Discovering Gold: The Treasure of Moorland Park
September 14, 2026 | Topics: Places, Stories
By Eddee Daniel
In memoriam: Wendell Berry 1934 – 2026
“The care of the Earth is our most ancient and most worthy, and after all our most pleasing responsibility. To cherish what remains of it and to foster its renewal is our only hope.”
~ Wendell Berry
When was the last time a neighborhood park knocked your socks off?
I’ve found a vocation in retirement out of exploring the nearby natural world; in particular the urban parklands of Southeastern Wisconsin. A vocation not in the sense of paid occupation, but as an almost religious calling. I’ve been doing it long enough now that it’s getting harder to find new places to explore. But just the other day I struck gold! Moorland Park in Muskego.
Not the precious, enduring metallic element, of course. But what I found was the no less precious in their own way, if far more ephemeral, golden hues of early autumn wildflowers. Goldenrods, certainly; but also a plethora of radiant sunflowers, prairie rosinweed, common evening primrose, and many others I wasn’t able to name. A few white and purple flowers, boneset and asters, appeared here and there for punctuation, but as the images illustrate, the fields were overwhelmingly overflowing with gold.
Never having been there before, I wasn’t at all sure what I’d find. As I entered the parking lot, first impressions gave only hints of the treasures awaiting me. The street edges of the park were lined with berms festooned with bristling goldenrod, but the view from the car was of soccer fields, a playground, and a skateboard park, all empty on a weekday morning. A long, fenced dog exercise area stood between me and the natural area I sought. It was occupied by several stationary humans and an equal number of frenetic dogs. I skirted around to the far side and there it was: acres and acres of glowing prairie.
Although no signage directed me to the trailhead, a neatly mown path was easy to locate by walking along the sidewalk. Wildflowers towering over my head leaned out into the path as if in greeting. I plunged right in without hesitation. It felt magical, like traveling to Oz—except that instead of walking on a yellow brick road it was the fields to either side that glowed with golden brilliance. Enchantment guided me onward.
Several ponds of varying size provided counterpoints to the prairie. The largest one, surrounded by berms, seemed to be a detention basin for the residential subdivision that ran like a palisade along its far side. In one of the smaller ones I watched as some kind of aquatic creature moved just under the surface, grubbing around in the vegetation. I couldn’t tell if it was a large fish or a small mammal. The sleek, dark squirming shape that was barely visible may have been covered in scales or fur.
The multitudes of wildflowers were abuzz with multitudes of pollinators: bees, wasps, butterflies, all flitting about in constant commotion. Monarchs, decked out in bold orange and black, commanded the most attention. But close inspection was rewarded with the revelation of the tiniest insects, too small to distinguish between bee, wasp or fly. Grasshoppers sprang from the ground at my every step.
Someone walking at a brisk pace likely could traverse the entire trail in about fifteen minutes. It took me two hours, as I dawdled in reverence and stopped frequently to take photos. When I began the sky was mostly overcast, which made the golden glow all the more intense. By the time I decided I’d had enough, the clouds had cleared and the sun beamed down like butter, transforming the golden hues into incandescent yellows.
I’ve said this before, but it’s worth repeating: Every neighborhood deserves a good park. It is one of the ways we can relate to the natural world. While most neighborhood parks provide welcome spaces for activities like softball, soccer and playgrounds, those which also include natural areas create a close at hand opportunity for community residents to connect with nature and nurture a sense of wonder. Moorland Park is an outstanding example of this. We won’t protect what we don’t love and we cannot love what we don’t experience in person.
“A viable neighborhood is a community; and a viable community is made up of neighbors who cherish and protect what they have in common.”
~ Wendell Berry
I am dedicating this story to Wendell Berry, who died on August 31. If you don’t know who Berry was (he’s not as well known as Thoreau, for example), he was a Kentucky farmer, who was also an influential novelist, poet, and essayist. He championed small family farms, local foods and interdependent communities, and railed against chemicals, most technologies, agribusiness and distant government. Although he was a lifelong environmental advocate, he was hard to pigeonhole.
Berry wrote one of my favorite poems:
The Peace of Wild Things
When despair grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting for their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.
Interspersed with the photos that follow I am including a number of quotes for which Berry is known.
Outdoors we are confronted everywhere with wonders; we see that the miraculous is not extraordinary, but the common mode of existence. It is our daily bread.
~ Wendell Berry
“And the world cannot be discovered by a journey of miles, no matter how long, but only by a spiritual journey, a journey of one inch, very arduous and humbling and joyful, by which we arrive at the ground at our own feet, and learn to be at home.”
~ Wendell Berry
“We have lived by the assumption that what was good for us would be good for the world. … We have been wrong. We must change our lives, so that it will be possible to live by the contrary assumption that what is good for the world will be good for us. And that requires that we make the effort to know the world and learn what is good for it. … We must recover the sense of the majesty of the creation and the ability to be worshipful in its presence. For it is only on the condition of humility and reverence before the world that our species will be able to remain in it.”
~ Wendell Berry
“Nobody can discover the world for somebody else. Only when we discover it for ourselves does it become common ground and a common bond and we cease to be alone.”
~ Wendell Berry
For more information about Moorland Park go to our Find-a-Park page.
Related stories:
Close Encounters in a Suburban Enclave or Why Neighborhood Parks Matter
Warm Winter Memories – Cool Neighborhood Park
Silver Spring Park: The Return of the Natives
Indian Creek Woods and Indian Creek: Rebounding with Life in Fox Point
Hidden Lake Park: Designing for the public
Nearby Nature Milwaukee Recognizes “Harriet Tubman Day” with a Water Trail Hike
Eddee Daniel, writer/photographer, is a board member of Preserve Our Parks, the Program Director of A Wealth of Nature, editor of The Natural Realm blog (and a former art educator and resident of Wauwatosa). Read more or subscribe at awealthofnature.org. Also available by arrangement for group presentations and guided tours.
The Natural Realm blog is part of A Wealth of Nature, which is a program of Preserve Our Parks.
About Preserve Our Parks
Preserve Our Parks, Inc. is an independent nonprofit organization dedicated to the preservation of parks and green spaces. Our mission: To advocate for and promote Milwaukee area parks and open spaces and to strive to protect the tenets of Wisconsin’s Public Trust Doctrine.
For more than 25 years, we have been a leader in advocating for the protection of Milwaukee County park lands, halting many proposals to develop, privatize, or sell local parkland and lakefront spaces. More information about POP, including past accomplishments, is available at www.preserveourparks.org.