Auditioning for the Second Act

My cancer treatments began soon after my 51st birthday in early November, 2006 and ended in late February, 2007. A hospital bed had been moved into our house and I spent my days watching cooking and travel shows on television (a useless exercise because I was feeding myself canned food through a tube in my stomach and had no idea if I would ever eat again, and I certainly wasn’t planning any vacation trips), and going through mountains of towels as I coughed up the gunk that continually formed in and clogged my throat. Life progresses and things change, however, and within a few weeks I was venturing outside for short walks and drove myself to town to get groceries. One goal was to present myself as healing and improving to my 86 year old mother, who had undoubtedly suffered greatly worrying about me. I began to eat a few things after a couple months, and, being a good Polish woman, she was thrilled when she was able to feed me some potato soup. My wife, Linda, had been on crutches for a bad knee since the late stages of my treatments, and after a few weeks I was able to drive her to her arthroscopic surgery and return a small amount of the care she had shown me the past few months.

A big question mark was whether I would attain the stamina to work, and what sort of activities I would be able to engage in. I went to visit a consulting client out in a new wheat field in early May, when I still had need of a lot of healing and likely didn’t look very robust, and he told me, “Don’t worry about coming out to look at my crops. You need to rest and recuperate. I’ll still pay you and we can visit by phone.” I reassured him I planned to fulfill my duties, but had tears in my eyes from his generous offer. I found myself much more emotional than I had been in the past, greatly touched by everything I experienced. Another activity that I was able to undertake was to attend my older daughter Anna’s college graduation party. I was even able to be useful conversing with a socially inept Spanish professor that I entertained for over an hour so that Anna could have fun with other guests. This party, about ten weeks after treatments ended, was also the first time I ate a complete meal since early the first week of radiation four months before. I was able to fly out to the Front Range of Colorado to attend a board meeting of the farmer-owned commercial baking business that I served on, and renew my contributions, as well as re-join active participation on the board of directors of the local ethanol plant and the board of a prospective wind farm of which I was the president and leader. Of course, I also had two young, adult daughters to parent and a wife to try to be a good partner with. I had a busy life to return to and decided I would just see how jumping back into the various activities went.

One might reasonably ask why I didn’t cut back; why didn’t I engage in triage and kick some things to the roadside? To be honest, I’m not sure. I considered all the activities both important and enjoyable. I also am an incorrigible optimist, and while I was professing agnosticism regarding the remission of my cancer my subconscious was undoubtedly planning for a full, speedy recovery and a long life. In any case, I do remember having the thought that I would revisit the topic of my career after I was completely healed up and had gone through the next several months to learn my capabilities. Why can’t we have it all?

Here’s why. Mayo scheduled me for monthly visits, including various scans, for the next year, In June I asked for an extra visit because of a hard pimple on my neck that wasn’t going away. I was shoehorned in for an appointment immediately, and after first reassuring me that it was unlikely to be significant, Dr. Olsen zeroed in on the hard pimple with a look of concern. Being a dedicated surgeon he pulled a scalpel out of his pocket, sterilized it and excised a small piece of tissue on the spot. There was no need of numbing the area because surgery and radiation had killed all the nerves three months before and my neck was a block of unfeeling wood. He obviously didn’t like the look of the tissue and sent it off for biopsy. Linda and I went to a local park that evening and had a perfectly miserable time waiting to hear the results. Dr. Olsen was also an optimist, and a very confident surgeon, and his obvious concern was very worrying. A return visit the next day confirmed that the same cancer had returned, and Dr. Olsen scheduled a small surgery the next week to excise a larger area. When I left he clapped me on the shoulder and in a resigned tone said, “Good luck, sir.” I had been told many times that they were firing all their ammunition on the big combined treatment that I had completed, and would basically have no shells left to shoot if the cancer came back.

No shells except for cutting more pieces from my body, that is. Because we caught it so early, attributable to my self-exam, Linda’s immediate concurrence and Dr. Olsen’s quick, efficient work, the tiny tumor was cut out so quickly that there was no sign of spread or metastasis. My surgeon felt very confident that he had removed all the cancerous tissue, checking each slice immediately for cancer cells, an ability you have when you work at Mayo Clinic. We were likely less confident than Dr. Olsen, but we went home and delved deeply into life again.

One of the effects of the cancer treatments was the aforementioned secretions that my radiated throat tissue kept producing. During the day this was merely a bother, necessitating a constant stock of towels and tissues to cough into. My throat was restricted to the size of a pea, and the secretions would interfere with both eating and breathing. This was a much larger issue at night. For many months I would be up for 30-60 minutes coughing several times a night, hoping to get five or six hours of fragmented sleep over a nine or ten hour night. Humidity kept the secretions looser and easier to get out, so Linda built a plastic tent around my bed with a humidifier inside so I slept in a fog. Still, I regularly woke up because your brain will not allow you to sleep if you aren’t getting enough oxygen. I would have the most interesting dreams as my subconscious tried to wake me up by changing the trajectory of the dream that was already occurring, so that it could shake me from slumber. There were several recurring themes. One was fire, usually spontaneous combustion of parts of whatever building I was in. If I was in a vehicle in my dream either the road became very dangerous, or the vehicle would suddenly go out of my control and start flying sideways down embankments or trying to climb dangerous cliffs. Another theme was being lost; I would wander endless hallways and go through unmarked doors trying to get out of buildings that had seemed so familiar and easily managed when I entered. The overarching thread was that things were out of control and I needed to do something to regain control, like wake up and start breathing better. Unfortunately, not much upsets me, and I was never worried in these dreams, just confused and perhaps a little peeved that things were going so badly. My stoic Nordic personality runs very deep, it seems. Whether it was my house starting on fire, or my car spinning out of control as it accelerated or finding myself completely lost in a labyrinthine building, my dream self just kept trying to figure things out, until my brain said, “Enough! Wake up you silly SOB!” and I would awaken feeling ill and short of air.

The final story of that first year regards the feeding tube that stuck out of my stomach. By late summer my proficiency at eating was such that the decision was made to take out the feeding tube. When it was installed it was threaded down my throat and out through a hole cut in my stomach. Doing it in this manner allowed a very small incision in my stomach, as the trailing end of the tube had a “bumper” which kept it from coming out through the hole that had been cut. When I arrived for the procedure I was chatted up by the charming, pretty young nurse. She told me they could quickly set up for a minor surgery to enlarge the hole to take out the tube which would entail a partial anesthetic and an overnight stay for observation, or if I was willing to put up with some momentary discomfort they could just pull the tube out, causing the bumper to collapse and come through. I don’t remember exactly how she put it, but the gist was that a big, strong man like me could handle it easily and go home the same day. She was possibly battling her eyelashes a bit, though my memory fails me here. And isn’t every guy a sucker for that schtick? Well, this guy was, and I agreed.

She asked me to go in the next room where a no-nonsense middle aged nurse (the charming young woman was on to other scams) got me a gown and told me to sit in the recliner. I sat alone for a few minutes until a muscular young guy came in. He obviously worked out regularly, his biceps bulging out of the t-shirt he wore, but had little to say. He put on sterile gloves, the other people who had been around disappeared and he hovered above me. He wrapped the tube around his fingers, got a good grip, braced himself, and finally spoke, “I assume they told you this is really going to hurt.” Before I could reply he gave a big yank. Kaboom!!!! The world exploded in my head as I felt like I had been shot, or at least kicked in my stomach by an elephant. The world went black and I quit breathing. The tube (and probably some stomach fluids) came flying out, For the only time in my life I saw the proverbial stars, tried to resume breathing, and assumed there must be a gaping hole in my stomach now, like a cartoon image of a cannonball going through my body. After a couple minutes I could see again and had wiped the tears from my eyes to gingerly examine the damage. I looked down as the middle aged nurse, who had returned to the room, put a glorified band aid over a very small, unimpressive hole. She told me that healing was very quick and asked if I needed anything else in a matter of fact tone. I had to admit that the procedure was very quick, and the pain was already subsiding. She gave me a Tylenol, walked away, and left me to gather my wits, get dressed and leave, booted out so the staff could move on to more important issues.

There are many more stories, but I will leave them untold as I am suspicious they are only interesting to me. For the next several years I settled into a routine, which wasn’t necessarily an easy routine, working around issues with breathing, eating, anemia, stamina and muscle spasms and cramping. People are adaptable, though, and if issues and their “work-arounds” are predictable enough we build them into our schedules and develop that routine. Ten years in I had an episode where my tiny throat got plugged by the husk from a kernel of corn and ended up with a trachaeostomy. Food leakage into my lungs after the trach was put in eventually led to regular bouts of pneumonia caused by bacteria which were becoming drug resistant. A laryngectomy was performed (that story was told in an earlier post “And Then the World Changed”), which meant I lost the ability to speak, so that now I do all my communicating by writing notes, texting, email and a sort of quasi-game of charades I play with gestures and facial contortions. I have probably taken close to 20 trips to ER’s, the past few years, though I admit we pull the trigger on an ER visit pretty quickly now. My mind is always preoccupied with figuring out how to get through the day accomplishing something positive with my beat up body.

