100 Sites for 100 Years: Implementing a collaborative, long-term, large-scale, urban biodiversity research program in Chicago Wilderness

The Chicago Wilderness Land Management Research Program (CWLMRP), more affectionately referred to as 100 Sites for 100 Years, is a network of land managers, academic researchers and restored and managed sites across the Chicago Wilderness region. The project is a cross-disciplinary research program connecting on-the-ground land management efforts across the region with applied and theoretical ecological research with a long-term perspective. Since initiation of the CWLMRP in 2008, we have identified over 120 one-hectare sites of woodland, savanna and prairie remnants and restorations replicated along a management gradient. These sites include degraded/unmanaged sites and sites that have been managed for a range of years; the latter include areas identified by managers as high-qualityreference sites. The goal of the project is to connect cutting-edge ecological research with land-management practices in order to address key questions that contribute to our understanding of local ecosystems and the impacts of management activities onorganisms and ecological processes. With the establishment of this network of sites and the collection of fundamental baseline data, we hope to encourage research collaboration within the region. Research to date has addressed plant community structure, soil aggregate formation, soil nutrient dynamics, and the structure of diverse animal communities (earthworms, ground-dwelling insects and spiders, native bees, and song birds). This session will introduce the history and developmentof the project and highlight key findings.