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CAMN MONTHLY NEWSLETTER
November, 2025 | | | | PRESIDENT'S MESSAGE
As 2025 fades into the past and 2026 looms bright and bold in front of us, I would like to take the opportunity to thank the membership of CAMN for allowing me to serve you this year. It has been a learning experience, and a true honor to have worked with such an amazing group of people.
| | | I have gotten to know many people better whom I had only met in passing before. It has been a pleasure to work with an AMAZING Board who have supported me more than I ever could have hoped or imagined. Honestly, the list of names is too long to write out, and if I inadvertently didn’t mention someone and hurt their I would never forgive myself. So, I won’t even attempt to make a list.
That being said, as many of you know, I was raised on the west coast between Northern California and The Pacific Northwest. When I moved to Arkansas in 2004, there was something that I noticed immediately that those who were raised here don’t often recognize as special. Growing up, I always heard the phrase ”I appreciate it” when someone did something for you. Subtly, in Arkansas, and maybe throughout The South, people instead say “I appreciate you.” One word, a world of difference. Changing “it” to “you” personalizes the “it” and takes the appreciation away from the object and gives to the person to whom the appreciation really belongs. I have endeavored to tell people that I appreciate them throughout my term as President, and indeed in my daily life. So, when I say that “I appreciate y’all,” please know that comes from my heart.
I’m looking forward to a great 2026 for CAMN. We have a great slate of leaders ready to serve you and The Natural State next year! I hope you are as excited for the future of CAMN as I am!
With awe and respect, and true appreciation for each of you,
John Sommer |
CAMN General Meeting
Thursday, November 20, 2025
Last meeting of the year
Dr. Paige Ford is the newish chief of station at Plum Bayou State Park (previously misnamed Toltec Mounds).
Location: Witt Stephens Jr. Central Arkansas Nature Center
602 President Clinton Ave.
Little Rock, AR 72201
Time: 6:00 PM until 8:00 PM
Pizza at 6:00. $1.00/slice
Program 6:30--7:30. Counts as 2 hrs CE in person. Zoom available 1 hr CE.
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IT'S THE CAMN WINTER HOLIDAY EVENT, AND YOU ARE INVITED!
THURSDAY, DECEMBER 11, 2025
6:00 P.M.
WITT STEPHENS JR. CENTRAL ARKANSAS NATURE CENTER
MAIN LOBBY AND MUSEUM AREA
POTLUCK - BRING YOUR FAVORITE HOLIDAY FOOD TO SHARE
The party also serves as our chapter's ANNUAL meeting, but our only two orders of business are to approve last year's minutes and vote on this year's Board. Other than that, it's out and out fun, food, friends, photos, and visiting with friends, and awards. Spouses and significant others are invited -- PLEASE register them and yourself on the CAMN EVENTS calendar. There's plenty of room, but we need to know how many tables and chairs we need.
| HELP WANTED
We need some additional volunteer help with the Winter Holiday Party in the form of setting up chairs and tables in advance (4:30 p.m. on Thursday, December 11 at Witt Stephens Jr. Central AR Nature Center, and help taking them down and cleaning up afterward. Faith Morrison and the Enhancemators will be there, but they need a little more help. Please reply to anneholcomb@sbcglobal.net. | Photos by Bill Toland and Katie Sakevicius | Oaktober 2025 Wrap-Up
By Audrey Cobb
Oaktober 2025 was a success! We had at least 13 events associated with Oaktober, along with several outreach opportunities. The kickoff at Dee Brown Library had 75(ish) attendees and everyone had a great time. HUGE thank you to CAMN members Kate Spontak, Rachel Tanner, Justin Vess, Jodi Morris, and Denise Ragland! Nothing would have come together without their help. The staff at Southwest Community Center deserves kudos as well. They really know how to engage with the community.
Are you interested in coordinating Oaktober 2026? I can't take this on next year. As the lead coordinator, you will certainly get all your volunteer hours! I can pass on the files, templates, and contacts you will need to get started. CALS sets their programming 6 months in advance, so some of the planning needs to begin in early spring. Oaktober could even be taken statewide if you can get in touch with the right people early on!
| Tree Replacement Project Updates
By Kate Spontak
Thank you to Cindy Hancock who joined Kate and several members of Crump Community Garden to get the 4 fruit trees planted on Halloween at the garden – 2 Wild Plums and 2 American Persimmons. It was touch and go after the heavy rain a few days before made digging a challenge.