But the overarching theme here is NOT that I have a hard life. I have enumerated a few of my challenges not to be pitiful or even worse, to seem noble. The point, very simply, is that it can work. The point is that we can live a good and satisfying life while dealing with some distractions and barriers. It can be bloody difficult, and bloody wonderful at the same time. I have been able to do a spectacular amount of things during the past 17 years. I was able to be a husband, father, and now grandfather (very soon to a third grandchild). I was able to manage my business and continue a career so that we have some resources for our retirement. I was able to help bury two parents, who didn’t have to do that for me, and to be there for the decline and passing of my older sister, Earlene, and my niece, Katie. And now, though my work days are short and sporadic, I am able to engage in my grand retirement project of 200 acres of prairie restorations and hoping to be a vehicle for inducing others to consider my path.

I’ve been able to visit both my daughters while they studied in Europe. I was able to go to India to meet my son-in law’s family, and then to participate in a glorious Indian wedding. I was able to dance with my younger daughter at her wedding two years ago. I have held two newborn grandchildren in my arms, am now watching them grow into wonderful human beings, and am giddy with the hope of doing it again very soon with a third grandchild. And I have been able to hold my girlfriend of 43 years in my arms as well, so she can know how much she is loved.

The point, again, to beat it into the ground, is that LIFE IS WONDERFUL!!! Life is enormous! Life has more possibilities than we can comprehend! A person’s life can be a path to love, to heroism, to peace, and ultimately to transcendence. The cancer aftermath could have gone so much worse, as I might not have beaten the cancer, or I could have become an invalid in constant pain. I certainly considered those outcomes, and I accepted them as part of the Faustian deal I was making. Except my deal wasn’t for ultimate wisdom and riches as in the story of Faustus, but for just what I have gotten, seventeen very good years. What have I had to give in return for this second act? My strength, my patience, my stamina and my mindful attention to my body; I simply give everything that I have. But what a deal!!! What a fucking spectacular deal!!! And if I am both lucky and good, after these seventeen years, maybe a few more. We humans are a greedy bunch and I admit that as great as seventeen years has been, I hope to be able to write a follow-up to this post ten years from now. But first, there’s today, and then tomorrow. What an amazing thing it is to be able to look forward to the next morning! I can already taste the first sip of coffee and I can hardly wait.

Seventeen Years, Seventeen Good Years

In various blog posts I often end with a reference to my dodgy health and physical condition. Aging is clearly a part of this, but much of what I refer to goes back to the cancer that was found 17 years ago, and particularly to the effects of the cancer treatments which have given me these last 17 years. Life is full of yin and yang, and there are a thousand sayings referring to the idea that there are inevitably both positives and negatives inherent in any action or event. Here’s how this all fits into the tale of my health since 2006.

I was visiting some friends in late summer of 2006 when Gail mentioned I was swollen at the top of my neck on both sides, and that I might want to have it checked by a doctor. I had been feeling run down and agreed, assuming swollen lymph glands might be a sign of an infection or illness. Several visits to a couple different doctors over a couple months led to a thoughtful reference to an infectious disease specialist in Fargo, North Dakota, a couple hours drive north of me. The doctor took one look, made no recommendation or diagnosis, but told me he was making an immediate appointment that afternoon with an ear, nose and throat (ENT) specialist for me. A very short exam led to a preliminary diagnosis of throat cancer and a further appointment for a tonsillectomy which would be used for a biopsy. It was a very long and dreary ride home with phone calls to make to my daughters and other family. To say that Linda and I were subdued or thoughtful is to grossly underestimate the impact of a diagnosis of a spreading cancer.

The return visit to the ENT doctor was no better. The removed tonsils were filled with a tumor of squamous cell cancer, a CT scan showed probable spread to lymph tissue, and I had at least stage 3, and very possibly stage 4 metastatic cancer. In response to my inquiry, he even made the comment that I had less than a 50-50 chance to survive five more years. At my first visit he had talked up the cancer treatment facility that resided in the same building, but after looking at the scans and the biopsy, he told us that I should go to Mayo Clinic which would be better able to deal with my case. When we got home I did my own research reading various medical journal articles on treatments for my cancer, and it looked even more grim, as the articles made it look like a successful treatment meant that I might live for two years rather than one. None of the articles mentioned full remission of the cancer. I didn’t lose hope, however, because of two things: medical trials are done on volunteers whose cancer is quite advanced, and were likely to be older and less healthy than I was, and published articles are often referring to research done several years before. There might be new ideas that I didn’t see.

Two weeks later we made the first of what would become dozens of visits to Rochester, Minnesota, where the original, and largest Mayo Clinic facility resides. Linda and I went into the office of Dr. Kerry Olsen, an ENT specializing in cancer surgery and treatments. In contrast to the gloom of the visit in Fargo, he was upbeat, confident and straight forward. He had seen many situations like mine and had recently been part of a team which had developed a new treatment for my cancer. Was this a recently developed chemo drug or an innovation in gene therapy? Or perhaps an implant of a radioactive treatment that promised to be my salvation? No, it was simply using the same coarse tools that had been used for years: 1) surgery to remove cancerous tissue, 2) radiation to kill growing cells, and 3) chemotherapy, with an old drug, also to kill growing cells (Much of cancer therapy revolves around the fact that cancer tumors are growing faster and using more resources than other tissues. If you engage in an action that harms growing tissue it will disproportionately harm the tumor. Collateral damage to other growing or metabolically active tissue is the yang to the yin of killing the cancer.). The trick was simply to do it all at once, and with maximum intensity, getting a synergistic effect, so that the cancer cells not removed by surgery would get a double or triple whammy and their demise enhanced. In effect it was the “bigger hammer” option, as in “When all else fails, get a bigger hammer.” Treatments would not last for months, as they often do for other cancers, but only six weeks, once I had recovered enough from surgery to get radiation and chemotherapy.

After my visit with Dr. Olsen I was sent to the radiation oncologist and the medical oncologist (who prescribes chemo and monitors your health to make sure you can keep receiving treatments). All three echoed the same story. I would have a very serious, extensive surgery that might lead to more surgeries to fix the damage done by the first surgery, that they would beat the living daylights out of me with a lifetime dose of radiation and high dose chemotherapy, and that they would cure the cancer. I might never work again. I might never eat again. I would likely lose my saliva and my teeth. People even died occasionally from the treatments. Did I want to go forward and allow them to do this? The answer was easy. Of course I did. Even diminished I could be a husband and a father. I doubt anyone says “no” to their presentation. What else can a person do?

Thus, two weeks later I returned to have my radiation mask created and more scans done to pinpoint cancerous areas. Mayo had just installed new machines that were able to pinpoint radiation treatments to very specific points in my neck, but that would only be helpful if tumors were correctly located and if I was severely restricted in my movement so that the narrow beam of radioactive particles hit the cancer tumors and missed as much healthy tissue as possible. Thus, my head and neck were draped with strips of a soft pliable plastic that would harden as they cooled and dried to become a stiff mask conforming perfectly to my head, neck and shoulders. I just had to lay very still while it hardened. Of course they left my nostrils open, but as I remember even my eyes had strips that meant it was almost impossible to open my eyelids when I was clamped in. My head and neck were not to move.

I received the big surgery, ended up in an emergency room back home from complications, lost a lot of weight, found out that I have an allergic reaction to opiates that made accepting the post surgical pain preferable to the meds, and generally felt that I likely had seen the worst of it, a mistaken illusion. After a month of healing I went back to Mayo to live for six weeks while I received radiation and chemo. The chemotherapy occurred the first day of treatment, three weeks later, and on my last day of treatment, two liters of Cisplatin each time. And every weekday for six weeks I would give one of my blues cd’s to the technician to play as distracting music and lay on the table to get clamped in to receive radiation for half an hour. The radiation gun moved around in a pattern that had been programmed by my radiation oncologist and shot radioactive particles into 17 different locations in my throat, neck and the lower part of my head. I was lucky that I had no problem with claustrophobia as many people needed sedatives to remain calm and motionless in the mask while the treatments occurred. Radiation is a funny thing in that you feel nothing while it occurs, but the cumulative effect of over a month of high dose radiation is massive. By the second week I was basically unable to eat anything. Food was not just lacking taste, but was indescribably offensive. It was an evil substance that my body and spirit just refused. One would think that I could just suck down a few nutrition drinks, but by the end of the second week I was struggling to get 500 calories a day, and by the end of the third week even that was impossible. Had I been able to force myself to eat, it would not have helped as I could no longer swallow, my damaged throat tissues making so much mucus that it was choking me, coughing gobs of mucus into towels every few minutes 24/7.

