2025-26 Winter Field Trips, Education Programs, and Speakers
We are excited for yet another field trip season in the Sax-Zim Bog! Accessibility notes are offered on the list of trips below. Carpooling during field trips will be done at the comfort level of participants. Field Trip attendance is free for members (those who have donated $25 or more within the past year). If you are interested in membership, the $25 fee covers membership and free entry to any field trip or program in a 12-month period!
Friday Afternoon Speaker programs do not require registration. Minnesota Master Naturalist field trips require registration through the Minnesota Master Naturalist online portal.
To give everyone better expectations of rigor for each field trip, we have included relative activity levels for each field trip this season. The approximate ratings are as follows:
Field Trip Activity Level Ratings
1- Easy (travel over even terrain on roadways/boardwalks or limited hiking up to ½ mile total)
2- Moderate (travel over even or uneven terrain, dry to wet conditions, or hiking over ½ mile total)
3- Average (travel over even or uneven terrain, hiking off trail possible, or hiking up to 1 mile total)
4- Difficult (travel primarily over uneven terrain, wet conditions, or hiking over 1 mile total)
5-Strenuous (mostly off trail with travel primarily over uneven and wet terrain or hiking up to 2 miles)
If you have any questions about any of the field trips listed, field trip registration process, questions about the accessibility of a field trip, or feedback on our activity rating scale please contact Head Naturalist Clinton Dexter-Nienhaus via email at naturalist@saxzim.org.
Friday, December 12
Woodpecker Ecology in Northern Minnesota
presented by Mike North, Wildlife Biologist, Minnesota Department of Natural Resources
12:00- 1:30 pm Meeting in the Lois King Education Center at the Welcome Center
Activity Rating- 1
Our first speaker of the winter season begins where our last Friday Afternoon Speaker of the summer season ended: woodpeckers! Join us to hear about the work and research that goes in to wildlife management, surrounding forests and the birds that need them. This talk will feature a synopsis on the cumulative research into woodpecker ecology in northern Minnesota, including research on their aspen resource and how it relates to timber harvest considerations. This presentation will take a retrospective look at the accumulation of knowledge since the onset of the research, and how new findings drive the research in new directions.
Mike North is a 28-year employee of the Minnesota DNR, currently in their Section of Wildlife. He works in the realm of forest planning and in old-growth protection. He is also an adjunct at Bemidji State University, having served on four graduate student committees, including three he will touch upon here. Prior to working for the DNR, Mike was a 11-year employee of the U.S. Department of Interior, with 10 years with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in Alaska. Mike has a Bachelor’s degree from Iowa State University and a Master’s degree from North Dakota State University. For his Master’s thesis he studied yellow-billed loons in arctic Alaska. He also has a Master Bird Banding permit and has banded around 23,000 birds. Mike supports research through Bemidji State University, the Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe, Central Lakes College, Deep Portage Conservation Reserve, and the Minnesota Purple Martin Working Group as sub-permittees under his permit. And he teaches kids about birds through hands-on bird banding at Mille Lacs Kathio State Park and the Todd County EnviroFest.
Saturday, December 13
Master Naturalist Advanced Training: Introduction to Minnesota’s Mammals
Registration is now open! Registration can be completed at the MN Master Naturalist page here: Introduction to Minnesota’s Mammals
Sunday, December 21
Sax-Zim Bog Snowshoe Hike #1: Starflower Bog
9:00- 1:00pm Meeting in the Lois King Education Center at the Welcome Center
Activity Rating- 4
Snowshoes are a great way to continue being active during the winter season and are a great way to explore hard to get to locations in the Bog. Join us for the first snowshoe hike of the season to one of our newer properties: Starflower Bog! This field trip will explore this property, hoping to explore some of the interior of this diverse property! Snowshoes are required for this field trip and can be borrowed from the Welcome Center by emailing Head Naturalist Clinton at naturalist@saxzim.org to reserve a pair or two.
