May your native grasses grow tall and your prairie flowers bloom plentifully this upcoming year.
– From the Native Prairies Association of Texas (NPAT)
Sideoats Grama (Bouteloua curtipendula) is the State Grass of Texas
Artwork by Lisa Spangler
2007/12/25
Happy Holidays from NPAT
May your native grasses grow tall and your prairie flowers bloom plentifully this upcoming year.
2007/12/20
Flint Hill Ranchers Donate Prairie Conservation Easement to TNC
Kansas landowners Bill and Maggie Haw recently donated a conservation easement on 3,120 acres of native tallgrass prairie in the Flint Hills of Kansas to The Nature Conservancy (TNC).
Located in Chase County, the conservation easement protects rare tallgrass prairie in the Flint Hills south of Cottonwood Falls.
Last year, the Haws also donated a conservation easement on more than 10,400 acres, the largest conservation easement donation in Kansas history, to TNC. The Haw’s total of donated conservation easements is now more than 13,500 acres.
See the Kansas Department of Wildlife and Parks press release for more information.
LandScope America Preview Includes Tallgrass Prairie Map
The LandScope America preview includes a tallgrass prairie map of the United States that shows the original area of the tallgrass prairies (before European settlement in the 1800’s) and the major known tallgrass prairie areas remaining.
The web site says: "Welcome to LandScope America, an exciting new online conservation resource. Planned for release in late 2008, this interactive website will bring together maps, data and stories about natural places and present them in highly dynamic and accessible formats. We hope the result will both inform and inspire conservation of America’s incomparable lands and waters. … LandScope America — a collaborative project of NatureServe and the National Geographic Society — is a new online resource for the land-protection community and the public."
2007/12/19
Proposals for Prairie Study Small Grants due 1/3
Prairie Biotic Research, a Wisconsin nonprofit established in 2000 to foster biotic research in prairies, is funding a a Small Grants Program with grants up to $1,000 for the study of any grassland taxon in the USA.
To apply for a grant, contact Michael Anderson at Prairie Biotic Research, Inc., PO Box 5424, Madison, WI 53705, or by email at pbr-grants@tds.net for a 2008 Grant Application Form and instructions.
Applications must be postmarked on or before January 3, 2008 to receive consideration. Researchers who received PBR funding in 2007 are not eligible for 2008 funding.
Read this post for more information.
Frisco May Create Art Celebrating Blackland Prairie
The City of Frisco is considering an prairie art installation entitled "Prairie Bells" by Bill and Mary Buchen of Son Arc, Inc as part of the Preston Road Phase 2 project. The proposal includes landscaping with native prairie grasses and flowers, a "bell tree", and "a wind twister."
From the city’s project description: "Prairie Bells" celebrates the rolling tall grass Blackland prairie that the City of Frisco sprang from and commemorates each year since its founding in 1902. … Prairie habitats remain vital to Frisco’s future environment conservation as to its past. Prairie Bells invites the public to explore the grasses and native plants surrounding the artwork.
For more information, see this story in the Pegasus News or read page 17 of the following city document.
2007/12/16
Houston-area Parks and Preserves with Coastal Prairie
Have fun and see tallgrass prairie at Houston area parks and preserves!
The Houston Chronicle carried an article, "Get away from it all by heading to a park", that highlights several parks and preserves around Houston that include native tallgrass prairie: Brazos Bend State Park, Armand Bayou Nature Center, Houston Arboretum & Nature Center, Attwater Prairie Chicken National Wildlife Refuge, and Brazoria National Wildlife Refuge.
See the Houston Chronicle article for more details!
Panhandle Shortgrass Prairie Preserve Created to Protect Prairie Chickens
The Nature Conservancy of Texas has purchased the 6,000-acre Fitzgerald Ranch in the High Plains of West Texas to protect habitat for lesser prairie chickens and other native wildlife found in the region. The Yoakum Dunes Project in the Texas High Plains will conserve 6,000 acres of shortgrass prairie.
See the Nature Conservancy press release and the Austin-American Statesman article for more information.
2007/12/13
Energy bill includes biofuel such as prairie grasses
The energy bill currently in the U.S. Senate would require 21 billion gallons of biofuel from sources including prairie grasses by 2022. Perhaps this will spur usage of diverse tallgrass prairie plantings for biofuel and carbon sequestration!
From a CNN article:
"It also would rapidly ramp up the required production of ethanol, eventually to 36 billion gallons a year by 2022, a sevenfold increase. At least 21 billion gallons must be from feedstock other than corn such as prairie grasses and wood chips."
2007/12/11
Prairie soils and plants sequester more carbon
Research at the Argonne National Laboratory and the University of Illinois at Chicago has found that native prairie plants and prairie soils hold more carbon than crop land and plants.
"Beyond growing crops like corn and soybeans, prairie soil is better than soils found in other parts of the United States at retaining carbon dioxide" said Roser Matamala, a terrestrial ecologist in Argonne’s Biosciences Division who was the lead researcher of the two projects that measured the intake and release of carbon dioxide of the different soils and plants. Her research also found that native prairie grasses absorb much carbon dioxide than crop plants.
Read "Argonne, UIC researchers get the dirt on prairie soil" at anl.org for more information.