I lost so much weight that my space age mask could no longer hold me in a perfect position for the fancy radiation machine, and the technicians basically “shimmed me up” putting cloths below my now skinny neck to try to keep me properly positioned and immobile. During the fourth week the most painful aspect of the treatment began. The skin on my neck and shoulders deteriorated and sloughed off, until raw meat was showing through the cracks. Linda would apply the ointments and compresses while I cried out, so that once I was protected I could go out to face the next radiation treatment or visit to a caregiver. I had also just received the second big dose of chemo, so my general physical state and my energy were at rock bottom the fourth and fifth weeks. I was the walking dead. During the fourth week my medical oncologist decided that I had lost too much weight and was in danger of not finishing the treatments, and a tube was inserted directly into my stomach so that I could receive liquid nutrition, bypassing both my damaged throat and my even more damaged appetite. That, however, was a real turning point. I would sit in the recliner with the bag of food mounted on an IV stand dripping into my stomach. I could just as well say a bag of strength, or a bag of energy, or even a bag of determined optimism. The difference in mind and body when you are receiving 1500 calories each day in comparison to when you are getting 150 calories per day is incredible. Even amid the pain and lack of sleep the world became bright and desirable again. I think the food even helped my radiation burns heal, as they seemed less painful the sixth, and last, week of treatments.

I walked to get my last dose of chemo on a bright late winter day with what felt like a bounce in my step. Something I had doggedly tried to do, even through the worst of the treatments was to acknowledge those around me; to say please and thank you and to look people in the eye and smile so that the words seemed genuine. I’m not sure that I was able to always do that in my zombie state, but without the ability to do anything else, it was a minute by minute goal, starting with always being polite to my wife, Linda. Still, I am sure there was rarely much conviction behind the words. One becomes totally divorced from what we usually think of as the real world in the throes of such medical treatments, and focusing upon the people I came in contact with was a way to keep a tenuous relationship with the world. I lacked the strength, though, to project my feelings, until the last day of treatments. My smile was very genuine that last day.

And then it was over. All through the treatments I had been unable to entertain a thought that seems innocuous now: the number of radiation treatments remaining. I could keep track of how many I had received, but not how many were left; it was just too daunting – until the next to last day. Suddenly my brain allowed me to go into the radiation waiting room and think, “After today there’s only one more.” I went in for the last one with what I believed to be a big smile, and walked out into the sunshine as if I was leaving prison, even though I still had the last chemo treatment to endure. I was weak as a kitten, having lost 65# over the four months since the tonsillectomy, and would not be able to sleep for more than 15-20 minutes at a stretch for months, but I felt the scales falling from my eyes, allowing me to see the world again. I truly felt reborn, but as a newborn I had to figure out how to live in the world. Unlike many people less fortunate I had a second act to develop. That will be the topic of the next post.

Springtime fun

Earlier this year I posted a couple short essays on some of the things that I hoped to accomplish this year. The overarching theme was a narrowing of focus to developing the restoration into a source of material for other restorations of “hard to access” species found in my prairies. That will mean choosing species to focus on, finding alternative seed sources to broaden the genetic base available for the future and to increase populations in order to both allow evolution to wield its ratchet and to provide a significant seed source for others. Thus, my goals in order of emphasis are: 1.) Creating a living seed bank of a group of species adapted to this area, 2.) Use my restorations as a site for encouragement, experimentation, education and a hub for building a community of restoration practitioners, and 3.) Integrate the restoration with the larger neighborhood and cattle grazing to maximize ecosystem services. Here’s one of the experiments.

The opening picture is a typical prairie hillside in my pasture. It’s bookended by a couple Nuttall’s violets (Viola nuttallii), with several bastard toadflax (Comandra umbellata) and several other small forbs just starting to peek through. The grassy types are Kentucky bluegrass (Poa pratensis), needleleaf sedge (Carex diuruscula), prairie junegrass (Koeleria macrantha) and lots of blue grama (Bouteloua gracilis). The area is mostly brown because the blue grama is a warm season species just beginning to send out a few leaves. This is an assemblage that I am hoping to recreate in my restoration because it is so obviously well adapted to my gravelly hills, but most of the forbs/wildflowers are almost impossible to get as purchased seed, and damn hard to gather. Thus, one of my experiments this year is to try a few transplants. Below is one attempt.

As you can see the attempt wasn’t very successful. It’s not as bad as it looks, though, as the violet wasn’t the primary target. the bastard toadflax was. Underneath the soil is perhaps 10 inches of toadflax rhizome which will likely put up a shoot after a while. Rhizomes are much more resilient than a flowering plant is, and I expect it is just fine. In a couple other transplant sites I combined a clump of the needleleaf sedge to see how well that transplants. In all these cases some soil from the relict prairie came along, but the plants were basically bare root transplants. Realizing that my work was a bit shoddy, the next day I replaced my trowel with a tiling spade as my tool of choice and took the time to dig out a larger clump of plants and soil. In the clump below, in addition to the little violet and the toadflax I have a bit of stiff sunflower (also a rhizomatous species), a needleleaf sedge (which is most of the grassy material) and an invisible blanketflower. The sedge is very densely rooted, which meant that digging the clump was difficult, but that once I had it out the 9″ by 6″ by 2.5″ deep island held together and planted easily. I have high hopes for this and flagged it so that it will be easy to observe later. I also cut out a similar sized clump of northern bedstraw (Galium boreale) and split it in half to plant in a couple appropriate spots. The magic of these rhizomatous plants is that they often spread very quickly. A few transplants can make a significant impact after some years. That’s the hope anyway. The ubiquity of these plants across the gravel hills argues for their evolutionary fitness in those sites. They will compete and likely spread. Given the opportunity, they could prosper. Assuming that at least some of the transplants live, I think that takes me pretty close to 130 species in the restoration now.

It’s hard to do very much of this, though. I have limited time and energy, and need to segue into the big project of transplanting several hundred milkvetch seedlings soon. With some help I hope to do a few more relocations, however, and who knows about the future.? If all goes well I have several more targets for some local redistribution. Below is a pussytoes (likely Antennaria neglecta), another rhizomatous plant that makes clonal colonies. And below that is textile onion (Allium textile), which is not rhizomatous, but with the onion bulb for food storage and shallow roots, should be a good candidate for transplanting. Onions are extremely hardy to store and transplant in a garden, and I’m hoping their wild brethren are as well.

It all makes me wonder what the next goals will be. While the changes are evolutionary rather than revolutionary, several turns of the wheel have created a very different plan, with outcomes needing different actions, than what I envisioned four or five years ago. In effect, I keep creating new iterations of a business plan to maximize the benefits (analogous to profits) possible with the resources available to me. Hovering over all of it are my physical infirmities, which could preclude the implementation of the plan, and practically insure a new iteration in another year or two. For now, this is the path for 2023. As the poet Dylan Thomas wrote:

“Do not go gentle into that good night. Rage, rage against the dying of the light.”

That may seem a bit dramatic for the circumstances, and I may have used the line in an earlier post. No matter. It fits how I feel about my life and the task I have set for myself. What I hope becomes an epic field season has begun.

Progress on the 2023 Plan

I’m stuck inside on the last day of March waiting for the latest blizzard of our interminable winter and thought I’d update the status of my spring plans given in a post written after the first of the year. Are the series of actions mentioned in that post on track to be completed?

Considering that my health and the relentlessly crappy weather shown above (we have more yet to come), has limited my activities this winter, I think that I have made good progress on multiple fronts. The components, again, are threefold. First, I need to find and prepare locally adapted seed that can be spread over the two latest 20 acre restorations, especially the piece that was seeded last fall. The preparation includes scarifying (abrading the seed coats) of legumes that I will be seeding and stratification (trying to mimic the effect of winter to overcome the natural dormancy of many species by putting them in a moist, cold environment for a period of time). As I type this I have a couple containers in our entry ready to use for that and a big bag of vermiculite to use as the soil substitute. And what of the seed? I have some seed unwittingly saved back from the fall seeding by the unorganized way in which it was labeled and stored. I have also bought about 12 species from our local supplier that were ostensibly purchased from locally gathered seed. I don’t mean to impugn the integrity of the supplier; however, I am not confident they were all gathered from native stands. Rather, they may have been purchased from people gathering from local pollinator plots of unknown provenance. Locally sourced doesn’t have to mean local genetics. My goals will never be furthered by my being overly suspicious, however, and thus I spent a fair amount of money to get some of the “local” seed. Out of twelve species, eleven are from within 70-80 miles of here. The one exception is heath aster (Symphyotricum ericoides) which I could obtain only if I accepted Iowa sourced seed. This will lead to perhaps 15 gallons of seed and vermiculite mix which can be spread over appropriate areas.

One of those appropriate areas, in addition to the 20 acres that were seeded last fall, is a portion of the older restoration which will be burned this spring, the second task I hope to complete. The burn can stand on its own as a management technique, but I hope to achieve even more by taking the opportunity to spread stratified seed over several of the burned acres as an experiment in augmenting diversity. The 60 acres which will be burned includes most of the area with the greatest diversity on the restoration, but there are several acres of mesic soil which are less diverse, primarily filled with the forbs which were purchased for the original CRP seeding. Thus, there are about 15 species of wildflower which at first glance give the appearance of a kick-ass pollinator plot. And so it may be, but I am going to see if I can make it something more. One of my tubs will include the 11-12 species, plus some of my leftover gathered seed. Very few of what is probably 20 species of wildflower are found in the area to be seeded after the fire. My hope is that the the combination of the fire, stratified seed, and perhaps a roller to get the seed down to the ground, will give the seedlings enough of a start to compete with the regrowth, and I will double the number of wildflowers there.

