Stewards of Kleinstuck

We're just a bunch of people from the neighborhoods surrounding the Kleinstuck preserve who've come together to try to restore the balance of native plants in the preserve. We've noticed over the years that the landscape has changed greatly with many of our beautiful Michigan natives being driven out by invasive species. The pond has been largely filled in by erosion and invasive plants and without active land management the preserve with continue to decline. One of the major problems with these invasive species is that they don't have natural predators in this area so they dominate and drive out the natives creating areas with only one or two varieties of plants. These areas of limited diversity are very unstable and vulnerable. So our goal is to gradually remove the invasive species and allow the natives to return and restore the balance. These efforts will benefit the land quality in and around Kleinstuck, but also the ground water quality, much of which drains down through Kleinstuck.

 We have so far received wonderful support from neighbors as well as Western Michigan University who own the property. One of our greatest assets is Nate Fuller, Conservation Director of the Southwest Michigan Land Conservancy (SWMLC, swmlc.org) and resident of Hillcrest neighborhood near Kleinstuck preserve. He has offered his professional services to design a management plan  for Kleinstuck and is committed to guiding our work and teaching us about the land and its preservation. He has broad experience, extensive knowledge in ecology and land-management, and is passionate about protecting natural areas. We also have Paul Macnellis, with 39 years of experience in landscaping at WMU, and an equally strong commitment to helping preserve Kleinstuck. Paul is offering the support of the WMU crew in helping our efforts.

If you're interested in helping we'd love to hear from you. We can use people to cut down shrubs, pull out invasive species, haul brush, help with monitoring our progress, and many other things. If you think you have a skill that we might be able to use, we'd love to be able to get your help, we can use help in all sizes and shapes. Please go to our Contact Us page to email us your thoughts.