Mark Spreyer

Mark Spreyer died on 5 November 2026 in South Barrington, Illinois, aged 69. No cause of death was made public. Arrangements were handled by Davenport Family Funeral Homes and Crematory, and the Daily Herald reported his death on 10 November 2026.

Services were held privately by his family, and a celebration of his life was planned at the Stillman Nature Center when the bluebells are in bloom. The family asked that contributions be made to the Stillman Nature Center.

Mark F. Spreyer was born on 20 November 1956, the son of Frank Spreyer and Wilma Spreyer, and grew up in Barrington, in the northwest suburbs of Chicago. In one of his later columns he recalled that his father chose to let a wild meadow grow in the family's sizable backyard, mowing it only once a year in the autumn.

He studied forestry at the University of Michigan, earning his undergraduate degree there, and then did graduate work at St. Cloud State University in Minnesota, where his research focused on great gray owls.

After his studies Spreyer organised and directed Chicago's peregrine falcon release program. Under his leadership Chicago hosted the first nest of peregrine falcons in Illinois in 37 years.

His career also included work with the Brooklyn Botanic Garden and the National Audubon Society, teaching at the College of Lake County, and a 5,000 square foot raptor exhibit he developed with the Science Museum of Minnesota.

In early 1995 he returned to Illinois to become executive director of the Stillman Nature Center in South Barrington, a post he held for the rest of his life. He led bird walks, spring woodcock watches and the center's annual New Year's Day walk, and for more than 40 years he gave hundreds of owl programs at schools, libraries and garden clubs, earning the nickname the Owl Man.

As a writer he published in scientific journals and popular magazines, including Birder's World and the Journal of the Association of Avian Veterinarians, and wrote newsletters for the nature center. For many years he contributed nature columns to the Daily Herald on subjects such as blue jays, black squirrels, flying squirrels, bald cypress trees and hibernating groundhogs. In 2016 a collection of his essays was published as Natural Digressions: A Natural History for the 21st Century.

Spreyer lived in the Barrington area. His obituary said that most of his achievements would not have been possible without the help of his partner, Susan Allman, described as a dedicated conservationist in her own right.

He shared his life with a succession of rescued sled dogs, which, his family wrote, howled with the coyotes and made certain he got out on the trails.

Spreyer's work with Chicago's peregrine falcon release program helped bring nesting peregrines back to Illinois, and his three decades at the Stillman Nature Center made it a place where generations of suburban families first met owls, hawks and woodland wildflowers.

His columns and his book Natural Digressions carried the same mix of science and playful humour to a wide readership, and the Stillman Nature Center keeps an archive of his Daily Herald articles online.