Linda and I recently drove to Nebraska to see the sandhill crane migration and had the opportunity to visit with Chris Helzer of The Nature Conservancy (TNC) at their Platte River Prairies. TNC has restored several thousand acres along the Platte under Chris’ leadership and we had a very enlightening visit with Chris on how to keep the prairies vibrant with grazing, fire and topdressing additional seed. Chris thought my plan reasonable, except that I wouldn’t be able to use the best tool to keep the burn regrowth from outcompeting the new seedlings – cattle – which would graze the grass regrowth. Though it will likely be less effective than grazing, I am afraid I will just line up mowing for the site and accept the results that I get.

The third project, and the one which will get the most attention this spring is the planting of several hundred seedling plugs into areas of existing restoration. I will concentrate on the new seeding where competition will be minimal, but plan to attempt to get new plants into a total of 40-50 acres, including 20-30 acres of restored prairie seeded four years ago. The first step in that process is already occurring in Brookings where Dr. Lora Perkins’ project has started the seeds. I hope to get down there next week to see what has germinated and whether I will have enough seedlings. If not, there is still time to ask if her crew can start more. I am ready to take on more not because I am looking for more work, but because I have some help lined up. My prairie partner Ben’s wife, Kelli, gave up a job to take care of their new baby, but would be willing to be hired to come help on the planting project (and on gathering seed later in the summer). If we assume that she can plant 60 seedlings in a day, which might be optimistic because all the crouching can be hard on one’s knees and ankles, then 6-8 days of work will take care of most of the seedlings. If my young friend Bri can also give me some help we might get to where I only have 200-300 to put in myself, about what I did last spring. The task is starting to look less like a mountain to summit and more like a reasonable hill to climb. Once again, to go all Beatles on you, “I get by with a little help from my friends.”

The picture above shows my task for the rest of the day, mixing several batches of seed with vermiculite which will then be refrigerated to overcome seed dormancy, with the white bags containing various wildflower seeds. It will be nice to feel that I can accomplish something today.

How Long Is Perpetual?

Linda and I are about to sign the documents that will put a US Fish and Wildlife Grasslands Easement on about 200 acres of the farm where I grew up. About 140 acres of that is previously cropped land that I have seeded down to prairie restorations (the other 60 acres are native prairie). There are already 110 acres under easement on the farm, all either native grass or acres that were farmed for a while and then seeded back to grass because they are terrible farmground. There was no angst in that decision; those 110 acres will do more for the world as pasture than they ever could raising crops. Some of the land that is going to be put under easement this time is different, however. While no one would call it prime land, it can and has raised profitable crops. Now we are going to preclude that option, theoretically forever. It is a bit overwhelming, and a decision that many farmers cannot bring themselves to make. To get there I had to “gnaw on the bone” for a while.

First, what are we giving up? We are giving up the rights to ever raise any crop but the grass and forbs that are there now. No corn or soybeans, no wheat or oats, no barley or rye, no flax or alfalfa; all of which are crops that have been raised there in my memory. We are also giving up the rights to build, drain, mine or alter the landscape on those acres. One aspect of these limitations is obviously monetary. The value of the land is decreased by a significant amount, perhaps by half. We will be reimbursed for a majority of that by FWS in payment for the easement, but our balance sheet will decrease the minute we sign the papers. That will be reflected in future income from renting the ground. We will be receiving at least $10,000 less income per year from crop rent, starting five years from now (the CRP payments we get now on most of those acres will make up that difference until 2028). That decrease in income is balanced by the payment we will get from FWS for the easement which will come later this year. It is impossible to know how this all comes out in the long run, but I think it is fair to say that the easement payment is a conservative estimate of the loss in value of the land and future income. Thus, if one were only looking at this as a business transaction we would pass. Even if the easement payment is an accurate estimate of the loss in value, any transaction that precludes future possibilities has opportunity costs, costs that I can’t begin to calculate.

Another way to look at the opportunity cost is that it is not a very humble action, to take decisions out of the hands of all future caretakers and to assume that I and my wife can make this decision for them. We certainly consulted our daughters and discussed this with them, but what about two or three or ten generations down the road? Might they make other decisions that are wise and thoughtful, that add to our societal good? For me, this was the most difficult question to answer, and I am still pondering it.

That leads to the other side of the equation, the benefit side. First, out of the 200 acres, 60 acres is native grass and has mostly been native grass since the glaciers. We will agree with my ancestors decision and leave those acres in prairie. Out of the remaining 140 acres, perhaps 80 acres are gravelly hills that should never been taken out of native grass. We humans are an optimistic lot, thinking we can create wonders out of smoke and dreams. After 100 years of being farmed several of the ridges have no soil left and the plants are growing out of undifferentiated gravel. There is actually an old gravel pit (mine) on 2-3 acres in the corner that indicates one of the other potential uses of the land. Much like the decision on the first easement I took several years ago, there is no angst in putting the 80 acres of gravel into an easement. I have little doubt that the best use of the land is for the ecosystem services that a restored prairie will provide, and take some pleasure in the memory of my mother putting a halt to the gravel pit 50 years ago because, in her words, “It will never be anything else but a gravel pit forever, Lester. We don’t want that on our conscience.” My mother was a perceptive person and may have saved 10-20 acres from mining, at the cost of much needed income. This leaves the last 60 acres, average farmground on the east and south side of the main restoration. When I first investigated the easement three years ago I had left those acres off the application, not yet comfortable with taking away the option of cropping them. My offer was not accepted at that time, partially because preference is given to larger blocks of land, and I was given time to reconsider. Why am I now willing to make this choice?

First, I think I have learned much about the benefits that the land can provide as restored prairie. From the beginning of this blog I have gone on about ecosystem services; such things as wildlife habitat, water purification, pollinator habitat, carbon sequestration and erosion control. Over the past few years I have come to realize that this restoration can actually be much more, It can be a refuge, an expansion of territory, for many prairie wildflower species that are still occurring naturally on my relict prairies. It can be surprisingly valuable as pasture in conjunction with the farmed acres adjacent to it. It can be valuable as an example of the possibilities of restoration and a teaching tool for others, allowing it to be a bit of a “bully pulpit” for the practice. There are other benefits I am surely missing, but some of these benefits, from habitat to wildflower refuge to its use as an educational tool are more powerful with scale. Thirty percent more acres doesn’t just add thirty percent more benefits, but much more. In that sense, size matters here., and the extra 60 acres is significant. There is a very intuitive concept I have alluded to in several other blog posts, the “island effect”, that simply says that isolated populations are more likely to survive if they are large and in a bigger territory. A larger island will have more species than a smaller island, primarily because smaller populations on smaller islands are more likely to be lost to various threats, while a larger geography allows more possibilities for some to find refuge, and even if no refuge is found there is more room for recolonization. My prairies are less likely to lose prairie larkspur or standing milkvetch or early figwort, to use three examples of forbs with small populations in my relict prairies, if I augment those populations in my restoration. Three hundred plants spread over 300 acres are more likely to survive than 200 plants spread over 200 acres. More acres means more species survive if I do a good job establishing all the species on those extra acres.

Second, more productive land is, well, more productive. It will sequester more carbon, raise more grassland birds, support more pollinating insects and grazes more cattle. I need to consider that productivity, not the average productivity of the restoration, when adding up benefits in my mind. Biomass production on that 60 acres is at least twice the average production on the 80 acres of poorer ground, and perhaps three times that on the worst 20-30 acres.

Third, I need to factor in border effects, especially in the value as a buffer against harmful activities occurring on the adjacent farmground. The border effect simply states that many perils lie beyond my boundaries, whether natural or manmade., and most problems will occur at the edge of a tract of land. A larger block of land has a smaller proportion of its area in its border. Activities that occur on nearby cropped acres provide very obvious and specific perils on the borders of my restoration. A primary impetus for this project was the discovery of the Dakota skipper butterfly, a federally listed threatened species. on my relict prairies. While they have never been found on restored prairie, most prairie restorations are young, and that may not be true 20 or 40 or 100 years down the road. The restoration may become colonized eventually. In order for that to happen, and for the restoration to increase the potential for the long term survival of Dakota skippers, that relict population would need to survive until then. I may be able to help that survival if there is more distance between farmed acres that could get an insecticide treatment that could drift in an untoward wind and harm the butterflies in the relict prairies. Also, while insecticide treatments only happen sporadically on crops in this area, herbicide treatments occur once or twice a year. Some drift is inevitable, and is a especially a danger to the forbs/wildflowers that are the source of nectar and pollen for the insects. In recognition of that I tend to concentrate my most valuable wildflower plantings away from the edge of the restoration. I am fortunate that both of the farmers that I work with and who farm acres adjacent to most of my restoration are aware of this issue and responsive to my needs. While my aims and goals may be perplexing to them, they are happy to help in any way they can. There is a quarter mile border, however, on the 20 acre restoration on the north side of the farm that adjoins a different farmer, not one I could expect to be responsive to my entreaties to show restraint in spraying when it is windy, and I don’t plan to invest many extra resources on the acres bordering that neighbor.

