Celebrate the Natural beauty of the door peninsula

The Door County Festival of Nature is a series of events coordinated by The Ridges Sanctuary and our partners in conservation to encourage visitors, residents, members, and friends to explore and celebrate the natural beauty of the Door Peninsula. Each year, we organize a number of field trips throughout the county, and special events to allow you to experience the county with field trips intimately involved in protecting and preserving these natural spaces and educating our community on their importance. We encourage you to learn more about this incredible event series and get ready to join us for Memorial Day Weekend!

Schedule of Events:

May 22, 2025:

Special Event:

4:00 pm - 6:00 pm: Art Exhibit and Artist Reception

Painting and Poems from the Ridges
Works by Jeff Kunkel and Mary Elyn Bahlert

This exhibition features plein-air oil paintings by Jeff Kunkel and poems written by Mary Elyn Bahlert. Jeff and Mary Elyn are husband and wife. Both were born and raised in Wisconsin, and both are lifetime members of The Ridges. They now live in Oakland, California and return to The Ridges often. The works on display have been composed on site and will grow over the next few seasons.

These works, in word and image, are personal responses to their favorite places in The Ridges and are offered in the hope that they might help you deepen your relationship to this unique landscape.

The exhibit will be on display beginning Thursday, May 22 at the Cook-Albert Fuller Nature Center and will remain on display for the summer. Pieces will be added to the exhibition throughout Memorial Day Weekend while artist Jeff Kunkel paints in the Sanctuary during the Festival of Nature. Artwork will be for sale, and all proceeds will support The Ridges Sanctuary’s mission.

Jeff Kunkel:

Jeff attended California College of Arts and Crafts in Oakland. He paints in oils in a style called plein air, which means outside, in the wind and sun and changing light. He paints loosely and quickly and completes a painting in one session. Not long ago, he was a Visiting Artist at the Cedarburg Bog near Cedarburg, Wisconsin. He is also an accomplished writer and has written two short collections of Wisconsin stories: Warming Fires and Bless Ewe. You can see his many books and paintings at jeffkunkel.org.

Mary Elyn Bahlert:

Mary Elyn is an intuitive poet who evokes images and feeling through her poetry. Her love of poetry and literature began as a child, and she can still recite from memory many well-known poems which she learned in Miss Ross’s English class at Peckham Junior High School in Milwaukee. She cannot attend a Christmas gathering without reciting, ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas. See her work at thewisdomyears.org.

Location: Cook-Albert Fuller Nature Center, 8166 State Hwy 57, Baileys Harbor, WI 54202.

May 23, 2025:

Special Event:

4:30 pm - 7:30 pm: Festival Keynote Dinner

Schedule:

Reception & Beverage Service: 4:30pm

Dinner: 5:00pm
Enjoy a delectable family style dinner prepared by Thyme Catering!

Welcome and General Announcements: 6:15pm

Keynote Presentation: 6:30pm

Keynote Presentation
FieldNotes

The Ridges is excited to present Rachel Davis and Andrew Hipp as the 2025 Festival of Nature keynote speakers.

Rachel and Andrew have been collaborating formally as an artist (RD) and a writer (AH) for more than 20 years. They have published two books-Field Guide to Wisconsin Sedges and Oak Origins: From Acorns to Species and the Tree of Life-and several illustrated natural essays together. They are currently working on a series of paintings and essays based on the lakes of Northern Wisconsin, supported by a multiyear residency through the Drawing Water Program at UW Madison’s Trout Lake Station.

Rachel and Andrew collaborate at the interface between art, literature, science, and natural history. Their work is in part documentation, seeing and recording what the natural world presents, then sharing it in their own ways. However, their collaboration moves beyond documentation and delineation. It also informs their individual work in art, education, and science. For Andrew, writing mediates between subjects of inquiry-a weevil escaping from an acorn, an early-emerging false rue anemone-and the processes that connect individual organisms. Sentences convey information, but they also give form to understanding. The writing complements his work as a researcher and herbarium curator. For Rachel, photographing plants, fungi and insects is a first step to discovering the formal in the natural. Painting, drawing, natural dyes, and printmaking are ways to distill the shapes of plants, the light reflected off the water, mosses seen through a magnifying lens, and lichens into patterns. The rearrangement of shapes from the landscape with colors found in nature engages and feeds her as an artist and as a teacher.

Field Notes will illustrate how Rachel and Andrew’s collaboration both reveals and exists in parallel with the natural world, while presenting their understanding of how integrating art, science, and natural history have changed their respective practices.

Location: About Thyme Farm, 8425 County F, Baileys Harbor, WI 54202.

Fee: $40 per person

Click Here to Register

Field Trips:

Program:

Morning:

6:00 am - 8:00 am: Early Morning Bird Hike
8:00 am - 11:00 am: Mud Lake Paddle
9:00 am - 11:00 am: See Bird? eBird!
9:00 am - 11:00 am: Three Sisters Corn Husk Doll Making
9:00 am - 11:00 am: Boat Tour of Green Bay and Gravel Island National Wildlife Refuges
9:00 am - 11:00 am: Ellison Bay Bluff Exploration
9:00 am - 11:00 am: Stream Monitoring: Assessing Stream Health through Citizen Science
9:00 am - 11:30 am: Make a Spring Wildflower Pop-up Book - Part One
9:00 am - 11:30 am: Explore Open Door Bird Sanctuary
9:00 am - Noon: Dolomite, Sand, Peat Landscape at Shivering Sands Preserve
9:00 am - Noon: Nature Immersion/Forest Bathing
10:00 am - Noon: Explore Toft Point
10:30 am - Noon: Fish Creek Scenic Boat Tours - Peninsula Park Caves and Ephraim North Cruise
11:30 am - 1:30 pm: Boat Tour of Green Bay and Gravel Island National Wildlife Refuges

