By JAN LARSON McLAUGHLIN
BG Independent News
Whether through birding or Bigfoot, Chris Gajewicz has spent the last two decades luring local residents to the woods.
Gajewicz, Bowling Green’s natural resources coordinator, retired this past week, leaving behind a legacy of appreciation for the city’s green spaces. He has checked off his goals of growing Wintergarden Park, teaching a younger generation to love nature, and ridding the parks of invasive plants.
Gajewicz, who started his career with the Wood County Park District in the early 1990s, was brought onto the Bowling Green Parks and Recreation Board by then director Bob Callecod, who recognized that the city parks needed someone with natural resources expertise.
It turned out that Gajewicz’s experience in land management, natural resources, and outdoor recreation and education was exactly what Bowling Green parks needed on staff.
Around the same time, the parks underwent an analysis of Wintergarden Park. The park seemed to be at a turning point. Should it all remain natural? Should a portion be made into ballparks? Should a section be sold for a housing development?
Turns out that city residents were overwhelmingly in support of preserving the natural park land.
That sentiment has grown – as well as the park, which has gone from 80 to 123 acres.
And finally, with the purchase of the most recent acreage along Wintergarden Road, all of the park acreage is now in a conservation easement.
“This property is protected from any development in the future – that’s a huge accomplishment,” Gajewicz said.
Of course, adding more acreage also meant getting rid of more non-native plant species.
“It’s taken about 20 years for that to happen,” Gajewicz said.
Top on his “hit list” has been garlic mustard plants, which are difficult to get rid of. The parks started making real headway against invasive plants when Cinda Stutzman, natural resources specialist, pointed out that the non-native plants have to be replaced by native species to keep the invaders from coming back.
“We’re helping nature along,” Gajewicz said. “We’re providing natives the opportunity to have less competition to succeed.”
With the changes in the flora in the park, the staff has noticed changes in the fauna as well. For example, red-headed woodpeckers are now residents of Wintergarden Park.
“It’s science,” Gajewicz said about the connection between flora and fauna.
Over the years, Gajewicz has been creative with programming at the parks to get more people interested. He has conducted Friday morning birding walks, and hosted programs on a wide range of topics such as Bigfoot, invasive species of fish in the Great Lakes, outdoor cooking, and authors of gardening books.
“I find something interesting that I like, and then find someone smarter than me to talk about it,” Gajewicz said.
He has worked to get the next generation hooked on nature. Bowling Green seventh graders visit the parks three times every year.
“That has worked out beautifully,” he said. Sometimes students help remove invasive plant species and replace them with natives. That gives young people some ownership and respect for places like Wintergarden Park, he said.
Gajewicz is the first to admit that COVID-19 accomplished what many parks and recreation officials across the nation have longed for – bringing more people to parks in search of respite.
“One of the most interesting things we experienced was COVID,” he said. “Everything shut down except parks.”
So people flocked to parks in numbers never before seen.
“When you’re here 20 years, you see the regulars. You get to know their dogs. You watch their kids grow up.”
But COVID brought new people to the parks.
“People found the parks have always been here,” Gajewicz said, noting that it wasn’t unusual during the pandemic to have cars parked out to Wintergarden Road by patrons seeking refuge from COVID.
“The university kids found us – and that was great,” he said. “It was really heartening to see all these people finding Wintergarden, Simpson and City Park. It was so great to see.”
“Now they’ve brought a whole new generation of kids here – which solidifies our existence.”
As he leaves, Gajewicz said his biggest accomplishment with Bowling Green Parks and Recreation has been training staff to carry on the work of preserving the parks.
“I’m most proud of the development of the staff here – who will be here when I leave,” he said. “They are dedicated to the vision of the park. They are what makes this place what it is.”