Finally, those acres of richer, mesic soil are habitat for a suite of plants, and likely their insect, fungal and microbial partners, that I don’t have represented in the poorer, xeric soils. If I am going to provide a place for more rough gayfeather, early figwort, downy gentian, porcupine grass and all the other plant species that need better dirt, I need to have that better dirt represented in the restoration for them to thrive. Though I make much of my tough little plants hanging on in the harsh environment of the outwash gravel hills, the restoration isn’t complete without the better soils.

And now we go back to the title of the post, “How long is perpetual?” I don’t believe that anything I might do will be perpetual; that is a concept beyond contemplating. You might even say that I comfort myself with the idea that we are not truly placing a perpetual easement on our land, we are placing an easement whose terms will hold as long as our society and governmental structures hold. How long will that be, I wonder? For the sake of argument lets say 300 years. If the inhabitants of 2323AD need this land for another purpose I assume it will be used for that other purpose, and I am very much at peace with that. While I love the image of native wildflowers blowing in the prairie wind forever, and I am very pleased with the easement allowing the restoration to develop into a mature prairie landscape, I am also humble enough to doubt my ability to know what is best for our far off descendants. I am not so humble, however, that I don’t feel a thrill that perhaps a descendant will gaze in wonder at what the prairie has become in 300 years. All of us simply do the best we can with what we have, and this is the best I know to do. I am content.

Species to Increase, 2023

As I tend to make notes for myself at random times and in many notebooks, it is not unusual for me to be unable to put my hands on a set of notes or a list that I want to refer to. That is less of a problem than it might sound like as I can usually recreate the idea or list, but one always wonders if that re-creation is complete. What am I missing that I came up with earlier? This is complicated by my lack of ability to speak, meaning that I communicate primarily by writing notes, and the notebooks soon become a jumble of hopefully thoughtful musings, conversations with my wife and lists of plant species. Things get lost. Thus, since I am working in a targeted way towards increasing the populations of many species in the restorations in 2023, I decided to put my list of those species with some attendant notes in cyberspace, where I know that I can always come back for reference. Here it is:

1. Groundplum Milkvetch (Astragalus crassicarpus) Perhaps 100 in my restoration and many in two of my prairies, but I am trying to get enough to gather more seed for others. This is part of my cooperative project with Dr. Arvid Boe and Dr. Lora Perkins, along with the next three milkvetch species. The idea is to start seedlings of these species from seed gathered from several locations and get them transplanted into a couple of my restorations. They can then have morphological and phenological observations taken for comparison of possible different genotypes and perhaps genome analysis. I hope to transplant a significant amount, 100 plants the first year and more in subsequent years, of all of these, both for the ecosystem services they provide for the restorations and as part of what could become a research project on propagation of these species. Ultimately they would then be a seed source for other restorations. Groundplums seed is available from several vendors, but usually in very small amounts.
2. Slender Milkvetch (Astragalus flexuosus) About 20 in my restoration and 60-100 in my prairies. I have not found a vendor within several hundred miles that sells this species, and after gathering it I understand why: It is either clearly not ripe, or the seedpods are splitting and flinging seeds to the ground. Different branches of the same plant ripen weeks apart. In other words, a collector has to cover each plant repeatedly in order to gather much seed. There is no “Goldilocks” timing when it is just right..
3. Standing/Prairie Milkvetch (Astragalus adsurgens) Only a couple in the restoration, and 30-40 in my prairies. A big target for increase, if only to cement its place in the prairie complex, but hopefully enough to provide seed for others. Once again, I hope to get 100 transplants out. And again, not available from seed vendors.
4. Field Milkvetch (Astragalus agrestis) The final member of the milkvetch genus that I may work on. This is common in dry mesic areas of the prairies which have not been heavily grazed and I have yet to gather seed from it, but I may be able to get some seed from Arvid. If not field milkvetch, I may try to get Missouri milkvetch (Astragalus missouriensis) going, as I know Arvid has seed. I think I have seen it in my prairies, but was not sure. There are no plants of either of these two species in the restoration, and they are not easily found from seed vendors. (Update: The fourth milkvetch species may end up to be A. plattensis, Platte River milkvetch, as Arvid has interest in it, as well as some seed)
5. Plains Muhly (Muhlenbergia cuspidata) This is a second project with Arvid which I have contributed to in a a small way. Plains muhly is a western species, and my native plants are a far eastern outpost which Arvid is studying in partnership with the USDA Plant Materials Center in Bismarck. There are scattered plants in my prairies and none yet in the restoration. I will feel fortunate if I can get 10-20 transplanted into the restoration.
6. Green Milkweed (Asclepias viridiflora) The milkweeds listed are part of a different collaboration, this one with Dave Ode, my friend who retired from a position as the state botanist with South Dakota Department of Game, Fish and Parks. Dave is growing and sharing seed of a variety of milkweed species he has gathered from prairies in central South Dakota. Green milkweed is found widely scattered in all my gravel prairies, not particularly rare, but I doubt there are more than 100 plants in all three prairies combined. Thus, this is another species to augment, both in numbers and in genetic variety. There may be a few from last year’s transplants living in the restoration. This is another species where I will shoot for 100 transplants.
7. Whorled Milkweed (Asclepias verticillata) A fairly common species, but only a few in the restoration. As this is a very rhizomatous species I think I will try to dig a few rhizomes to transplant.
8. Showy Milkweed (Asclepias speciosa) Only a few in the native prairie, and perhaps a few more in the restoration from last year’s transplants. Perhaps 20-30 transplants to try, or I may just scatter some stratified seed.
9. Dwarf/Plains Milkweed (Asclepias pumila) This is a western species that I don’t have in my prairies, and is unlikely native in the neighborhood, but I am starting some plants as I was given some seed by Dave. It fits my site, so I may just stratify and put seed out in appropriate areas.
10. Canada Anemone (Anemone canadensis) This is a common species, so a lower priority, but I haven’t had a catch in the restoration. I will either put some seed at the base of a hill, or perhaps dig a few rhizomes this summer to transplant.
11. Northern Bedstraw (Galium boreale) Same notes as for Canada anemone, including the rhizome method of seeding.
12. Alumroot (Heuchera richardsonii) I have spread seed of alumroot several times, but usually from purchased seed. I saw quite a few plants originally, but far fewer last summer, making me think that I had spread poorly adapted seed. Thus, I hope to start plants from the seed that I gathered in my prairies last summer and transplant a batch. Alumroot is fairly common in the native prairies, and I have hundreds of plants in the native prairies. I am hoping to get 30-40 transplanted.
13. Grooved Yellow Flax (Linum sulcatum) This is the only annual on the list. I gathered more last summer than the four summers previous combined, so I have a little to play with. In years with little early summer rain it won’t germinate, which is what happened in 2020 and 2021, but last year we were lucky to get a couple rains in late June/early July, and the hills were covered in flax blooms which allowed me to get some seed. This indicates the seed has some staying power and I will likely just fling some out on the tops of hills and ridges. If I get some going and have good luck with weather it should seed itself and spread naturally.
14. Prairie turnip (Pediomelum esculentum) I found one prairie turnip in the restoration in 2021, and did not notice it last year. I transplanted some, but had little luck with getting the transplants to live. Thus, I will try another batch of transplants and try to care for them more carefully and hope to have better luck. I have quite a few in a couple of my prairies, at least a couple hundred, and see them in the neighbor’s pastures, meaning they are very tolerant of grazing. Still, I have hopes of getting a larger population in the restorations and will put effort into the attempt. I have fun memories of digging and eating them as a kid and they are important to me. Hopefully I can get 40-50 transplants out.
15. Prairie Larkspur (Delphinium carolinianum ssp. virescens) I am not sure how many larkspurs I have in my native prairies, because they don’t bloom every year, but it is likely less than 100. I found a few in the restoration in one spot last summer for the first time and would like to establish three or four additional groups to allow cross pollination. Perhaps 15-20 transplants will be enough
16. Downy Gentian (Gentiana puberulenta) Another of my favorites. I have 30-50 plants in two of my prairies, and found two blooming in the restoration in 2021. Downy gentian doesn’t bloom every year and can seem more rare than it actually is, but I have found it in several other mesic prairies in my corner of South Dakota. It is also generally available from seed vendors, so similarly to the larkspur, I would just like to establish a few more populations to give more cross pollination possibilities.
17. Early Figwort (Scrophularia lanceolata) I have three valleys in my prairies with about 20-30 plants, and started to see plants from seed in two of my restorations last year, maybe 10-20 plants. Those likely came from purchased seed, so I would like to transplant about 20 plants grown from gathered seed to put in the restorations for the best cross pollination.
18. Pennsylvania Cinquefoil (Potentilla pennsylvanica) These are scattered across the hilltops on two of the prairies, but likely less than 100 plants. I also see them in the neighbor’s overgrazed pasture, as I believe they are an increaser species. I have 10-20 that I have noticed in my restoration, and would like to supplement that with at least 20-30 more, giving a population that might provide a little harvestable seed. The seed is very small, and seems to do a good job establishing on xeric sites, so it is worth trying.
19. Textile Onion (Allium textile) This is a very humble little onion which produced a lot of seed last year, so I hope to get it started on some of the hills of the restorations. I am not sure if I will spread stratified seed, or also grow some transplants. With a bulb and shallow roots it will be super easy to transplant. If I don’t get seedlings established in the greenhouse I may just spread the seed and transplant some from my native prairies where it is common on the most xeric hills.
20. Wood Betony (Pedicularis canadensis) This is one of three species on this list that I don’t have in my prairies, but I have seen it in other prairies nearby. I bought some seed that had been gathered locally and hope to transplant 20-30 plants and also spread some stratified seed.
21. Pale Spiked Lobelia (Lobelia spicata) This is one of many species that had a prolific reproductive year in 2022, though I don’t have many plants. I find them mostly on the north base of one hill in a pasture, and saw about 100 little lobelias blooming. Gathering seed was complicated by the cattle grazing in the area as they ripened, but I got some seed that I hope to have plants started from. Low priority.
22. Bastard Toadflax (Comandra umbellata) I have lots and lots of these on the gravel hilltops of the native prairies, where they likely parasitize blue grama, but none in the restorations. They are reputed to be difficult to start from seed, so I hope to gather some for Lora to start next winter or I may just dig some rhizomes to transplant this spring.
23. Silver Leaf Scurfpea (Pediomelum argophylum) After several frustrating attempts to gather scurfpea seed in the past I was able to finally get some with the help of Bri Lind and her friend Robin last year. While this is a common plant, considered almost weedy by some people, I have none in the restorations. I would like to transplant 20-30 into the restorations and then let it spread naturally.
24. Licorice (Glycyrrhiza lepidota) Gathering licorice seed is easy, but I have yet to find one from the seed that I have spread in the restorations. Once again, this is a fairly common species that is rhizomatous, so 20-30 seedlings to transplant would go a long way.
25. Rattlesnake Root (Prenanthes racemosa) This is another of the three species on this list that is not found in my prairies, but I find it scattered in other mesic prairies that I visit. Thus I will try to get some started to establish a population in my restoration, but it is a low priority for me.
26. White Camas (Zigadenus elegans) I have just a few camas plants in a couple mesic areas of one prairie, and it is a fairly common plant so this is another lower priority, and I have not gathered seed for it, as I would have to ask permission from the owners of one of the prairies where I see it. I hope to do that this year, but it is a low priority species for me.
27. Panicgrass (Dichanthelium oligosanthes) I have lots of this in the piece of prairie that was only hayed (until I had it fenced in 2021) and I rarely see it in the pastures, meaning it is likely sensitive to grazing. That makes it a lower priority, as I plan to graze the restorations once the CRP contract has ended. Still, I would like to gather a little seed if I can and start a few plants to transplant.
28. Bottle Gentian (Gentiana andrewsii) Yet another of my favorite species. I have zero in my prairies, however, so by definition that makes it a lower priority. There are plenty spread through the countryside, favoring wetter sites than downy gentian. If it works out, I would like to start a few plants to transplant, attempting to get a viable population in my restorations over the next couple years.
29. Pincushion/Ball Cactus (Coryphantha vivipara) I transplanted 8-10 individual balls last year that cattle had dislodged, and it will be interesting to see how many survive. In addition, I gathered about 50 berries after a big reproductive year for them, and hope to get quite a few seedlings started, perhaps 30-40 to transplant. I wonder what the seedlings even look like.
30. Nuttall’s Violet (Viola nuttallii) This one is a long shot, unless I find some seed to buy this year. I hope to flag some plants in my prairies and gather some seed this summer, looking towards next year. After blooming is over the plant becomes invisible to me, so I hope flagging works.
31. Blanketflower (Gaillardia aristata) I had blanketflower in the original mix of purchased seed planted in the spring of 2018, and the hills were covered in blanketflower blooms in 2019. The seed source was Colorado, however, and the phenotype is not close to my native phenotype. Most died in a tough winter three years ago, and that might have been a good thing. I gathered a fair bit of it last year, and meant to spread it on the new 20 acre restoration that was seeded last fall, but the bag was misplaced and not found until recently. I will likely stratify the whole batch and spread it on the two newest restorations, along with another 20 adjacent acres which have none (or very few) of the Colorado plants. If I get a catch, these areas can then be a gathering area. This may be towards the end of this list, but it is one of the higher priorities.
32. Rough Gayfeather (Liatris aspera) Most of my supply of L. aspera was in the same container as the blanketflower, and thus didn’t get into the seeding last fall. I only have a few in my own prairies, and have never gathered any of the seed, but it is a relatively common plant, even showing up in ditches and random bits of grass. As it is relatively common in mesic prairies of the area I would like to augment my paltry population, bringing in reinforcements. I have seeded it in the past in the restorations, mostly gathered and a little purchased seed, and saw 30-40 blooming plants last year. I think this is a pretty robust competitor, and if I can get it a few more places it may become ubiquitous in my restorations. I also have some L. ligustylis growing in the restoration, a closely related species that will hybridize with L. aspera, so I will accept that I may have a genetic mish-mash and just enjoy the beautiful blooming stalks in late summer.