Register for this field trip here: Sax-Zim Bog Snowshoe Hike #1
Saturday, December 27 and Sunday, December 28
Winter Birding Field Trips
8:00 am- 2:00 pm Meeting in the Lois King Education Center at the Welcome Center
Activity Rating- 1-2
Warbler Wednesdays are a fixture for summer birding, but we don’t have a counterpart to winter birding… until now! Join us this winter for a couple of winter birding field trips. The intention of these field trips is to give you an introduction on how to approach birding in the Sax-Zim Bog in the winter months. We will not be targeting owls, but will look at any we come across. This is a good field trip for folks to attend if you are looking to learn more about how to approach winter birding in the vast Sax-Zim Bog.
Register for the Saturday, December 27 trip here: Winter Birding Field Trip #1
Register for the Sunday, December 28 trip here: Winter Birding Field Trip #2
Saturday, January 3
A User’s Guide to iNaturalist
10:00 am- 1:00 pm Meeting in the Lois King Education Center at the Welcome Center
Activity Rating- 4
Why not break in the new year by learning how to participate in Citizen Science! iNaturalist is a platform that we use in the Sax-Zim Bog quite a lot and it is a very powerful tool not just for identification, but for exploring species diversity. This course will spend time looking at the desktop version of iNaturalist and also consider the mobile app out and about in the field! Join us to learn more about iNaturalist or to simply give it a try!
Register for this field trip here: A User’s Guide to iNaturalist
Sunday, January 4
Bird Anatomy and Artifacts
10:00- 2:00 pm Meeting in the Lois King Education Center at the Welcome Center
Activity Rating- 1
Sometimes birds have negative interactions with human-made infrastructure. Those birds often get found by folks who take them to science museums, collections at Universities, or seek out nature centers to utilize those birds for education purposes. Over the years, we have been able to collect feathers, wings and feet, skulls, nests, and professional mounts from a number of species under our education permit and now have a space to share those items with you all! If you have ever wanted to learn about birds through their feather adaptations or skulls, this program is for you! Our time will be spent in the Lois King Education Center investigating the bird artifacts collection at the Welcome Center.
Register for this field trip here: Bird Anatomy and Artifacts
Friday, January 9
Quantifying the environmental benefits and impacts of peatland restoration in Minnesota
presented by Chris Lenhart, Research Professor, Biosystems Engineering Program at the University of Minnesota
12:00- 1:30 pm Meeting in the Lois King Education Center at the Welcome Center
Activity Rating- 1
Our second talk of the winter season speaks to a topic and some research that is happening right in the greater Sax-Zim Bog ecosystem! There is a lot of amazing work going on in Minnesota regarding peatland conservation and restoration. In areas where active restoration is happening, there is also active research! This talk will feature some of the current research going on in Minnesota’s peatlands and how those projects have been impacting the surrounding environment. Join us to learn more about the research and projects currently being done in Minnesota’s peatlands!
Chris Lenhart is a Research Professor with the Bioproducts and Biosystems Engineering (BBE) Department at the University of Minnesota and works with The Nature Conservancy (TNC) on restoration implementation and scientific assessment. Chris has been a professor in BBE since 2010, leading research projects on stream and wetland restoration as well as management for water quality especially in agricultural areas. He has over 30 scientific publications and co-authored the book, Ecological Restoration in the Midwest: Past, Present and Future published in 2017. More recently he has focused his efforts on studies to quantify the effects of peatland restoration on greenhouse gas emissions, peatland hydrology and downstream mercury loads. He has also led assessment and design of many stream and wetland restoration projects with the U of MN and TNC. Currently he is leading research on peatland restoration in
the Sax-Zim bog and a stream and wetland restoration project at the Cedar Creek Ecosystem Science Reserve. He is also part of the Snowchange Collaborative to develop an approach for scaling up peatland restoration in the boreal north across North America and Europe, coordinating with staff from the Friends of Sax-Zim Bog.
