Welcome to Bluestem
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A place of reverence in a nature preserve, with native grassland restoration, a trail network, quiet areas for reflection, open space for contemplation, and a conservation cemetery for natural burial.
Imagine your favorite walking path in a Piedmont landscape, fields of native grasslands rolling out in front of you, the sky above you, open and wide. A path draws you into the prairie teaming with crickets and birds. On the woodland edge you notice an opening and duck into the shade, past ferns and shrubs, finding a quiet glade with a nearby pond. Birdsong, and sometimes bullfrogs, add notes to the quiet, butterflies and dragonflies color the air. The trees welcome you in their steady rootedness, the seasons offer you their timely gifts. The clean scent of the earth reminds you: you are home. |
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Drop in to Bluestem (virtually) and learn what others have discovered on this land, in this place. Click here. In the spring of 2023, graduate students from Duke University's Community Based Environmental Management program spent time at Bluestem documenting the activities, the landscape, and the perspectives of volunteers and families. They asked: "What does Bluestem mean to you?" |
Knowing that you love the earth changes you, activates you to defend and protect and celebrate. But when you feel that the earth loves you in return, that feeling transforms the relationship from a one-way street into a sacred bond." —Robin Wall Kimmerer
A Place of Worship in a Nature Preserve
Grassland Restoration for Native Habitat
A Conservation Cemetery for Green Burial
Grassland Restoration for Native Habitat
A Conservation Cemetery for Green Burial
1900 Hurdle Mills Road, Cedar Grove, North Carolina 27231
All photos credit Bluestem Community.
Read about Bluestem Conservation Cemetery
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Read Exchanging Gifts, an article about conservation burial featured in this Summer issue of The Land Trust Alliance's publication Saving Land. Here's an excerpt:
"Within the course of a year, veteran conservationists Heidi Hannapel and Jeff Masten’s parents received terminal diagnoses. They each took leaves of absence from their careers to support their parents’ dying at home. Emerging from these life changing events, they recognized they could apply their conservation experience to building a local, community project that could change the way people approach life, death and burial." Read the entire article here |
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Bluestem. Where nature is enough.
All photos credit Bluestem Community.
