Water quality team celebrates 100th birthday of Red Oak Rain Garden trees

Posted November 19th, 2019 in News, Stormwater & Green Infrastructure, Video
two women hug a tree with a banner that reads "it's my 100th birthday!"

The Red Oak Rain Garden (RORG) was the first rain garden on the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign campus, and the two red oak trees that the garden’s name honors—fondly called the RORG sisters—have just turned 100 years old. To commemorate this occasion, the RORG team, led by Stormwater Specialist Eliana Brown of University of Illinois Extension, threw a surprise birthday party and created a video to celebrate the milestone and highlight the importance of green infrastructure in stormwater management.

The two red oak trees work with the 9,000 plants in the rain garden to soak up roughly 10,000 gallons of water per year. Rain gardens like the Red Oak Rain Garden, built in 2006, help reduce polluted stormwater runoff and flooding.

“This is really important,” said Brown, “because in our cities and towns, we create more impervious surfaces [like roads, roofs and parking lots]. They’re really great at doing things like letting us drive on them, but they shed off water, and so they’re not so good at soaking up water. So, we end up with a lot more water, and our streams just really aren’t designed to handle all of that, and it creates some problems with water quality. Rain gardens are a great way to combat that and make things better.”

The RORG team is managing a renovation of the rain garden, involving design and build phases of the project to help improve both aesthetics and functionality. The Red Oak Rain Garden website describes the purpose of the garden on UIUC’s campus: RORG provides flood protection, improves water quality and serves as a model for ecologically healthy landscapes. Prior to the garden, rainstorms limited sidewalk use and impaired the red oak. The updated design enhances the garden’s ability to absorb rainwater in a beautiful, educational way.

Layne Knoche worked on the landscape design, and Tony Heath completed the engineering design. Kate Gardiner organized the whimsical birthday celebration for the RORG sisters.

Illinois-Indiana Sea Grant is a part of University of Illinois Extension and Purdue Extension.

 

Writer: Hope Charters

Videographer: Matt Wiley, University of Illinois Extension

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The full script (English) and participation scripts (English, Spanish, and Hmong) are free to use, along with marketing materials for performances.

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Check it out at the link in bio.

#TeachingTuesday

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Open post by ilinseagrant with ID 18104492783310070
Looking for a fun way to teach about marine debris? Check out Me and Debry, which is a whimsical, 30‑minute, audience‑participation play created for @UWiscSeaGrant. It helps students explore what marine debris is, why it matters, and how we can make a difference in the Great Lakes.The full script (English) and participation scripts (English, Spanish, and Hmong) are free to use, along with marketing materials for performances.Bring learning to life and start a conversation about litter in our waters!Check it out at the link in bio.#TeachingTuesday

Do you work or live along the Great Lakes coasts? Watch our newly released video series collection, containing several short videos that overview the range of coastal protection options in the Great Lakes, including:

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Find our two new video series at the link in bio.

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Open post by ilinseagrant with ID 18075599984541727
Do you work or live along the Great Lakes coasts? Watch our newly released video series collection, containing several short videos that overview the range of coastal protection options in the Great Lakes, including:- Natural processes in the Great Lakes- Hard coastal protection structures and how they interact with/alter natural processes- Nature-based coastal solutions in the Great Lakes, ranging from green to gray approachesFind our two new video series at the link in bio.

Located in Washington, D.C., the Sea Grant Knauss Fellowship provides a unique educational and professional experience to graduate students who have an interest in ocean, coastal and Great Lakes resources, and in the national policy decisions affecting those resources. This is a one-year fellowship open to any student, regardless of citizenship, who is enrolled toward a degree in a graduate or professional program on the day of the deadline.

Students enrolled at an Illinois or Indiana university or college should submit their applications through Illinois-Indiana Sea Grant by emailing Angela Archer at amcbride@purdue.edu. Students in surrounding states without a Sea Grant program should contact the National Sea Grant College Program at oar.sg.fellows@noaa.gov for a referral.

Application deadline: June 3, 2026.

To learn more about the fellowship, visit the link in bio.

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Open post by ilinseagrant with ID 18136822375511465
Located in Washington, D.C., the Sea Grant Knauss Fellowship provides a unique educational and professional experience to graduate students who have an interest in ocean, coastal and Great Lakes resources, and in the national policy decisions affecting those resources. This is a one-year fellowship open to any student, regardless of citizenship, who is enrolled toward a degree in a graduate or professional program on the day of the deadline.Students enrolled at an Illinois or Indiana university or college should submit their applications through Illinois-Indiana Sea Grant by emailing Angela Archer at amcbride@purdue.edu. Students in surrounding states without a Sea Grant program should contact the National Sea Grant College Program at oar.sg.fellows@noaa.gov for a referral. Application deadline: June 3, 2026.To learn more about the fellowship, visit the link in bio.