So there’s the hit list. About half are high priorities which I will try very hard to get in the ground. Perhaps a fourth are a bit less important to me, but will be planted if I am able, and the last fourth are lower priority or will wait until I can gather some seed for use in 2024. Many of the species are not easily found from seed vendors, meaning even small amounts of gatherable seed would be significant to another restorer. As attested by the notes following the species they will be increased by different techniques and with different partners, though Lora’s greenhouse space and cadre of grad students is integral to it all. I am certain that I will not be able to accomplish significant increase of all 30, but I will at least develop a plan for each that provides a path forward and be ready for opportunities. Half are already found in the restoration, but in numbers that I would like to increase. While all are species that I would like to have enough of to gather seed to give to others, there are perhaps 8-10 where that is a primary purpose, while simply developing the deep diversity of the restoration is the goal of the rest. I apologize for the boring nature of this post, but I did this for myself to refer back to in the future, and not so much for casual readers. I am steadily progressing in both the conceptualization of what these restorations could become and in the strategies I can use to achieve those goals, and sometimes I just need to get things on paper to review. There are likely to be additions and subtractions that may become edits to this in the future. Ultimately I hope to augment my native populations of all of these to avoid the “island effect” where genetic drift causes impoverished genomes and inbreeding, and to provide more resiliency to environmental challenges that could otherwise cause them to disappear from my place.

Now I just have to stay healthy enough to accomplish some of this. I am about to go back to Chicago to see the grandkids, and on at least half of my visits the little plague spreaders provide me with a virus that leads to a bronchial infection that can lead to pneumonia. That’s just a price I am eager to pay at this point in my life, and I have to try to stay strong enough to pay that price. When I was in college 45-50 years ago I read several of Carlos Castenada’s trippy series of books about the indigenous sorcerers of northern Mexico, and one thing really stuck with me. His magical spiritual guide, Don Juan, was describing his concept of being a warrior and admonished Carlos for his view that it was mostly about bravery in battle. As I remember it, Don Juan said that the heart of being a warrior was discipline and preparation, living a life that prepared you for great tasks. I promise to live the life of a warrior for the rest of my days as the life before me is certainly one of great and noble tasks, and just as the old gospel song says, “I want to be ready.”

The 2023 Plan, Three Lessons to Guide Me

As time goes on my hope for what can be accomplished by my humble restorations develops and grows. There is an entire post from 2021 on the topic of my evolving goals, but I think the clarity provided by another year of thought, wandering and discussion has modified those goals enough to deserve a new blog post. The overarching theme, the emerging goal, that I want to wrap my efforts around in 2023 is the building of native forb populations on the various restored prairies as reservoirs and examples of the genetics that have become adapted to this corner of the world. If I can do that, those plants can be used as seed sources for others. It’s attempting to create a native plant community within which a genetically diverse, resilient population of as many locally extant wildflowers as possible can flourish, not just for my site, but hopefully as a seed source for other restorations and even for reseeding of depauperate native prairies. I want to take my good fortune in having the opportunity to do these restorations and to offer it to others. The first lesson was the realization of what these restorations could contribute, the amount and quality of seed that can be produced if populations of forbs are large. I can visualize it in a very concrete manner, partly because there are several species that already have what I consider abnormally high populations in my restorations, and I have been harvesting seed from those species.

