Milwaukee River – East Bank

The River District riparian area, located in Hubbard Park on the east bank of the Milwaukee River, has served the Shorewood community as a gathering space since the village’s beginning, and is valued for its historical legacy and ecological significance. In 2020, the Village of Shorewood hired Marek Landscaping to assist in implementing their River District Land Management Plan, which aimed to improve the overall quality of the riparian area. Our stewardship team was successful in helping the Village achieve their goals of maintaining the current vegetative diversity, managing invasive species, and enhancing biodiversity and available habitat for wildlife. This area along the Milwaukee River has been identified as a potential habitat for the  long-eared bat (Myotis septentrionalis), which is federally listed as a threated species. It also supports populations of Forked Aster (Eurybia furcata), which is recognized as threatened by the state of Wisconsin, and the special concern species of hop tree (Ptelea trifolata) and butternut (Juglans cinerea).

Marek Landscaping’s stewardship team has continued to provide services at the Milwaukee River’s East Bank to further manage and eradicate the invasive species that remain. In February 2021, we facilitated a community buckthorn removal event to help accelerate progress towards those goals and to encourage community involvement. Future work along the East Bank will continue to focus on invasive species management and will include planting of native grasses, sedges, forbs, and trees to enhance existing vegetative communities and wetlands.