Saturday, January 10
Acrylic Painting Workshop: Vibrant Winter Lands
lead by Lauren Hefty, GreyFoxArtworks and FOSZB Summer Artist in Residence Participant
11 am- 3 pm Meeting at the Meadowlands Community Center
Registration: $100/non-FOSZB members (includes membership); $85/ FOSZB members and MN Master Naturalists; Materials are included!
Activity Rating- 1
The arts and the Sax-Zim Bog have a strong relationship: from photographers capturing the sights and creatures of the region to the artists inspired to profile this amazing place in their favored medium. This is our first foray into art-based workshops in the Bog, and we are starting off with two offerings this year! The first involves paint. This workshop is your chance to dive into acrylics and learn to paint vibrant winter landscapes! During class, students will further their painting skills and learn how to conjure up dramatic landscapes that challenge the idea of what can be achieved with acrylics.
Lauren is an illustrator and painter who specializes in natural landscapes, surrealism, and birds. The simple beauty of the outdoors is what inspires her to create. From the cold silence of a winter landscape to the warm, vibrant colors of a spring warbler, Lauren’s work is meant to showcase the diversity of nature in a way that moves the viewer to a sense of nostalgia. She currently creates in her home town of Star Prairie, WI. Lauren is a member of the St. Paul Artist Collective, a board member for Frederic Arts and an Arts Educator for the White Bear Center for the Arts, Glädje Gallery, and Frederic Arts. Lauren’s artwork is currently on display at Glädje Gallery in Lindstrom, MN and at One10 Gallery in Frederic, WI.
Register for this workshop here: Acrylic Painting Workshop: Vibrant Winter Landscapes
Winter Tracking and Animal Sign Field Trip
10:00 am- 2:00pm Meeting in the Lois King Education Center at the Welcome Center
Activity Rating- 2-3
Winter offers a lot of opportunities in our area to find and interpret animal sign! Many mammal species are hard to see in the Sax-Zim Bog, but their sign is all around us. This field trip will work to hone your skills finding, interpreting, and documenting animal tracks and sign. Do you need practice determining if you are looking at a dog or wolf track? What is the difference between Black-backed Woodpecker and Pileated Woodpecker sign? This field trip will hope to answer these questions and more while investigating the roadsides and trails around the Welcome Center and beyond. Snowshoes will be helpful during this field trip, but are not required. If you wish to use a pair from the Welcome Center, please email Head Naturalist Clinton at naturalist@saxzim.org to reserve a pair or two!
Register for this field trip here: Winter Tracking and Animal Sign
Sunday, January 11
Sax-Zim Bog Snowshoe Hike #2: Sax WMA
9:00- 1:00pm Meeting in the Lois King Education Center at the Welcome Center
Activity Rating- 4
Snowshoes are a great way to continue being active during the winter season and are a great way to explore hard to get to locations in the Bog. Join us for the second snowshoe hike of the season to a new location for our winter exploration: Sax Wildlife Management Area! This is a neat area in the summer, but is rarely explored during the winter months. Expect snowshoeing through an open area, heading to some bog habitat on the edge of the larger Great Gray Peatland! Snowshoes are required for this field trip and can be borrowed from the Welcome Center by emailing Head Naturalist Clinton at naturalist@saxzim.org to reserve a pair or two.
Register for this field trip here: Sax-Zim Bog Snowshoe Hike #2
Saturday, January 17
The Science of Feathers
10:00 am- 2:00 pm Meeting in the Lois King Education Center at the Welcome Center
Activity Rating- 1-2
Feathers are the first thing we see when we look at birds! But how much do you know about these structures that allow birds to fly, become insulated against water and wind, or display fitness to potential mates? This Advanced Training will take a deep dive into everything feathers from basic feather structures, to how feathers influence bird evolution, and more!
Register for this field trip here: The Science of Feathers
Sunday, January 18
Master Naturalist Advanced Training: Snow Ecology
Registration is now open! Registration can be completed at the MN Master Naturalist page here: Snow Ecology
Saturday, January 24
A Closer Look Series: Finches!