What are the components of a plan to accomplish this increase in forb populations? And what can I do to significantly move this agenda forward in 2023? First, to use an old saying: “stick to the knitting”. I have a great many reproducing plants of forb species of interest already growing in my restoration. Anything that I can do to make those plants healthier and more competitive furthers my goals. Thus, I hope to get a burn done on the 60 acres with the best diversity this coming April. Fire isn’t magic, but it can seem like magic. The tendency of many forb species to grow, spread and make seed after a spring burn is pretty dramatic. As I indicated, I have already been gathering seed of four species in the restoration which are primarily derived from the seed that I have gathered and spread. By this next summer and fall I have hopes to increase that to eight or ten species. Some of this seed will likely be topdressed over the last two restorations that I have done, particularly over the 20 acres that were seeded last November. However, I hope and expect that there will be enough seed to share with others who are working on similar projects.

This is still only ten species of forbs at best, not the 80-100 species of wildflowers that occur in the native prairies on my farm (I need to compile a complete list to give myself a starting point for future efforts). While I have examples of most of those species in the restoration already, populations aren’t sufficient to have hopes of significant seed production, and I am just hopeful that enough seed is produced to eventually replace, or increase populations of those species within the restoration. As my goals have expanded so must my repertoire of methods to reach those goals. To be more specific, if my restoration is to be a reservoir of seed for the conservation community in this area I need to find ways to increase populations of many more species, first to make them resilient, long lived contributors to my prairies, and subsequently to provide seed for others. Thus, I plan to take a more active part in further increasing populations than I have the past couple years.

Right now there is a 50-60 acre area in the original 100 acre restoration that has a significant population of forbs resulting from seed that I have gathered from my prairies as well as some other prairies that I have access to. This is the area where seed has already been gathered. However, I have 230 acres of former cropped ground that I have seeded down, and by the end of this year 175 acres of it will be under easement with the US Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS). On the FWS easement acres I will feel it worthwhile to spend precious resources, whether that be financial resources or the time and energy that I can put towards this endeavor. That means that there are about 120 additional acres that will be under easement that could benefit greatly from efforts to increase populations of native forbs. Easiest to help are two 20 acre fields that have been seeded in the last two years that have not yet filled in with plants. Experience on the older restoration has shown that it is worthwhile spreading new seed for three years after the original seeding before competition from existing plants precludes efficient colonization from new seedlings. This avenue is likely almost closed to me on the older restorations unless I create disturbance to open things up.

I also need to factor in the probability that some or many of the forbs which have come from my gathered seed are from populations that have a narrow genetic base, the topic of a recent blog post. I not only need to increase number of plants; I need to increase genetic diversity. This is unlikely to occur if I just keep recycling my own seed from the plants on my prairies, so I need to look elsewhere. As I move ahead, I see several sources of seed that will likely have genes different from the ones in my prairies. The first, and easiest, is to gather from other prairies in the surrounding neighborhood. I have a few that I have access to within reasonable driving distance, and will continue to gather and use that seed. This is obviously a good choice as those plants are certain to be adapted to this latitude and climate, but they are discrete populations likely to have slightly different genomes. However, I only have additional sources of perhaps 40-50 species locally, and substantial amounts that I can gather of perhaps half that. That leaves at least 40-50 species for which I need alternate seed sources.

The second, and easiest, path is to buy seed. I bought seed of many species this fall for the new 20 acres of restoration and plan to purchase a significant amount this winter to spread in the spring. As I wrote in that earlier post on the topic, I have, and will attempt to continue to ascertain the origins of that seed, the provenance, to avoid planting obviously maladapted genetics, and hopefully plant seed that provides useful alleles, useful traits to add to the cumulative genetic resource of my forbs. I have already been engaging in conversations with my contact at Milborn Seeds, the local purveyor that I work regularly with, and am getting a list of species together to ask 2-3 other vendors about right now. I really haven’t decided where to draw a line to define “locally adapted seed”, and the answer is likely to be different for different species. In effect, it might depend upon how desperate I feel about the need for an additional source. For a species for which I have no additional sources a generic answer of “Minnesota selection” will likely cause me to leap at a chance to buy some. For others, where I feel I can afford to be more picky because I already have multiple sources, the source might have to be within 100 miles. That is unlikely to be possible from seed vendors in eastern Minnesota or Nebraska.

A third path is to trade seed that has been gathered by other enthusiasts and conservation professionals around here, to try to establish a seed exchange. I already do that with my friend Ben, though mostly I am given or purchase what he gathers. I actually had high hopes a year ago that I would be able to get a great deal of seed from Ben, but he and his wife decided to have a baby instead. So it goes. I don’t look at this as a way to get a lot of seed, rather a targeted way to access small amounts of specific species. This could be done with individuals working on their own, or with organizations working in restoration ecology such as South Dakota Department of Game, Fish and Parks, FWS or The Nature Conservancy (TNC).

I have written about all this in various guises before, but it is basically a preamble to what I hope and expect is a large part of my efforts this next couple years, and the second lesson of the three that I allude to in the title. That is that I don’t have to limit myself to flinging this precious seed into the wind. That can be a dicey enterprise even on a new seeding, but is certain to be very inefficient on an established restoration. What I hope to spend a significant time doing early this summer is transplanting seedlings of forb species that I choose to concentrate on. In order to do this I need to find the appropriate seed, get it stratified and/or scarified, get resources together to germinate and grow the seeds to a size to transplant, and then finally to gather the labor to get them in the ground and marked. This is all prompted by my relationship with Dr. Lora Perkins of South Dakota State University (SDSU), whom I have been giving seeds to for a couple years, and who grew seedlings for me to plant last summer. Before that I had never considered anything other than planting or spreading seed directly in the field. Though circumstances caused my success rate to be poor on the transplants this past summer, the experience was still revelatory. I have spread seed of standing milkvetch (Astragalus adsurgens), in admittedly small amounts, for three years, and so far I have found one plant in the restoration derived from that seed. I planted about a dozen seedlings last spring and believe I now have two more. If I can more carefully get fifty or a hundred planted this spring, what might I end up with? This might sound narrowly focused when I am trying to shepherd development on 230 acres of restorations, but it might be the only way to get a population large enough to be viable in the long term, and to be a significant contributor to the ecosystem services that I desire to provide. Standing milkvetch is a species that is not available from any vendor within several hundred miles. Fifty or one hundred reproducing plants may eventually become several hundred plants and establish a sustainable population here. I aspire to no less than contributing to the long term survival of a suite of forbs/wildflowers with genetics adapted to a significant geographic area, and I am working on the list of species that I hope to work with in 2023, hoping to grow and plant seedlings of 15-20 species this year. This is big stuff here.

There is a catch, however, a large one. I am 67 years old, and my various health issues could preclude making significant progress. There is not a day where I don’t ponder the vagaries of my physical condition, attempting to strike a balance between getting shit done and taking care of myself; ambition versus prudence, or perhaps hubris versus self-awareness. How aggressively can I plan? How many plants and how many species can I attempt? What are the opportunity costs of this new obsession of mine, whether in health or in other activities? I feel like Hamlet talking to himself, “To be or not to be, this is the question.” – but this is real life, dammit! It demands attention and thought. It demands time to allow for wise decision making, and it demands a wide angle view of my world. This leads to the second half of the 2023 plan, and the third lesson, one that all of us learn, forget and relearn.

That lesson which has been developing over several years is that this is not just about me. As mentioned earlier, I have a partner in Dr. Perkins of SDSU. Lora has indicated that she will be able to help me out by growing seedlings for me to purchase. A partner with a crew of sharp, young grad students and greenhouse space is a huge resource for me. I have another probable partner at SDSU in Dr. Arvid Boe, an old friend who has been working on growing native species for over forty years. Arvid did an imitation of the old magician pulling a rabbit out of a hat when I last visited him, instead pulling out boxes of packets of old seed of three milkvetches (Astragalus sp.) after I enquired about possible seed sources for those species. He then also offered greenhouse space for us to share, making this into an joint exploratory project on those species. My old friend Dave Ode will once more supply me with seed of two or three xeric adapted milkweed species from central South Dakota, and may help Arvid and I on the Astragalus project. The demands of karma mean that all this good fortune needs to be respected, of course. I have to find ways to repay and reward such kindness, and I plan to do that, both with the individuals involved and with the world at large.

I also have friends who have helped me gather and spread seed over the years, and who last year helped me to plant some of the seedlings. Notably that includes my friend Ben Lardy, who works as a biologist for the South Dakota Department of Game, Fish and Parks. Ben was integral to the seeding of several of the restorations, and has provided gathered seed over the past several years. It includes Roger Assmus, an old friend from graduate school who has come up several times each of the last three years to gather and later to spread seed, and Bri Lind, who was a good friend of our younger daughter in graduate school, and now works for the EROS Data Center as a GIS specialist. Bri has come up several times over the years to gather seed, and she helped me put in seedlings last spring.

