The Master Naturalists of Milam County

If you've picked up a packet of free native seeds at the Cameron Public Library, walked a garden planted for pollinators, or seen a careful record of a Milam County wildflower pop up online, there's a good chance a Master Naturalist was behind it.

The El Camino Real Chapter of the Texas Master Naturalist program is Milam County's own corps of trained nature volunteers. The chapter organized in 2007 and held its first training class in January 2008, and its members have been working quietly across the county ever since — teaching, planting, documenting, and restoring the natural world that surrounds our towns and farm roads.

A statewide program with local hands

The Texas Master Naturalist program is sponsored by the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department and the Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service. Its mission is "to develop a corps of well-informed volunteers to provide education, outreach, and service dedicated to the beneficial management of natural resources and natural areas within their communities for the State of Texas."

Started in 1997, the program now counts 49 chapters serving 213 Texas counties. Master Naturalists are adult volunteers, 18 and older, who complete 40 hours of initial training in the classroom and the field. To certify, they give 40 hours of volunteer service and take 8 hours of advanced training in their first year — and they repeat that service and training every year after to stay certified.

What they do here at home

The El Camino Real chapter's work is easy to find around Milam County:

- Sow & Grow: the Milam Seed Library. Chapter members run free native-seed libraries, opened to the public in January 2025 at the Cameron Public Library, with a free-standing seed library added at the Milam Wildscape later that year. Members meet monthly to sort and package seeds, working alongside the Little River Basin Master Gardeners. A 2026 Pollinators for Texas award — the H-E-B-funded grant program administered through the state program — will expand Sow & Grow to two more sites: the Lucy Hill Patterson Memorial Library in Rockdale and a free-standing library at the chapter's city wildscape at All Saints' Episcopal Church in Cameron. The grant plan also includes a county-wide Native Wildscape Yard of the Month for April through September 2027.

- The Milam Wildscape. The chapter's native-plant garden at Bird and Bee Farm near Milano won a 2025-26 Pollinators for Texas award and is being redesigned around pollinator conservation. Members hold regular wildscape workdays to keep the plantings tended.

- Citizen science. Chapter members document Milam County's plants and wildlife on iNaturalist, the nature-recording platform, and the chapter's website hosts its "Nature of Milam County" records of local birds, mammals, trees, and wildflowers. The chapter has also spent two years recording bats around the county to learn which species are here, in coordination with Texas Nature Trackers, the statewide effort tracking bats all over Texas.

- Community outreach. Volunteers staff education tables at events across the county — including Cameron's downtown Fourth of July festival and the All Saints' Blessing of the Animals and Fall Festival this past October, where they gave away 100 wildflower seed packets.

The chapter's 2026 officers are President Marian Buegeler and Vice President Phyllis Shuffield.

The next meeting — and you're invited

The chapter meets on the second Thursday of each month in the fellowship hall of All Saints' Episcopal Church, 200 N. Travis in Cameron, and the meetings are open to the public — visitors are welcome, and anyone thinking about joining is encouraged to come as a guest.

The next meeting is Thursday, November 12, 2026. A potluck meal starts at 5:30 p.m., and the program begins at 6:00 p.m.

This month's program is the final report on Bat Acoustics in Milam County, presented by Chad Cryer — an Associate Professor of Biology at Temple College, and himself a member of the chapter's 2025 training class, who earned his certification last December. The chapter spent its second year in 2025 recording bats to see what's here, working in coordination with Texas Nature Trackers, who are tracking bats all over the state. Cryer and several of his students did all the computer work for the chapter, and Temple College approved their work and contributed to the project.

Two student researchers will also give updates on their projects: Tyler Miller, on Nasal Bot Flies, and Jacquelyn Rios, on her project on UV+ Lichen Distribution.

Thinking about joining?

The chapter's next training class begins in January 2027, and the chapter is building its information list now. To get on the list, contact training coordinator Alan Rudd at aerudd@yahoo.com or (979) 220-3328. The chapter can also be reached at ElCaminoRealMasterNaturalist@gmail.com, and readers can learn more at txmn.org/elcamino or on Facebook at "Texas Master Naturalist – El Camino Real Chapter." The Milam County AgriLife Extension office, (254) 697-7045, can also point you their way.

No experience is required — just an interest in the natural world and a willingness to give some hours back to it. In Milam County, that trade has been paying off for nearly twenty years.