Prairie in a Can

A couple of days ago we were out at Cayler Prairie and my classmate Alex observed that he’d seen several similar species in the prairie across the street from our cabins. Dr. S., our professor, scoffed, “That’s no prairie; it’s someone’s wildflower garden.” He acknowledged that both areas may contain some of the same plants, but said that a prairie should have more than just a few native species.

To show us what he meant, the next day Dr. S. walked us across the street to the field. It did immediately appear to have different composition than the prairies that we’d been tromping through for the last couple of weeks. I recognized a few species: little bluestem, daisy fleabane, and June grass. Dr. S. pointed out many species that wouldn’t appear in native Iowa prairies and explained that the field had been planted with “prairie in a can,” a seed mix from somewhere in Colorado. He explained that a true restoration project takes into consideration the grasses and flowers that would appear naturally in the area. If possible, a prairie is planted with seeds harvested from a nearby, established prairie. To him, this re-seeded field could not be called prairie; instead it was someone’s experimentation with non-native wildflowers.


Dr. S. agreed that the blooms in the field were beautiful, bright showy flowers, but also said that he didn’t think that some of the plants would survive for more than a few years. The non-native flowers included blue flax, lance-leaf coreopsis, lupine, Indian blanket, Shasta daisies, and even musk thistle. Despite the field's failure to be an Iowan prairie, I was glad to it was there to enjoy, almost like a public botanical garden.

And Then the Sky Dropped

Here are a couple of pictures of yesterday's storm, just minutes before it hit. We were in Minnesota at The Nature Conservancy's Red Rock Prairie doing a transect when the sky turned dark. (More on transecting later.) You can see some of my group in the second picture, walking toward the van. We drove away from the storm, but watched the wind and nearly horizontal rain whip the grasses around and pound the prairie flat. The radio said that the winds were around sixty mph. We returned after lunch, about an hour later, to a sunny but humid field.

Small Song

The pre-storm wind across the grasses today make me think of A. R. Ammon's "Small Song." Simple, yet powerful. A poem to remember and take with you everywhere.

Small Song

The reeds give way to the wind
and give the wind away.

Happy Little Fabaceae Family

In the last week, I’ve learned to identify over fifty prairie plants. We’re concentrating on learning the ones now in bloom in northern Iowa. Most of these flowers are distinctly different in color and shape, and this makes the identification easy. Three of these plants, however, are in the same family and look very much alike: veiny pea, American vetch, and marsh vetchling. They all have similar leaves and pinkish- purple flowers. At first these three plants perplexed me. How would I ever tell them apart? I’ve since learned the secret.

In order to distinguish among the plants, first, look at the stipules. A stipule is a pair of tiny leaf-like appendages at the base of the petiole. “Petiole” is a fancy word for the little stalk that attaches the leaf to the stem. The stipules in the veiny pea and the marsh vetchling are plain, but in the American vetch, they have teeth. Rough stipules are a sure sign of the American vetch.

If the stipules are not jagged and toothy, the plant may be either the veiny pea or the marsh vetchling. A quick guess could be made between the two through observation of the surroundings. The veiny pea grows more readily in dry areas while the marsh vetchling grows--you guessed it--in marshy, wet areas.

But to be sure, check the plant's stem. If the stem is relatively square, it is likely a veiny pea. If, the square stem has a pair of wings and appears almost two dimensional, ribbon-like, farther down on the plant, it is the marsh vetchling.

Puzzling specimens like these make plant identification much more fun. Even the same species can look differently and so I’ve found that I’m learning largely through comparison. I really have to get down there in the grasses and look carefully at the plant before making a judgment. It can be tedious work, but is also very satisfying!

Not Quite a Prairie Rattler

Today we drove out to Kirchner Prairie. The class has been searching for some more seasonal flowers to add to our field identification notebooks, and at Kirchner we did find several new ones. One was the white camus plant, Zigadenus elegans. It belongs to the Liliaceae family and has small, six-petaled white flowers, each marked with a green band. The stamens are yellow, and, though poisonous to most animals, flies seemed to be drawn to the plant.

As I stopped to record and sketch the delicate flower, the student next to me nudged my shoulder.

“You’re not afraid of snakes, are you?” he asked.

“Wha..Why?” And then I understood and looked down. A winding black cord was making its way between my feet.

I stood very still and looked at the dark body and yellow stripes. Just a garter snake. And then, for a moment, I thought about trying to catch it. It seemed as though it’d be easy to bend down and close my hand around its thin neck. Then I’d hold it, dangling the twisting tail as the snake squirmed in my fist.

I remembered how my father would sometimes catch a garter snake in our yard, then let us pet it, hold it. The scales felt so cool, so glassy under my fingertips, like a thick beaded bracelet. And yet, for all of its rigidity and shape, the body seemed flexible and alive, definitely not a toy. The belly, wrapped in softer and smoother scales, contained a pulse, the eyes moved, and the tongue flickered. We let the snakes go in our garden. “Snakes are good,” Dad said, “they eat the things that bother us.”

Today, I didn’t pick up the garter snake. Instead, I carefully stepped over it. Here, it wasn’t in my “territory,” my yard, but I was in its home. Something about handling it seemed rude, as though perhaps there is prairie etiquette to understand and follow, rules that I’m just now learning. I didn’t even follow the snake, but stood back and watched as the it quickly slithered into less compacted grasses, then disappeared.

A Field Notebook

Before I start notes, here are some things to know about me and my postings:

1. This is meant to be an exploratory record of my surroundings and experiences. I am new to the ecology and won’t pretend to be an expert. These are my beginner’s observations.

2. I am spending the next four weeks in northern Iowa taking a class in prairie ecology. We work in the field as well as in the lab. I hope that by becoming intimate with the area I will gain a greater appreciation of the much-neglected landscape of my Midwestern home.

3. My favorite color is green.

4. My class is intensive and time is limited (Also, it’s summer and I’m hanging out with a bunch of college students near a lake); my postings may be sporadic.

5. I believe that the arts, humanities, and sciences can and should collaborate. We can learn a lot from each other.