After the storm: How are the Woods doing?

Nearly four years after an historic wind storm devastated great swaths of Leelanau County woodlands, the Glen Arbor Arts Center takes a look at how the woods are doing these days with Julia Gehring, a biologist with the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore, on Thursday, March 28, 10:30 am at the GAAC, 6031 S. Lake Street, Glen Arbor.

The program is offered as part of the GAAC’s “Wood, Woods, Wooden” exhibition, and is free to attend.

In August 2015, a straight-line storm with winds clocked at up to 100 mph swept through Glen Arbor and other parts of Leelanau and Grand Traverse counties. In minutes, the storm destroyed homes, and flattened acres of mature trees in the Sleeping Bear Dunes. This remarkable event set in motion a variety of natural processes that are inherently dynamic, but happen slowly and are sometimes missed.

In this conversational program, Gehring will talk with GAAC Gallery Manager Sarah Bearup-Neal about the process of regeneration and recovery in the woods. What has changed? How have the native residents – birds, mammals, insects and other biota – fared and adapted to the changes in their habitats? And how does the SBDNL assess the potential for forest fire with so much downed wood?

The GAAC exhibition “Wood, Woods, Wooden” is a juried show of 2D and 3D work by 29 visual artists from throughout Northern Michigan and the state. The exhibition runs March 8 – April 11. The GAAC is open Monday-Friday from 9 am – 3 pm; and noon – 4 pm on Sunday.