The Grassland Restoration Network is a loose affiliation of people trying to use prairie restoration (reconstruction) as a way to rebuild, conserve and sustain grassland ecosystems.  Each year, we put on a workshop to share ideas, techniques, research results, and stories with other.  Workshops are hosted by a different site each year, giving us the opportunity to visit a range of projects over the years.

The next workshop will be hosted here in central Nebraska (near Grand Island) on September 13 and 14, 2016.  We’ll visit sites owned by both Prairie Plains Resource Institute and The Nature Conservancy (Platte River Prairies).  As always, we will compare notes on restoration techniques and we will look at a variety of plantings, from brand new to more then 20 years old.  In addition, however, we will talk about how to evaluate the success of restoration projects beyond simply counting plant species.  We will tour restored sites with a number of researchers who have helped us see whether we’re actually restoring ecological function at our Platte River Prairies – including whether or not we are defragmenting the landscape for a variety of insect and animal species.