Nature and Culture Intertwined

Prairies, ideally, are expansive places, where the land spreads out unobstructed on all sides except by miles upon miles of sunlit wildflowers and grasses. When you’re out on the prairie, the only aspect greater than the land is the unfathomable sky above.

So to me it makes perfect sense that the Missouri Prairie Foundation has been encouraging us to look at prairies not just as places full of grasses, flowers, bugs, and birds, but as places significant to human culture—to our history, our settlement patterns, our agriculture, our artworks, our spirituality.

At the same time, the Missouri Humanities Council has been turning its attention to the “outdoors,” also known as the natural world. Like their 2020 Water Symposium and “Growing Up with the River” video series. To me, this makes sense, since you can’t have human history without nature, without our environment.

Maybe I need to backtrack for a second: it is remarkable that the MPF has been featuring programs beyond the biological and ecological, and that MHC has been featuring programs beyond the strictly humanistic, given the standard myopia of twenty-first-century public outreach. It’s generally considered best practice to stick to a single subject and reiterate a few chosen angles to that subject. “We need to stay in our lane.” That’s the general strategy for today’s media.

Don’t get me wrong: I love nature. When I think of prairies, I think of a lot of my favorite native plants and animals. And you know that I appreciate Missouri’s humanities, too, such as the German-immigrant history and culture, and our Missouri musicians and musical organizations.

So it’s a nice surprise that these two organizations are daring to connect, because I don’t much care for the standard myopic mores of our sophomoric century. I’m attracted to what the people of Phi Beta Kappa call “breadth and depth.” Notice how the Missouri Humanities Council has been using lovely, rich photos of Missouri landscapes instead of the “collages depicting a variety of Missourians” that you might otherwise expect, for an organization with “human” in its title. Something’s going on here beyond just eye candy—there’s a crossover shift between culture and nature, and I’m liking it.

So last night I helped my Dad with his first-ever Zoom presentation. Since he was one of three co-presenters, and the representatives of the Missouri Prairie Foundation and Missouri Humanities Council took charge of organizing the presentation, Dad (and I) didn’t have a steep learning curve. My job as helper was mainly to sit beside dad (off camera) and provide a sense of technological security, which he really didn’t need.

The presentation (whose recorded version you can watch on YouTube here) was about the intersection of Missouri prairies with Missouri’s human history and culture. Though I admit to being biased, I think it was really good. I think you’ll like it, too.

But wait, there’s more: MPF will be having another expansive webinar this next week! This time, the topic is “Contemporary Art and the Prairie,” “an exciting panel discussion that brings together the communities of MPF and the Kansas City Art Institute in a shared passion for the landscapes within which we reside. This conversation, moderated by MPF Executive Director, Carol Davit, features three Midwest artists, Julie Farstad (Kansas City, MO), Erin Weirsma (Manhattan, KS), and Keli Mashburn (Fairfax, OK), whose creative practices focus upon the rich and nuanced significance the prairie has in our understanding of time, self, and place.”

“Keli Mashburn is a photographer and filmmaker living and working at the edge of the Tallgrass Prairie on the Osage Reservation of northeastern Oklahoma. Julie Farstad is an artist, Professor and Co-chair of the Painting Department at the Kansas City Art Institute, who explores the role of plants and the idea of cultivation in mixed media studio artwork and community based painting projects. Erin Weisma Wiersma is an artist and professor at Kansas State University. Wiersma’s new and ongoing works draw from the Konza Prairie, becoming both the medium and subject matter.”

I’ll bet you’ll enjoy it. It’ll be live on Wednesday, October 20, at 4 p.m., and it’ll be recorded so you can see it later. Here’s where you go for more information and to sign up.

A Conversation with Walter Schroeder, Mapper of Missouri's Presettlement Prairies

This is a short post. I'm just sharing a video with you. I hope you enjoy it.

I sure did.

For those of you who don't know, while I was in elementary school and junior high, my dad spent a decade meticulously researching the original handwritten descriptions of Missouri's landscapes made by the original land surveyors, who worked before Missouri was opened up to settlers, who plowed up the prairies, cut down the woods, suppressed natural fires, introduced cattle, etc.

From the surveyors' notes, he created a map (in the days before computers) of what parts of Missouri had been prairie (grassland) and which were wooded. The map was published by the Missouri Department of Conservation in 1981 and is still incredibly useful for conservationists and others who want an idea of how a piece of land was vegetated before settlers came in and altered it.

My dad's had a long career in both physical geography (landforms) and historical geography (especially settlement patterns). Many people in Jefferson City know him only from his popular books about the capital city and its German immigrant community—books he's written in retirement.

In this video, he touches on a lot of these subjects. A longer video, incorporating more parts of the interviews, is in the works, so stay tuned.

Also, be sure to check out the Missouri Prairie Foundation at moprairie.org.