Thank you to Louann Griswood and Lindy Streit who showed up at SJCA on Friday to pull up trees for delivery on Saturday and then came Saturday to help plant. And thanks to Laura Smith-Olinde, Rhonda Fiser and Joe Wankum who came also for Saturday planting. Joe did a great job telling homeowner Brian all about CAMN and encouraging him to participate. Rhonda is a new NIT for 2026, who came to find out what we were doing and stayed to help. Mark Matteson helped with digging holes on Sunday and with Kate and Martha Nixon helped the homeowner get the trees planted.
The statistics on urban trees are not good. The average life of an urban tree is only 10 years, usually as a result of poor planting. By planting carefully, we are making sure our trees really can grow to maturity.
We are still working with people to arrange more planting dates, and trying to clear out our inventory of saplings at St. Joe's. Maybe once we get the big trees planted, we can transition to giving away small trees in one-gallon pots in the fall. Dig in Spring, grow during summer, give away in Fall. All the other free tree distribution seems to be in Spring, but fall is a better time to plant trees.
We are still working on planting at several larger sites – School for the Deaf/School for the Blind, Rose Creek Park, and UALR.
Crew members have really been impressed with the Tree Diapers we now use for watering bags and talked about wanting to make them available to members. Maybe that would make a good fundraising project.
We have two sites for planting on Wednesday, 11/19, starting at 9 am at 1816 Alberta Drive, off Leatrice. 2nd site is 78 Cimarron Valley Circle, at the southwest corner with Shenandoah Valley Drive. We hope to get done before the rain starts.
We have 3 proposed sites in the Kingwood area for 11/22, that have not yet been confirmed by applicants.
On 11/24 we are meeting with the Superintendent and the Facilities Manager at the School for the Deaf to finalize plans for the planting there, so we expect those to be scheduled for December dates.
| | Nature Ramblings: Fall
By Lynn Foster
As fall overtakes us, our perceptions adjust. That object fluttering through the air? Not a swallowtail as our spring and summer instincts would suggest, but a falling leaf caught by the wind. The gentle pattering coming from the ground? Not the drizzle of rain, but of countless leaves hitting the ground from many trees. Walking through my garden and seeing the few flowers still in bloom (goldenrod, asters and Turk’s Cap), I see bumblebees sleeping on plants in the morning, all but the new queens soon to die. The beauty of autumn leaves is our consolation prize for knowing they will soon disappear from the trees.
Photo: Turk’s Caps bloom until hard frosts arrive. | | | Photo above: Winged sumac fall colors. | I still glance reflexively outside the window at my hummingbird feeder, but it’s been unused for more than a month, and I need to take it down soon. My first winter birds have just started to appear; I saw my first-of-season Ruby-crowned Kinglets and White-throated Sparrows last week. The week before that, a huge flock of Common Grackles perched in my trees and greeted my walking outside into the yard with a raucous chorus of cackles and jeers. That night, two Barred Owls serenaded each other in my yard after dark. When I went outside to hear them better they flew away on noiseless wings, but their songs were followed by the yodeling of a pack of Coyotes.
The switch back to our “natural” time, the time where the sun is overhead at noon, not at 1, catches us by surprise because sunset comes so much earlier, accentuated by the continual shortening of each day.
How life gets through the winter is fascinating. Some alternatives are as an egg (walking sticks), a larva (Woolly Bear caterpillars), a pupa (Silver-spotted Skipper), or an adult (Mourning Cloak). Or heck, just fly to Mexico (Monarch). Sleep under the ground (fireflies), or on the ground but under a blanket of dead leaves (Luna Moth), if you’re lucky enough to live in a space where people leave the leaves. Trust that someone won’t burn you or throw you in a chipper. |  | | Photo above: Walking sticks overwinter as eggs. | | Photo above: A monarch on his way to Mexico. | Arkansas summer, the longest of the seasons, is tenacious and today as I write the temperature is summery, although most leaves have turned brown and have fallen. We’ve already had our hard frost, although summer has temporarily clawed her way back. I hope you will leave your yard so as so help and not hinder overwintering life. | |