—so close to so many people and invasive plants and other influences—a vacuum almost always leads to something else. In the aftermath of the bust, it wasn’t surprising to hear the reporters talk of the “dense brush,” and to recognize invasive buckthorn on TV. That section of Crabtree needed attention. In this case, the hands-off approach favored no species so much as Cannabis sativa. It’s just one symptom of a larger “attention deficit disorder” across our natural areas.

Yet when we pay more attention, it can yield big dividends. Thousands of regular people counting birds just a few days each year is how researchers now know that Common Birds populations of many wonderful species have declined.

Much of canoeist Ralph Frese’s life has been devoted to getting people to notice the rivers he loves to paddle. Ralph is one of the reasons the public has turned back towards the rivers after years of neglect, and part of why reformers and citizens are asking our water districts and corporations to further improve our rivers and lakes.

Peter Baranyai was paying attention when he noticed wild sponges in the wastewater plant he runs and realized his facility could play a big ecological role.

We don’t have attention meters at the entrances of preserves, some kind of turnstile or giant thermometer, but we do have them inside the preserves. These days, a prairie full of rare native wildflowers is saying “some staff or volunteer is a steward here—someone’s paying attention.” Botanists can actually combine the “conservation values” of the plants and rate the floristic quality of the place. That’s as close as you’ll get to an attention meter anywhere.

In conservation, paying attention means promoting ambitious programs to monitor and care for our woods, prairies, and wetlands. But it all rests on simple acts by regular people, repeated millions of times. It can be as simple as going for a short walk in a local preserve once a week. For many people, it’s just doing what they love.

The more attention we pay our wild places, the more they’ll pay us back. (It was, after all, an intern studying foxes who caught those pot farmers.) The more controlled burns for restoration, the fewer Cannabis burns by law enforcement. In short, the more we appreciate our preserves for nature-compatible pursuits such as hiking, canoeing, restoration, birding, and botanizing, the less they’ll be used for the wrong things. And we—the public and the agencies—will find our accounts all paid up.