An institute taking shape
A future for
prairie waters.
A proposed home for freshwater conservation, research, and community across the Great Plains.
Led by ecologist Dr. Elizabeth Renner, the founding vision connects native species recovery with the people and places that make it possible.
The place we call home
A prairie is also
a waterscape.
Beneath the grassland’s wide horizons are rivers, streams, wetlands, and the life they hold.
The founding proposal centers the native fishes and mussels that are often overlooked in conservation. It imagines a lasting home for the science, care, and collaboration their recovery requires.
Across the Great Plains, with an early facility concept along the Big Sioux River near Sioux Falls, South Dakota.
Three connected commitments
Care for the water.
Keep learning.
Bring people along.
Conserve native life
Develop the science and propagation capacity to help imperiled fishes and mussels recover.
Make research useful
Connect field monitoring, freshwater ecology, and practical questions about prairie waters.
Grow a freshwater community
Create ways to learn, explore, and build a lifelong relationship with the water.
Meet the founder
Rooted here.
Looking ahead.
Liz is a freshwater fisheries ecologist and a sixth-generation South Dakota farm kid. Her experience spans aquatic ecosystems in South Dakota, Kansas, and Nebraska.
Her proposal brings that regional knowledge into a shared ambition: a place where applied science, species recovery, and community belong together.
Meet Liz and the people behind the visionBuilt through relationships
There’s more we can
do together.
The vision reaches across watersheds, disciplines, and generations.
Tribal natural resource programs. Conservation agencies. Universities. Schools. Neighbors. Each brings knowledge and capacity that can shape the institute’s work.
Explore possibilities for partnershipA home for work that takes generations.
Explore the proposed research hub, the values behind it, and the future Liz is working toward.