10:00- 11:30 am Meeting in the Lois King Education Center at the Welcome Center
Activity Rating- 1-2
We are trying something new this winter with a couple of shorter, more intensive programs, focused on bird families that are not just common in the winter, but also draw a lot of attention during the winter months! Instead of one longer field trip, we will be doing two(!) shorter programs during the day. Feel free to attend both talks consecutively or just choose one or the other. Our first program in the series will feature finches!
Register for this field trip here: A Closer Look: Finches!
A Closer Look Series: Owls!
1:30- 3:00 pm Meeting in the Lois King Education Center at the Welcome Center
Activity Rating- 1-2
We are trying something new this winter with a couple of shorter, more intensive programs, focused on bird families that are not just common in the winter, but also draw a lot of attention during the winter months! The second program of the day will feature owls!
Register for this field trip here: A Closer Look: Owls!
Sunday, January 25
A Closer Look Series: Woodpeckers!
10:00- 11:30 am Meeting in the Lois King Education Center at the Welcome Center
Activity Rating- 1-2
We are trying something new this winter with a couple of shorter, more intensive programs, focused on bird families that are not just common in the winter, but also draw a lot of attention during the winter months! Instead of one longer field trip, we will be doing two(!) shorter programs during the day. Feel free to attend both talks consecutively or just choose one or the other. Our third program in this series will feature woodpeckers!
Register for this field trip here: A Closer Look: Woodpeckers!
A Closer Look Series: Chickadees!
1:30- 3:00 pm Meeting in the Lois King Education Center at the Welcome Center
Activity Rating- 1-2
We are trying something new this winter with a couple of shorter, more intensive programs, focused on bird families that are not just common in the winter, but also draw a lot of attention during the winter months! The final program in this series will feature a favorite bird family of many… chickadees!
Register for this field trip here: A Closer Look: Chickadees!
Friday, January 30
Anaamaagon: Under the Snow
presented by Emily Stone, Naturalist/Education Director at the Cable Natural History Museum
12:00- 1:30 pm Meeting in the Lois King Education Center at the Welcome Center
Activity Rating- 1
Our fourth speaker of the 2025-2026 Winter Season is Emily Stone! Anaamaagon is the Ojibwe word for the Subnivean Zone. This is a hidden realm where mice play, weasels hunt, and life depends on deep snow. The drifts may look deserted, but dive down and you’ll be amazed by the way little lives thrive in winter. We’ll learn all about them through Indigenous and Western Sciences and beautiful artwork.
Emily Stone is a naturalist by birth, training, profession and passion. Her childhood spent as a “mud and water daughter” in northeast Iowa led to a degree in outdoor education from Northland College and a Field Naturalist Master’s from the University of Vermont. As the Naturalist/Education Director at the Cable Natural History Museum in Cable, Wisconsin, Emily writes a weekly “Natural Connections” column published in more than 20 local and regional newspapers. She has earned multiple Excellence in Craft awards from the Outdoor Writers Association of America, including for her second Natural Connections book, and published Natural Connections3 in November 2025.
Saturday, February 7
Drawing Bog Birds: Boreal Chickadee
lead by Lauren Hefty, GreyFoxArtworks and FOSZB Summer Artist in Residence Participant
12- 3 pm Meeting at the Meadowlands Community Center
Registration: $80/non-FOSZB members (includes membership); $65/ FOSZB members and MN Master Naturalists; Materials are included!
Activity Rating- 1
The arts and the Sax-Zim Bog have a strong relationship: from photographers capturing the sights and creatures of the region to the artists inspired to profile this amazing place in their favored medium. This is our first foray into art-based workshops in the Bog, and we are starting off with two offerings this year! The first involves drawing charismatic Bog birds! Learn to illustrate one of the bog’s most beloved residents: Boreal Chickadees! We will cover the basics of form, lighting, texture and more. Materials will be provided by the instructor. This class is geared toward students that have a little experience with graphite pencils but are looking to expand their skill set.
