Volunteers keeping state park ecosystem healthy

Chris Herzog of Laketown Township pulls invasive garlic mustard at Saugatuck Dunes State Park, 6575 138th Ave. in Laketown Township, on Sunday, April 19, 2026.

Laketown Township resident Chris Herzog paused a moment, stood up in the field among pine trees and pointed to a patch of invasive garlic mustard.

“It’s easy to find once you have the eye for it,” he said to others in the group looking to eradicate the invasive species on Sunday, April 19, 2026, at Saugatuck Dunes State Park, 6575 138^th Ave. in Laketown Township.

Herzog was one of seven at the volunteer stewardship workday sponsored by the state Department of Natural Resources and coordinated by Natural Resource Steward Tyler Lidgard.

For a video of the volunteers at work, visit here.

Lidgard explained to the volunteers how the garlic mustard crowds out native plants and impacts pollinators and the entire dune ecosystem. She handed out gloves and plastic bags the volunteers would fill with the plants for proper disposal.

For Herzog, the cleanup is a way to give back.

“It’s my community and I want to help,” he said. “It’s my favorite time of the year to get outside and see the trees and everything come back to life.”

Natural Resource Steward Tyler Lidgard, left, identifies garlic mustard for Lynda Yates, center, and her daughter Chloe, right, at Saugatuck Dunes State Park, 6575 138th Ave. in Laketown Township, on Sunday, April 19, 2026.

Lynda Yates and her daughter Chloe came from Middleville to help. Chloe, a junior in high school, was volunteering on behalf of the National Honor Society.

The mother-daughter team plucked the invasive plants along the roadside as Eli Ferriday of Grand Rapids joined in.

“It’s a good way to get out, meet people and learn,” he said.

Eli Ferriday, right, of Grand Rapids collects invasive garlic mustard at Saugatuck Dunes State Park, 6575 138th Ave. in Laketown Township, on Sunday, April 19, 2026, as a jogger passes by.

The 1,000-acre Saugatuck Dunes State Park includes hiking trails of varying difficulty through dunes to Lake Michigan with 2.5 miles of lake front. The park’s 300-acre Patty Birkholz Natural Area contains a coastal dune system and three endangered plant species.

Lidgard leads the stewardship days several times throughout the year. Volunteers removed woody invasives and spotted knapweed last year.

Volunteers remove garlic mustard at Saugatuck Dunes State Park, 6575 138th Ave. in Laketown Township, on Sunday, April 19, 2026.

In 2025 across the lower peninsula, volunteers removed 167 bags of invasive herbaceous plants, stewarded 1,579 acres through hands-on restoration, completed 859 volunteer shifts (with many returning volunteers), completing 1,449 hours of boots-on-the-ground restoration work with a total of 2,161 hours donated, according to the DNR website.