AfterNoon:

1:00 pm - 2:30 pm: A Bug Walk for People Who Don’t Like Bugs!
1:00 pm - 4:00 pm: Phenology in a Handmade Book
1:00 pm - 3:30 pm: It Isn’t Easy Being (Ever)Green
1:30 pm - 3:00 pm: Discovering Native Bumble Bees and Citizen Science with Bumble Bee Brigade
1:30 pm - 3:30 pm: Natural and Human History at Heins Creek Nature Preserve
1:30 pm - 3:30 pm: Sway Brewery Tour: Highlighting Wild Harvested Ingredients and Rustic Techniques
1:30 pm - 3:30 pm: Exploring Europe Lake and Newport Shorelines
1:30 pm - 3:30 pm: The Clearing History Hike
1:30 pm - 4:00 pm: The Sex Life of Plants
1:30 pm - 4:00 pm: From Field to Farm: A Sustainable Dairy Experience
1:30 pm - 4:00 pm: Explore Open Door Bird Sanctuary
1:30 pm - 4:30 pm: Birding by Ear Class
2:00 pm - 4:00 pm: Boat Tour of Green Bay and Gravel Island National Wildlife Refuges

Evening:

6:30 pm - 8:30 pm: Baileys Harbor Lakeside Coastal Tour - Sunset Trip

May 24, 2025:

Field Trips:

Morning:

7:00 am - 9:00 am: Birding by Ear Field Trip
9:00 am - 10:30 am: Macroinvertebrate Mayhem!
9:00 am - 11:00 am: Hike, Read, and Write!
9:00 am - 11:00 am: Lighthouse Tales of Triumph and Tragedy
9:00 am - 11:30 am: Make a Spring Wildflower Pop-up Book - Part Two
9:00 am - 11:30 am: Wildflowers Galore!
9:00 am - 11:30 am: Kayak Logan Creek
9:00 am - 11:30 am: Research at The Ridges
9:00 am - Noon: Photographing Spring Wildflowers
9:00 am - 12:30 pm: Green Bay National Wildlife Refuge Island Exploration
10:00 am - 1:30 pm: Green Bay National Wildlife Refuge Island Exploration
11:00 am - 2:30 pm: Green Bay National Wildlife Refuge Island Exploration

AfterNoon:

12:45 pm - 2:45 pm: Sturgeon Bay Maritime Overview
1:00 pm - 4:00 pm: Introduction to Wisconsin Sedges
1:00 pm - 3:00 pm: Baileys Harbor Lakeside Coastal Tour
1:00 pm - 3:00 pm: The Art of Drinking Local: Connecting with the Landscape through Wine
1:00 pm - 3:30 pm: State Natural Area Sampler
1:30 pm - 3:00 pm: Stickwork Environmental Art Installation at Historic Horseshoe Bay Farms
1:30 pm - 3:30 pm: Geology of Baileys Harbor and The Ridges Sanctuary
1:30 pm - 3:30 pm: Turtle-y Good Time
1:30 pm - 4:00 pm: A Way with Words
1:30 pm - 4:00 pm: Exploring Three Springs Preserve
1:30 pm - 4:00 pm: Deep Listening: The Voices of the Natural World
1:30 pm - 4:00 pm: A Climate Resilient Community | The Ridges Sanctuary
1:30 pm - 4:00 pm: Forest Ecology at the Mink River Preserve
1:30 pm - 4:00 pm: The Fossils and Bedrock Geology of Door County

Evening:

6:30 pm - 8:00 pm: Adventures in Documentary Film: Screening of The Great Ledge
6:30 pm - 8:30 pm: Baileys Harbor Lakeside Coastal Tour - Sunset Trip
9:30 pm - 11:30 pm: Guided Stargazing

May 25, 2025:

Field Trips:

Morning:

6:00 am - 9:00 am: Let’s Go Birding!
6:30 am - 8:30 am: Birding at The Ridges Sanctuary
9:00 am - 11:00 am: Wandering Aimlessly at Appel’s Bluff
9:00 am - 11:00 am: Boat Tour of Green Bay and Gravel Island National Wildlife Refuges
9:00 am - 11:00 am: Planting for Pollinators
9:00 am - 11:00 am: Stream Monitoring: Assessing Stream Health through Citizen Science
9:00 am - 11:30 am: The Mos(s)t Amazing Plant!
9:00 am - 11:30 am: A Climate Resilient Community | Door County
9:00 am - 11:30 am: Explore Bjorklunden and Boynton Chapel
9:00 am - 11:30 am: The Importance of Healthy Forests
9:00 am - Noon: Eco-Art: Celebrating our Boreal Wonders through Collage
9:00 am - Noon: Bryoramble at The Ridges Sanctuary
9:45 am - 11:45 am: Sturgeon Bay Maritime Overview
10:00 am - Noon: Eagle Bluff Kayak Trip
11:30 am - 1:30 pm: Boat Tour of Green Bay and Gravel Island National Wildlife Refuges

AfterNoon:

2:00 pm - 4:00 pm: Boat Tour of Green Bay and Gravel Island National Wildlife Refuges

Dates: May 22 - 25, 2025

Location:

Various Location,
Baileys Harbor, WI 54202.

Click Here for More Information