Lauren is an illustrator and painter who specializes in natural landscapes, surrealism, and birds. The simple beauty of the outdoors is what inspires her to create. From the cold silence of a winter landscape to the warm, vibrant colors of a spring warbler, Lauren’s work is meant to showcase the diversity of nature in a way that moves the viewer to a sense of nostalgia. She currently creates in her home town of Star Prairie, WI. Lauren is a member of the St. Paul Artist Collective, a board member for Frederic Arts and an Arts Educator for the White Bear Center for the Arts, Glädje Gallery, and Frederic Arts. Lauren’s artwork is currently on display at Glädje Gallery in Lindstrom, MN and at One10 Gallery in Frederic, WI.
Register for this workshop here: Drawing Bog Birds: Boreal Chickadee
Winter World of Lichens Field Trip
10:00 am- 2:00 pm Meeting in the Lois King Education Center at the Welcome Center
Activity Rating- 1-2
Northern Minnesota is home to a diverse lichen community. These species cover nearly 8% of the terrestrial surface of the earth, yet are relatively unknown to most of us. Join us on this trip to get firsthand experience in lichen identification, as well as to learn a few of the more common lichens in our area. We will start our field trip indoors, investigating the Welcome Center Lichen Library and during the trip, we will be making small collections of lichens for the Welcome Center Lichen Library! We MAY utilize snowshoes for this Field Trip (email Head Naturalist Clinton at naturalist@saxzim.org to reserve a pair or two).
Register for this field trip here: Winter World of Lichens
Sunday, February 8
Sax-Zim Bog Snowshoe Hike #3: Toivola Swamp: Devil’s Islands
9:00- 1:00pm Meeting in the Lois King Education Center at the Welcome Center
Activity Rating- 4
Snowshoes are a great way to continue being active during the winter season and are a great way to explore hard to get to locations in the Bog. Join us for the final snowshoe hike of the season to a new location for our winter exploration: Toivola Swamp: Devil’s Islands! While we may not get out to the official named location, we will be heading out into Toivola Swamp to check out the odd little pockets of conifers that are found in this vast, open peatland. This should be an interesting field trip, looking at a very difficult habitat to investigate during the summer months. Snowshoes are required for this field trip and can be borrowed from the Welcome Center by emailing Head Naturalist Clinton at naturalist@saxzim.org to reserve a pair or two.
Register for this field trip here: Sax-Zim Bog Snowshoe Hike #3
Friday, February 13
Winter Storytelling
presented by Hope Flanagan, Seneca Elder; Community Outreach and Cultural Teacher for Dream of Wild Health
12:00- 1:30 pm Meeting in the Lois King Education Center at the Welcome Center
Activity Rating- 1
Winter is traditionally storytelling time for Native American communities in northern climates. We are lucky to have a good friend of the Bog join us this winter to share winter stories with us!
Hope Flanagan is an elder who has taught and worked in the Twin Cities Native Community since the late 1970s. She is a long-time Community Outreach and cultural teacher at Dream of Wild Health. Before that, Hope taught in an Ojibwe Immersion classroom for ten years and was a storyteller for Minneapolis Public Schools. She teaches about plants and wild plant gathering and is also an Urban Bird Collective walk leader.
Saturday, February 14
Corvid Ecology Field Trip
9:00 am- 2:00 pm Meeting in the Lois King Education Center at the Welcome Center
Activity Rating- 1-2
The family Corvidae includes crows, ravens, magpies, jays, treepies, ground-jays, and more! This group of birds is found all over the world, from the tropics to the high arctic, and most habitats in between. In northern Minnesota, this group of birds is one a few that can be found all year round. Because they are found year-round, there are lots of opportunities to observe these birds in your backyard, local park, or here in the Sax-Zim Bog. This field trip will be a mix of indoor learning and outdoor observation to explore this amazing group of birds!
