Gun Club Ponds, Chicago, IL • September 2022

Old maps call this spot Gun Club Ponds, and it doesn’t take long, after walking the narrow strip between the railroad embankment and wall of Phragmites, that the gun club comes into focus.

A good place to look for waterfowl.

there’s slag here too!

a tunnel of european buckthorn leads us to the ponds.

it’s big leaf season as we head back over the tracks to the Indian Ridge Marsh parking lot.

Railroad Marsh, IL • November 2021

The bright blue sky and faded green of a warm early winter day. This place is wholly constructed now, atop swampy former wetland surrounding Lake Calumet – is there any remnant soil from that ecosystem? Or are all sediments so polluted it is unrecognizable beneath Phragmites and slag and a dune + swale landscape made from construction debris.