Training and Continuing Education

• Have a representative from the company that manufactures the chainsaws you use come to your shop and train your employees. An advantage of this approach is that they can also look at your equipment and let you know if it needs any maintenance. A drawback is that some representatives may be less familiar with providing field demonstrations of safe brush removal techniques.
• Find an experienced county conservation board employee who periodically conducts chainsaw training.
• Find a nearby land management organization or nature center that periodically conducts chainsaw training.

• Attend chainsaw training at a community college with a land management program. For example, Hawkeye Community College regularly offers classroom-based chainsaw training with a representative from Stihl. Check with Hawkeye instructor Ryan Kurtz (ryan.kurtz@hawkeyecollege.edu) to find out when the next class is being offered.
• Receive training from a company that regularly conducts chainsaw training. These are more common in Wisconsin and Minnesota. One example is Blue Heron Stewardship in Wisconsin.

• ‌Forest Safety Instruction, LLC: Offering hands-on in-person safety training in the Midwest, including Iowa.
• Safe Training Online: Offering an OSHA-compliant online chainsaw training course.

• 360 Training OSHA Campus: Offering an OSHA-compliant online chainsaw training course.

• Botany Beginners — Exploring Iowa’s Native Plants: This Tallgrass Prairie Center course includes six one-hour webinars teaching people the basics of plant identification using Newcomb’s Wildflower Guide as a resource, and three webinars produced in partnership with Practical Farmers of Iowa featuring hosts walking in the prairie pointing out common prairie plants.
• Botany Beginners — Grasses for the Masses: Seven one-hour webinars from the TPC about cool-season and warm-season grass identification
• Botany Beginners — Managing Prairie Strips: A TPC course for those who manage prairie strips and other Conservation Reserve Program plantings within farmland.

• Golden Hills Resource Conservation and Development (RC&D): Plant identification webinar recordings, many of which are taught by botanist Dr. Tom Rosburg. Some of the webinars that might be especially useful to roadside managers include:
• Invasive and Native Look-alike Plant Species in Iowa
• Common Weeds & Invasive Species of Iowa
• Cirsium (Thistle) Identification

• ‌Newcomb’s Wildflower Guide: This is the textbook used for the Botany Beginners courses. This guide contains both native and non-native wildflowers, shrubs, and vines. Its breadth (1,375 species) and easy-to-use key make it a valuable resource.
• Wildflowers of the Tallgrass Prairie: This guide contains high-quality images of 78 species, most of which are wildflowers. It is particularly useful for information on prairie remnants and ethnobotany. The guide is arranged in order of flowering time. It doesn’t include a key and has fewer species than the other books mentioned. The guide’s creators also produced complementary field guides for the wetlands and forests of the upper Midwest. 
• Prairie Plants of the University of the Wisconsin–Madison Arboretum: This is the most detailed guide on the list. It includes horsetails, ferns, rushes, sedges, grasses, shrubs, vines, weeds, and wildflowers and features both flower and fruit photos. Because the guide is arranged by plant family and doesn’t have a key, it is recommended for audiences who are already familiar with botany.
• ‌Weeds of the Great Plains: This guide features weeds commonly found in Nebraska and neighboring states, including Iowa.

• Native Seed Production Manual: This TPC manual features basic information for native seed production of up to 100 species of the tallgrass prairie flora of the upper Midwest.
• The Prairie in Seed Identifying Seed-Bearing Prairie Plants in the Upper Midwest: This book includes plant identification, seed descriptions, seed harvesting and cleaning information, and more.
• The Tallgrass Prairie Center Guide to Seed and Seedling Identification in the Upper Midwest: This guide shows how to help identify and germinate 72 species of tallgrass wildflowers and grasses. 

• USDA PLANTS Database: The Plant List of Attributes, Names, Taxonomy, and Symbols (PLANTS) provides standardized information about vascular and nonvascular plants and is useful for finding federal and state listings of weeds that are considered introduced, invasive, and noxious. 
• Minnesota Wildflowers: This field-guide-style website has photos and information on Minnesota wild plants as well as guidance on how to search for them using multiple methods. 

• ‌Illinois Wildflowers: This website provides useful ecological information on the wild plants of Illinois. 
• Iowa Weed Commissioners: This website includes weed identification brochures from nearby states and the Hawkeye Cooperative Weed Management website.

• Approximate date: A three-day meeting typically held during the third or fourth week of January in Coralville.
• A variety of sessions led by academics and professionals working in conservation in Iowa and nearby states.

• Attended by a variety of county conservation staff and many college students on Wednesday for collegiate day.
• Includes an exhibition area with vendors and other organizations.

• ‌Approximate date: A three-day meeting between in late February to mid-March in the days immediately following the AFIRM meeting.
• A separate meeting for new weed commissioners is held in the late afternoon on the day of the AFIRM meeting.
• Presentations by researchers and practitioners, and an opportunity for continuing education in pesticide application.

• Attended by weed commissioners and conservation professionals whose role includes weed management.
• Includes an exhibition area with vendors and other organizations.

• Approximate date: Held every other year (typically in the years the North American Prairie Conference isn’t held) at a location in Iowa.
• Presentations about managing and restoring tallgrass prairie, with a focus on Iowa.

Attended by natural resource professionals, researchers, and prairie enthusiasts.

• Approximate date: A four-day meeting held every other summer at a location in the central United States.
• A focus on advances in managing and restoring tallgrass prairie ecosystems.

• Attended by researchers, students, and stewardship professionals.
• Includes an exhibition area with vendors and other organizations.

• Approximate date: A three-day meeting in September or October.
• Includes an afternoon of field trips.
• Attended by roadside managers, Iowa Department of Transportation staff, and others interested in roadside management.

• Includes an exhibition area with vendors and other organizations.

• Approximate date: A three-day meeting held every other year in mid-October to mid-November. 
• One of the most comprehensive and largest invasive species conferences in the United States.

• Attended by a wide variety of researchers, natural resource professionals, and government agency staff.
• Includes an exhibition area with vendors and other organizations.

• ‌Approximate date: A one-day meeting held in early February in Des Moines.
• Attended by members of county boards of supervisors.

• Includes an exhibition area with vendors and other organizations.

• Approximate date: Three-day conference held in March in Des Moines. 
• Attended by all types of county employees.

• ‌Includes an exhibition area with vendors and other organizations.

• Approximate date: Three-day conference held in August in Des Moines. 
• Attended by all types of county employees.

• Includes an exhibition area with vendors and other organizations.

• Approximate date: Three-day conference held in mid-September at a location in Iowa.
• Attended by county conservation staff, especially conservation board directors and others in leadership positions.

• Includes an exhibition area with vendors and other organizations.

• Approximate date: One-day workshop and two-day conference held in late September in Ames.
• Attended by secondary road and street maintenance supervisors and staff and others interested in road and street maintenance.

• Includes an exhibition area with vendors and other organizations.

• ‌Approximate date: Three-day conference held in mid-December in Des Moines.
• Attended by county engineers and other secondary road department staff.

• ‌Includes an exhibition area with vendors and other organizations.

• Attended by natural resource professionals and private landowners.
• Includes an exhibition area with vendors and other organizations. 

• An annual field day held in August at a location in eastern Iowa.
• Topics include managing invasive species and other land management topics. 

• Association for Integrated Roadside Management
• Iowa Weed Commissioners
• Iowa Native Plant Society
• Iowa Prairie Network
• Midwest Invasive Plant Network
• National Roadside Vegetation Management Association

• Rights-of-Way as Habitat Working Group
• Transportation Research Board Roadside Maintenance Operations Committee