stLouISTInvasive Plant Species Removal Program Preserves Local Native American Historic Sites
ILLINOIS - As the National Resources Conservation Service works to clear out invasive plant species, there’s no telling what they could find. The National Resources Conservation Service (NRCS), part of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, offers a conservation planning and funding program that allows them to remove invasive species from private properties. Their goal is to conserve the area and avoid disrupting nature or historic sites. “That’s what their object is, to get some funding to help offset the cost of cleaning that out,” Andy Schlichting, who works with NRCS, said. “But you have to protect all the natural resources that we have. You have to make sure that we’re not going to destroy anything.” Locally, the NRCS is mostly concerned with protecting Native American artifacts and burial sites. Sarah Fisher, Illinois’s State Cultural Resource Specialist for NRCS, explained that this part of Illinois can be a “hotspot”