Register for this field trip here: Corvid Ecology Field Trip
Sunday, February 15
Winter Tracking and Animal Sign Field Trip
10:00 am- 2:00 pm Meeting in the Lois King Education Center at the Welcome Center
Activity Rating- 2-3
Winter offers a lot of opportunities in our area to find and interpret animal sign! Many mammal species are hard to see in the Sax-Zim Bog, but their sign is all around us. This field trip will work to hone your skills finding, interpreting, and documenting animal tracks and sign. Do you need practice determining if you are looking at a dog or wolf track? What is the difference between Black-backed Woodpecker and Pileated Woodpecker sign? This field trip will hope to answer these questions and more while investigating the roadsides and trails around the Welcome Center and beyond. Snowshoes will be helpful during this field trip, but are not required. If you wish to use a pair from the Welcome Center, please email Head Naturalist Clinton at naturalist@saxzim.org to reserve a pair or two!
Register for this field trip here: Winter Tracking and Animal Sign
Saturday February 21
Master Naturalist Advanced Training: Winter Through a Hand Lens
Registration is now open! Registration can be completed at the MN Master Naturalist page here: Winter Through a Hand Lens
Friday, February 27
Daytime Raptor Migration through Sax-Zim Bog
presented by Erik Bruhnke , Bird Guide and Raptor Migration Enthusiast
12:00- 1:30 pm Meeting in the Lois King Education Center at the Welcome Center
Activity Rating- 1
Have you ever wondered what raptor is circling high over your head, or one you saw migrating past on the far horizon? Are you interested in fine-tuning your hawkwatching skills? Would you like to learn more about daytime raptor species you may encounter while birding Sax-Zim Bog? If you answered yes to any of these questions, this talk is for you. Come join Erik as he shares a wealth of knowledge about raptors along with catchy identification anecdotes, and an abundance of his raptor photography, to help you enhance your appreciation and identification skills of these splendid birds throughout the area. With Spring raptor migration approaching after the timing of this presentation, this event is not to be missed!
Erik Bruhnke has loved birds since he was a child looking at chickadees. While still a student at Northland College, he taught field ornithology for three semesters, graduating in 2008 with a Natural Resources degree. After graduation his springs and summers were spent conducting bird surveys through northern forests, vast prairies, and western mountains. He worked as an interpreter for six fall seasons at Hawk Ridge Bird Observatory; counted migrating raptors at the Corpus Christi HawkWatch in Texas in 2015; and was the 2016, 2017, and 2018 hawk counter at the Cape May Hawkwatch in New Jersey. In the fall of 2020, he educated visitors at the Cape May Hawkwatch. Throughout more recent fall seasons he has volunteered back at his stomping grounds at Hawk Ridge, assisting both interpreting and counting the migration. He became a board member of Hawk Ridge Bird Observatory in 2025. Erik’s wildlife photography has won national awards, and he’s written for the American Birding Association’s Birder’s Guide, BirdWatching magazine, and Bird Watcher’s Digest. Erik is a full-time birding tour guide for Victor Emanuel Nature Tours (VENT) as well as his own business, Naturally Avian. He enjoys hiking, kayaking, ice skating, dips in Lake Superior, and just being out in nature. In his free time he loves to cook and bake, often following the recipes of his Omas and Opas.
Saturday, February 28
Winter Season Mini-BioBlitz!
9:00- 2:00 pm Meeting in the Lois King Education Center at the Welcome Center
Activity Rating- 2-3
It is no secret that much of the biodiversity seen in the greater Sax-Zim Bog region is observable in the warm weather months. However, there is a very distinct set of creatures that can only be seen (or seen more reliably) during the winter months. Join us on this mini-bioblitz to see what kind of species diversity exists during the winter months in the Sax-Zim Bog! This will be an informal, generalist oriented bioblitz, which will visit FOSZB Properties and beyond. Join us for this first ever effort to document some winter biodiversity!
