Skunk cabbage is one of the first native plants to emerge from the frozen winter ground in the Chicago area. Its powerful aroma isn’t the only quirky thing about this plant.

The overall number of trees in the region has increased, according to a 2020 tree census conducted by Morton Arboretum.  But not all trees are seen as equals. Some are invasive and prevent native trees and plants from flourishing. 

DuSable Park has been a park in name only since Mayor Harold Washington dedicated the site, at the confluence of the Chicago River and Lake Michigan, in 1987. Wednesday, a design team was selected to bring the vision to life.

The Chicago Bears are teaming up with the Lake County Forest Preserves to remove invasive buckthorn from the property surrounding Halas Hall in Lake Forest.

Back in the 1980s, the number of fish species found in the Chicago River could be counted on a single hand. Today, that number is up to 60 species, an increase in diversity that can be directly attributed to a decrease in wastewater pollutants, according to a new study from the Shedd Aquarium.

A powerful line of thunderstorms ripped through the Chicago region Saturday night, with wind gusts topping 80 miles per hour. The wild weather continues Sunday with winter mounting a comeback.

Cook County’s forest preserves are much loved for their picnic groves and trails. Not as well known: The forest preserve district’s role as a research hub and early warning system of sorts against zoonotic diseases.

Get ready to experience spring, a brief dalliance with summer, and then a return to winter – all in the coming weekend.

As problematic as invasive plants, pests and pathogens already are, climate change will only magnify the havoc they wreak on habitat, wildlife and even humans.

A bit of space junk is hurtling toward the moon at 5,800 miles per hour, with impact set for Friday morning.

A rare patch of 8,000-year-old remnant Illinois prairie has been granted a new three-month lease on life, as the Greater Rockford Airport Authority has again delayed demolition of the natural area, pending additional environmental review.

Field studies over the past few weeks — a collective effort known as the “Winter Grab” — were intended to boost knowledge of what happens in the five lakes when they’re covered partially or completely with ice.

The Supreme Court is hearing a case its conservative majority could use to hobble Biden administration efforts to combat climate change.

Though the Save Bell Bowl Prairie coalition earned a temporary reprieve for the natural area through March 1, the group remains at a stalemate with the Greater Rockford Airport Authority.

Chicago would permanently ban investments in oil and gas companies under a measure introduced Wednesday by Treasurer Melissa Conyears Ervin and backed by Mayor Lori Lightfoot.

As enchanting as Lake Michigan's ice may appear, it’s unmistakably dangerous, as evidenced this week by the presumed drowning of an Indianapolis man who fell into the water off shelf ice at Indiana Dunes National Park on Monday.