I'm really pleased that the nice folks at MPF saw fit to do these interviews with my dad. I'm biased—I know he's a big deal—but it's nice to see others honor him, too.

Fun fact: my Grandma Schroeder was a charter member of the MPF. She and the other Garden Club ladies viewed native prairie conservation as integrally related to their gardening and landscaping interests. It seems that Grandma always spoke gushingly about the beauty of the prairies. She always pronounced it puh-HRARE-ie.

The Green, Green Grasses of This Horrible Drought Year

I'd like you to notice something about our native prairies: All summer long, despite this awful drought, they've stayed green, green, green!

Unlike our pastures and old fields, which are filled with cool-season grasses, our native prairies have grasses whose favorite growing season is the hottest part of summer. Really, instead of calling them "warm-season" grasses, we should call them "hot-season" grasses. Because that's what they truly are. Not only is this their peak growing season, but also, they have super-deep roots that allow them to survive horrible droughts. (Like this one.)

For proof, here are some pictures I took at Tucker Prairie on July 29. All the pastures we drove through to get there had turned golden and dry. But the prairie--though not having a fabulous year--was getting along okay.

Tucker Prairie, in case you didn't know, is owned by the University of Missouri and is used as an ecological research area. This is 146 acres of true, virgin prairie, folks. You can see it as you drive along I-70: It's just west of Kingdom City. Apparently somebody knocked the sign down that used to be visible from the interstate, but you can easily recognize the native prairie by its greenness and the uniquely textured look of its vegetation. (By the way, the little research station building has attracted a great deal of vandalism, too. Which is very sad to see!)

You might have noticed that I-70 has a prominent curve between Tucker Prairie and Kingdom City, and this is no coincidence. When the government was planning the new superhighway, conservationists had to fight to keep it from plowing through and destroying this tiny remnant of original, untouched, native landscape.

Among the green grasses and sedges are hundreds of "forbs," which are herbaceous plants that aren't grasslike--in other words, broad-leaved nonwoody plants. There are something like 260 species of plants living on this small, precious patch of earth.

Below is one of my favorite prairie plants: Rattlesnake master! It looks a lot like a spiny ol' yucca plant, but Eryngium yuccifolium is actually in the celery, carrot, or parsley family. It's more closely related to "harbinger of spring" and "Queen Anne's lace" than it is to "Spanish bayonet"!

This is one of six species of sunflowers that occur at Tucker Prairie (I think it's ashy sunflower, Helianthus mollis, but I didn't photograph enough of the vegetative parts for this amateur botanist to be certain). There are 48 members of the sunflower family on this one small prairie (statewide, there are about 400 different taxa in the sunflower family).

Below is one of my favorite pictures from our visit--it's an insect you don't want to play with, though it's awfully interesting to watch one. This is a female robber fly (Promachus vertebratis) depositing her eggs into the flowerhead of an ironweed (Vernonia missurica, I believe).

Yeah, she was big and made an ominous buzz when she flew--she looked and sounded "stingy"! Robber flies are insect "wolves" that often prey on creatures much bigger than themselves. And they have a venomous bite that every account says hurts very bad.

Like all other wild creatures during this drought, she seemed pretty frantic, trying to do what she needed to do before water, and life, ran out on her. The 100-degree temperature itself must have cranked her metabolism up about as high as it ought to go. The wild critters of Growing Season 2012 deserve medals of valor! These will be awarded in spring of 2013, upon the hatching of their progeny.

One more thing. Every Missourian should know about the Missouri Prairie Foundation. They have some upcoming events of interest:

Thurs. Aug. 30: Doug Tallamy, author of Bringing Nature Home: How You Can Sustain Wildlife with Native Plants, will speak at Lincoln University's Scruggs University Center. There will be a whole bunch of native plant stuff going on, too, with food, tours of Lincoln's Native Plant Outdoor Laboratory, and so on.

Sat. Sept. 8: Workshop on Prairie Planting from Seed, with Jon Wingo and Frank Oberle. Learn how to convert lawn or fescue fields to drought-tolerant, beautiful native prairie plants that provide habitat for pollinators and other wildlife. Morning presentations, lunch, and tours of Prairie Star Restoration Farm (between Belle and Bland, Mo.). You have to RSVP for this. Click on the link at the bottom of this post.

Sat. Sept. 15: Prairie Day at Shaw Nature Reserve, Gray Summit, Mo. This is fun event for the whole family!

Sat. Sept. 22: "In Touch with Nature Field Day," at the Alan Busby Farm on US 54 west out of Jefferson City. Exhibits, hands-on demos, tours; more family fun!

Sat. Sept. 29: Prairie Jubilee at Prairie State Park, near Nevada, Mo. Celebrate Prairie State Park's 30th anniversary! Another family-friendly event.

FOR MORE INFORMATION ON THESE MISSOURI PRAIRIE FOUNDATION EVENTS, CLICK ON THE MPF'S "EVENTS" PAGE, HERE.