Register for this field trip here: Winter Season Mini-Blitz!
Sunday, March 1
Introduction to Bird Song
10:00 am- 2:00 pm Meeting in the Lois King Education Center at the Welcome Center
Activity Rating- 1
Birds are incredible songsters. Some species are expert mimics, some species are tireless songsters, while some species barely make any sound at all! While March might seem like an odd time to offer a course on bird song, think of it as a good way to start preparing your ears for the spring! Winter species will be considered during this course and the overall focus of this class will be great for folks wishing to learn about bird song (how birds make sound and why), for folks hoping to become better birders (especially by ear!), and for those who just want to know what that sound is outside the Welcome Center! This course will serve as a baseline to supplement what you might already know or to help build a good foundation on understanding birds and their sounds.
Register for this field trip here: Introduction to Bird Song
Saturday, March 7
Northern Owls Evening Program
Program- 4:00- 5:00pm, with field trip until 8:00 pm
Meeting in the Lois King Education Center at the Welcome Center
Activity Rating- 1-2
Most often, visitors to the Sax-Zim Bog are looking for owls, but do you really know “hoo” owls are? Come and learn a little about some of the owls that can sometimes be found in the Sax-Zim Bog and the surrounding area. Following a short talk, we will caravan looking for some owls at dusk!
Register for this field trip here: Northern Owls Evening Program
Sunday, March 8
Master Naturalist Advanced Training: Introduction to Late Winter and Early Spring Insects
Registration is now open! Registration can be completed at the MN Master Naturalist page here: Introduction to Late Winter and Early Spring Insects
Friday, March 13
Peatland forest in Minnesota: Past, Present, Future?
presented by Josh Kolasch, Master’s Student, Integrated Biological Sciences program at the University of Minnesota-Duluth
12:00- 1:30 pm Meeting in the Lois King Education Center at the Welcome Center
Activity Rating- 1
Peatland forest are wetland forest communities that play a crucial role in global carbon sequestering, water regulation and biodiversity conservation. These forests host a unique diversity of specialized flora and fauna, and are critical habitats for a number of species listed on Minnesota’s Species in Greatest Conservation Need (SGCN). In this presentation, we will explore the natural history of peatland forest, the historical impacts of colonization and industrial development, and the threats they currently face and the future outlook on this incredibly important but highly threatened ecosystem.
Josh Kolasch (he/him) is an ecologist, naturalist and complete biodiversity nerd. He is a 2nd year graduate student at the University of Minnesota-Duluth in the Integrated Biological Sciences Master’s program. He works for Dr. Alexis Grinde in the Avian Ecology Lab out of the Natural Resources Research Institute. Josh has been fascinated with forest communities and biodiversity since early childhood. He has worked across the northern forested region and in primary tropical forest of Costa Rica on numerous ecology projects, deepening his love for these ecosystems and how our human society has and is impacting these ecosystems. His current research project is looking at how ecological succession impacts forest structure in black spruce peatlands, and how forest structure impacts peatland bird specialist in
this forest community.
Directions to the Friends of Sax-Zim Bog Welcome Center
ADDRESS: The address is Sax-Zim Bog Welcome Center 8793 Owl Avenue, Toivola, MN 55765
[NOTE: THIS IS NOT A MAILING ADDRESS…but put this address into Google Maps or Apple Maps.]
Directions from Cotton, MN on US HWY 53:
*Go West from Cotton on CR52/Arkola for 11 miles
*Turn South (left) on Owl Avenue
*Go 1.75 miles (second curve) to Welcome Center
Directions from Meadowlands, on CR133…
*Go East on CR133 to CR229/29
*Turn North (left) on CR229/29
*Go North to T at Correction Line Rd
*Turn West (left) on Correction Line Rd
*Road curves North and becomes Owl Ave
*Go North on Owl Avenue for 2.5 miles to Welcome Center