May 2020 • Nebraskaland 51
or two years, Joe Heatherly of Lincoln rose before dawn
on Saturdays and drove to Nine-Mile Prairie on the
northwestern edge of the city. He'd settle at a picnic
table to watch the sun rise and then head out to hike
for a couple hours.
"Hiking through there is almost a spiritual experience,"
Heatherly said. "That's my church every week."
Over time, though, "you start feeling guilty for enjoying
something that much without putting something back into
it," Heatherly said. He wondered if there was a way he could
help maintain the prairie so others could enjoy it, too.
The prairie seemingly brought the answers to him, in the
form of an ecology professor Heatherly met during one of his
morning hikes. The two began talking, and Heatherly shared
his passion for the prairie and desire to help.
"Check out the master naturalist program," the professor
told him.
Creating Home-grown Naturalists
Since 2010, more than 500 people have been trained as
certifi ed master naturalists in Nebraska. This involves 60
hours of in-depth training by natural resource experts that
can cover a wide range of topics including insects, mammals,
reptiles, native plants, geology, grasslands ecology, outdoor
skills, conservation biology and more. No prior in-depth
Making a Difference
Nebraska's Master Naturalists
by Renae Blum
F
At the end of a day of master naturalist training in the fi eld, Dan Deff enbaugh of Hastings explores the Niobrara Valley
Preserve's Norden Chute.
PHOTO
BY
MATT
JONES
PHOTO
BY
KAREN
KLEIN
