Our National Tallgrass Treasure

“Tallgrass prairie is a national treasure. Prairie reconstructions and restorations require a commitment of time, resources, and ongoing management. Progress may be slow, but the processes and product are exciting, fulfilling, and perhaps, life changing. –Dr. Daryl Smith

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It’s sunset. The small patch of prairie remnant glows.

The Belmont Prairie Nature Preserve is a wedge of about 10 acres of tallgrass tucked into an unlikely spot between a golf course, freeways, and subdivisions, deep in the Chicago suburbs. Look west across the prairie, and you can’t help but think of a more subdued Albert Bierstadt painting in the Hudson River School style, or perhaps the shadowy drama of an Andrew Wyeth rural landscape.

Turn in another direction, and the view is more “Chicago Suburban School of Realism.”

As I walk these and other pockets of remnant prairie in the Chicago suburbs, I wonder how these tiny prairie acres hung on by a thread when others were destroyed. Each has a story. Most revolve around a person who recognized the value of a plant or bird or butterfly and called it to someone’s attention before the land was bulldozed.

Oh, the stories these plants that remain could tell us! Tales of a time when Illinois was covered with 22 million acres of tallgrass prairie. Survival despite the odds. And yet, so much of what was once here is lost. Gone forever, never to be replaced.

Although only a few thousand of those original acres remain, the ink has not completely faded from the original prairie pages. We read what we see there.

Inspired—we continue to plant and reconstruct new prairies for the future.

Yet, no matter how many new acres of tallgrass we plant, we can’t seem to replicate the original remnants. To come close will require genius, research, and ingenuity— know-how that we don’t have yet. And even so, our efforts  may not be enough. The planted prairies are similar, yet not the same. They are missing some of the insects. Some of the “words” from the original prairie pages. And also…

If you walk a remnant prairie at sunset, do you feel a different sense of place there than you feel when you walk a planted prairie, or a reconstructed prairie? And you wonder… can we ever replicate that?

Perhaps this is not a question any scientist would care to tackle.

We do know this: The remnants we cherish may be the last of their kind. Irreplaceable.

And so, they are almost dreamlike in their tenuous grasp on the land…and in their hold on our imagination.

That’s why I hike the trails of the prairies this month. To see the remnants. To think about what was lost. To feel that irreplaceable sense of place. To treasure what is left. And to remember.

At the end of November.

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Dr. Daryl Smith is one of four authors (with Dave Williams, Greg Houseal, and Kirk Henderson) of the iconic book, The Tallgrass Prairie Center Guide to Prairie Restoration in the Upper Midwest (University of Iowa Press). Anyone who is interested in prairie would benefit from having this comprehensive manual on their bookshelf.

All photos copyright Cindy Crosby (top to bottom) pale purple coneflower (Echinacea pallida) seedheads, Belmont Prairie Nature Preserve, Downers Grove Park District, The Nature Conservancy of Illinois, Belmont Prairie Preservation Association, Downer’s Grove, IL; trail at sunset, Belmont Prairie Nature Preserve, Downers Grove Park District, The Nature Conservancy of Illinois, Belmont Prairie Preservation Association, Downer’s Grove, IL; homes and buildings at the prairie’s edge, Belmont Prairie Nature Preserve, Downers Grove Park District, The Nature Conservancy of Illinois, Belmont Prairie Preservation Association, Downer’s Grove, IL; unknown seedhead with spiderweb thread, Danada Forest Preserve, Forest Preserve District of DuPage County, Wheaton, IL;  cream gentian seedheads (Gentiana alba) Belmont Prairie Nature Preserve, Downers Grove Park District, The Nature Conservancy of Illinois, Belmont Prairie Preservation Association, Downer’s Grove, IL;, sunset on the Schulenberg Prairie Savanna, The Morton Arboretum, Lisle, IL; wild quinine seedheads (Parthenium integrifolium), Belmont Prairie Nature Preserve, Downers Grove Park District, The Nature Conservancy of Illinois, Belmont Prairie Preservation Association, Downer’s Grove, IL; thimbleweed seedhead (Anemone virginiana), Belmont Prairie Nature Preserve, Downers Grove Park District, The Nature Conservancy of Illinois, Belmont Prairie Preservation Association, Downer’s Grove, IL; leaf at sunset, Danada Forest Preserve, Forest Preserve District of DuPage County, Wheaton, IL; Belmont Prairie Nature Preserve, Downers Grove Park District, The Nature Conservancy of Illinois, Belmont Prairie Preservation Association.