By: Taylor Christensen | Royal Oak Review | Published March 24, 2026
ROYAL OAK — The Royal Oak Nature Society is celebrating 25 years, and with that it will also be hosting its 18th annual fundraiser from 7 to 10 p.m. May 21 at the Royal Oak Farmers Market. 316 E. 11 Mile Road.
The Royal Oak Nature Society’s goal is to raise funds through a silent auction with more than 150 items to help support Royal Oak’s nature preserves: Cummingston Park, Tenhave Woods and the Fred A. Erb Arboretum.
Tickets cost $10 per person in advance and $15 at the door, according to a flyer prepared by the society.
Bob Muller, president of the society and programs director, has been a member since its inception in 2001.
“The Nature Society has been around for 25 years now, and we took over all of the programs in the nature park, nature walks, that type of thing,” Muller said. “We also took over all of the maintenance of the nature parks because the city never went in and built trails or maintained the trails.”
Since the beginning of the society, it has grown substantially in its programs, and the group has brought in a significant number of new nature experiences, like the Fred A. Erb Arboretum.
“About 15 years ago we started building an arboretum, which is a botanical garden specializing in trees. The goal was to have all of the trees native to the state of Michigan, either in our nature parks or planted in the arboretum for teaching ability,” Muller said. “We got really lucky and three years ago we got a grant from the Erb foundation for a quarter of a million dollars to plant trees and do work within the arboretum.”
But, now that the grant is over with, Muller said they are looking for help from the public to raise more funds to continue the work that they are doing to improve the parks.
“The city may help us here and there, but primarily it’s us spending the money,” he said. “We have put close to $100,000 into invasive plant control in the parks in the last 20 years, and we have purchased many trees.”
Right now, according to Muller, the Nature Society has $1,000 worth of trees and native shrubs and other plants coming in this year that, since the grant is over, the Nature Society will be buying itself.
The fundraiser has always been a silent auction, according to Muller, and there are items priced from $10 to $100 or more depending on the item. The Nature Society is still working to acquire all the items for the event.
“We get a lot of gift certificates from Royal Oak restaurants and gift certificates from other Royal Oak businesses. We get donations from people,” he said. “We also have a lot of plants. I think last year almost a quarter of what we made was with wildflowers that we had grown and potted up and taken in.”
During the event people can enjoy snacks or Kal’s Lunch Bowl, which will be staying open late for the event inside the farmers market.
“It’s fantastic to have this continued support for the community. Just recently we all of a sudden got a surprise of spending about $400 on some prairie plants that we had to move fast on, and we actually threw out a request to the general public if they can help us on this,” he said. “Within a few days, all of the money that we needed came in.”
Muller said that this is an example of the willingness of the community to help the Nature Society in times of need.
“We certainly have city support. We have put over 500 nature walks into the parks, and everything is free to the public, we don’t charge anything for the stuff we do in our programs,” Muller said. “And having built the arboretum that surrounds the community center, we created a quality park for the city, not at their cost, and I think people appreciate that.”
Looking into the future of the Nature Society, Muller hopes to encourage more younger people to join and take initiative.
“I’m in my 70s, so 25 years ago, I was just a kid, but we are trying to get more people to lead nature walks and do that kind of stuff,” Muller said.
For more information on the Royal Oak Nature Society annual fundraiser, visit romi.gov/463/Annual-Fundraiser.