Spring 2021

For many of us the time we spend in the outdoors amounts to the best part of our busy lives. That has prompted me to invent ways to make those times remain with me as long as possible. One way to do that is by keeping a natural history journal. It could start with the very practical aspects of a small notebook with recorded dates such as the time when a favorite wildflower can be found in bloom in some secluded ravine, or the best date to see migrating raptors at your favorite mountain overlook. It is always useful to have such information available for future reference. My interest in nature journals started early during my days in New England where I enjoyed John Hay’s poetic calendar of the arrival of spring on Cape Cod (The Run). Then on to Thoreau’s famous journal while on sabbatical and exploring the woods around my rented home in areas adjacent to Walden Pond. I soon had my own personal copies of the Lewis and Clark journals while living in Montana, and then the Ozark and Ouachita journals of Schoolcraft and Nuttall after arriving in Arkansas. All of these serve as useful examples of [...]

The second printing of Ozark Forest Forensics is completed. Published in 2019 and co-authored by Fred Paillet and Steve Stephenson, the book is once again available through our store. The authors are planning public programs for the book later this year. A second printing of “Trees, Shrubs, and Woody Vines of Arkansas” is in process. The new field guide has had very strong sales and high public recognition, including citations from the Arkansas Senate and House of Representatives. The book also reached the top of an Amazon list, noted as the #1-selling new book in the nation in Botany. OSF will launch the Sassafras Award for Excellence in Environmental Writing next month. The award will be given to a literary work that addresses conservation issues in the areas where OS/OSF operates. The winner will be announced in early 2022. Finalist judge for the award is Davis McCombs, director of the University of Arkansas Creative Writing Program and a former park ranger at Mammoth Cave National Park. In addition, the Foundation Endowment Fund has been established with the Arkansas Community Foundation. And new activity is underway in the mammoth effort to digitize all OSF files from past and current projects and [...]

Remembrance of Steve Wilson: Steve Wilson passed away February 21 in New Mexico.  He was a Norfork, AR resident for several years after his retirement from Arkansas Game and Fish Commission.  Steve served as Director of the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission for 21 years, shaping it into the organization it is today.  He was a very active member of the Ozark Society and was President of the OS, 1976-1978.  Steve and his wife Jo and their children hiked and paddled as often as possible, good or bad weather. Steve was a born leader as evidenced by the following career successes: He was District Wildlife Biologist for Arkansas Game and Fish Commission, 1968-1969, Senior Environmental Scientist for the Arkansas Highway and Transportation Department 1972-1974, Assistant Chief of Highway and Transportation Dept. 1974-1979, Chief of AHTD's Environmental Division in 1979, Director of Arkansas Game and Fish Commission in 1979.   During his tenure at AG & F, he established the elk herd in the Buffalo River corridor, stocking 112 elk from Colorado from 1981 to 1985.  Then there is fishing! During Steve's term Arkansas developed into our country’s most popular destination to fish for trophy brown trout; Arkansas also became the inland [...]

Prize winning photo journalist Lil Junas, Ph.D. died December 11, 2020 in Pennsylvania at the age of 85. Her career was amazing: college sports information, university teaching, and photographic missions throughout the United States, Mexico, Canada, and Central Asia and much more. She was also an avid canoeist and outdoors person, she tent-camped in all mainland US states, in Canada and the Yukon. She spent 4 years in Arkansas (1976-1980) as a photographer for the Log Cabin Democrat newspaper in Conway, AR. In 1973, the Ozark Society decided to publish books on various endangered Arkansas streams in hopes of exposing the scenic, geological, historical, fish and wildlife, educational and cultural values to the general public, emphasizing the need for preservation. Ken Smith’s Illinois River (1977) was the first in the series, and then Lil was asked to undertake Cadron Creek: A Photographic Narrative (1978) even though she had never been on the Creek. The threat for Cadron Creek at the time was the Soil Conservation Service proposal to put 23 dams on the Creek for the purpose of flood control, even though the amount of land flooded by the impoundments exceeded the amount of land saved from flooding. And as [...]