So you might ask where the lesson lies, as this is all old news and existing relationships. The lesson lies in recognizing that ultimately this isn’t “my” restoration. My efforts are not just for me and my family. This restoration, especially with the perpetual easements I am agreeing to, belongs to the world. My blog unavoidably is written in the first person and talks about me a lot. It’s my blog, after all. However, this isn’t just my land anymore. It is part of the US National Wildlife Refuge System, and I need to look more expansively at accessing help for my activities. As part of the easement process I will receive a payment from the government for the development rights to the land, and I need to find a way to use some of that money to pay for help to get these seedlings in the ground and to nurture this project.

A question that I have addressed a couple times before has been the worth of this project to society, to the greater world. Figures lie, and liars figure, so I won’t bore you with monetary calculations right now. What I do know is that I feel deeply, in a very visceral way, that this is a good and valuable thing to do. I feel that the time my friends put into it is not just for me, but their contribution to the health of the future world. Land is important and can provide myriad benefits to us and to our children, and I and my friends will be warriors, and do right by this land for all who are yet to come.

Summarizing 2022

In June I wrote a post entitled “June Observations, 2022”. I periodically revisit old blog posts to continue to root out grammar mistakes and punctuation problems I have missed, and in re-reading that post found that I had promised a year-end summary. Much of this has been referred to in blog posts earlier this year, but this perhaps provides a more complete context. Or, I just like repeating what I have already said. Either way works for me. Fair enough, here goes.

Here is the centerpoint of the entire blog post, and one might say, the entire year. These two pictures aren’t from the identical location, rather from two nearby sites on the same hill a year apart, but I truly believe these photos are representative of the development of the restoration over the past year. Even though the second picture was taken a couple weeks earlier in the summer it shows a denser, more varied canopy of plants and a much higher percentage of ground cover. While I was happy with the development in 2021 I worried that it would take 20 years to achieve full ground cover on the eroded, damaged hills, and that aside from a little pollinator food very few ecosystem benefits would accrue. Certainly the 2021 picture doesn’t yell out “Carbon Sequestration!” with the sparsity of vegetation. However, while the 2022 picture may not be yelling, it may at least be quietly suggesting “carbon sequestration”. The improvement also means that I no longer worry so much about erosion because of the lack of ground cover. These soils will always have some gaps that show the gravel underneath and allow annuals to grow after summer rains, but if I look at the hilltops a few hundred yards away in the relict prairies, those gaps are very small, and I can now visualize my restoration reaching that standard soon. These sites are very droughty, and as such have a limited number of species which will grow there long-term, and I see that sorting process progressively occurring on the restoration, with the grasses and wildflowers that need more water wasting away and being replaced by a burgeoning cover of xeric adapted species as the winnowing process continues. Eventually, the tall warm-season grasses and mesic adapted forbs, which are already sparse on these hills, will disappear and the xeric species should take over. If one could look closely enough I think we would find almost all of the species in the 2022 picture are plants that survive droughty soils.

In short, I am ecstatic at the progress that has been made during the last year. The area where those pictures were taken received almost all its seed in three or four topdressings one and two years after the original seeding. As such it was a blank slate upon which my gathered forbs were spattered in my best Jackson Pollock imitation, and there is less competition from the seed that I purchased for the original CRP seeding. In areas that received more of the seed during the original seeding, mostly better soils, there are fewer of my gathered forbs as there were fewer open spaces they could fill and much more below ground root competition, but I see quite a few plants of some of the more common species that have resulted from the topdressings, such as tall cinquefoil, white penstemon, slender penstemon, black samson and stiff sunflower. And I see scattered plants of many others, including leadplant, alumroot, silky and sky blue asters, gray goldenrod, prairie smoke and even a few groundplum milkvetch. As I keep saying (and keep reminding myself) we are playing the long game here, and even a few of the right plants in the right place could have a big impact in fifty or a hundred years. The next picture was taken about 200 yards from the previous photo. Between the scattered plants from seed gathered from my prairies, some possible further augmentation and potential seed spread from more diverse areas nearby I have high hopes for areas like this, which lack the maximum diversity of the best areas of the restoration, but have great potential.

I have a greater dilemma on 25 acres of mesic soil that received the full complement of seed during the original CRP seeding in June, 2018. Actually, much of it received a double or even a triple seeding. As this was immediately obvious later that year, this area received far less of the gathered seed the subsequent two years. Thus, it is far less diverse than the 50 acres to the north and west. It would be Zone 1 on the map below (the previous discussion was primarily on Zones 2 and 3).

The dilemma here is twofold. First, do I want to spend the time and money to augment the 30 species found on this area? Second, do I want to do something to control/thin out the ubiquitous Canada thistle patches that cover much of this (the mowing shown in the picture above was primarily to keep thistles from going to seed). The two topics are deeply intertwined because most of the thistles are not in thick, discrete patches, but scattered generously throughout the zone, so management of thistles with herbicide inevitably affects the forbs. At present the thistles aren’t impeding growth of the native species that were planted, but they are very competitive and may do so in the future. I do not expect to be concerned with management of thistles down the road, because at some point the restoration has to stand on its own, but at present it is still in its formative stage and I want to give it the best chance to develop. I have been tempted to broadcast spray the 30 acres with Milestone herbicide, accept that it will diminish the forb composition, and then topdress reinforcements. After reflection I have put that idea to the side and have done an experiment. Last fall I spent 4-6 hours laboriously spot treating the west couple acres on Zone 1 with herbicide. My best guess is that less than 5% of the ground actually got herbicide, meaning I had very little impact on existing forbs, but that perhaps 70-80% of the thistles got herbicide, hopefully significantly thinning the stand. Next spring I will get to evaluate the experiment, decide whether it is a good time to topdress a more diverse mix of seed over this area, and also to decide whether it is worth continuing the practice on more of Zone 1. My hope had been to do 4-5 acres but aspirations are sometimes no more than aspirations. It’s difficult to bring all your hopes to fruition.

Another symbol of progress this year was all the new species that I found in the restoration, both expected and surprising (I will list them in a bit). What follows is an incomplete pictorial compilation, but indicative of the variety I saw.

The common thread here is simple. It should not be surprising to find new species or to find existing species in new areas. The standard reply to this occurring is that many prairie species will be quite small and hard to find for a prolonged period of time while they develop a crown, a deep root system and carbohydrate reserves sufficient to justify reproductive expenses, at which time they become more visible, though they may already be several years old. Most species also can have a portion of their seeds which have a prolonged dormancy, sometimes many years, before they germinate and grow. It can also be true that there could be new seed being transported from adjacent prairies or other areas of the restoration. The last reason is certainly true for both the yellow sundrops and the panicled aster which I did not spread, at least not knowingly. Conversely, I have no bottle gentians in my relict prairie, and the nearest that I know of are a couple miles away, so these obviously came from seed spread four years ago; they have just been patiently hiding until now. And the larkspur and the prairie sandreed could be from either source, because I spread new seed (a little larkspur and a fair amount of sandreed), and they also occur in the adjacent pasture (once more, a little larkspur and a fair amount of sandreed). My best count is that I have now found 124 native prairie species in the restoration, primarily in Zones 2 and 3. I have likely lost half a dozen of that number that I saw 2-4 years ago and not since, though I had a small epiphany last summer regarding jumping to conclusions as evidenced below:

I had seen a couple flat topped asters 3 years ago on one the gravel hills. The species is not adapted to xeric sites, however, so I wasn’t surprised when I did not see it the past two years. Then, late this summer I found several blooming near the drainage that cuts across the restoration, an appropriately moist site for flat topped aster. In the Midwest it is noted as a “facultative wetland” species, meaning that it doesn’t require soggy feet, but neither does it mind wet toes. This is another species that I have not found in my prairies, and the restoration is on the western border of flat topped aster’s range, but there could easily be other examples within a few miles, and I am happy to have found some. Maybe there will be other revelations in 2023.

Here is the list of new species found in the restoration in 2022:

1. Needle and thread (Heterostipa comata)
2. Virginia wildrye (Elymus virginicus)
3. Prairie sandreed (Calamovilfa longifolia)
4. Tall/Prairie dropseed (Sporobolus heterolepis)
5. Prairie cordgrass (Spartina pectinata)
6. Flodman’s thistle (Cirsium flodmanii)
7. Bottle gentian (Gentiana andrewsii)
8. Ball/Pincushion cactus (Coryphantha vivipara) I transplanted about 10 that cows had dislodged in the adjacent pasture and some appear to have survived.
9. Standing/Prairie milkvetch (Astragalus adsurgens)
10. Joe Pye weed (Eutrochium maculatum)
11. Panicled aster (Symphyotricum lanceolatum)
12. Prairie blazing star (Liatris pynostachya)
13. Northern plains/Meadow blazing star (Liatris ligustylis)
14. Harebell (Campanula rotundifolia)
15. Yellow avens (Geum aleppicum)
16. Early figwort (Scrophularia lanceolata)
17. Green milkweed (Asclepias viridiflora) This and the other milkweeds are from transplants that were surplus from a graduate project of Grace Villmoe, who works with Dr. Lora Perkins at South Dakota State University (SDSU) and I think some of each species survived.
18. Slim leafed milkweed (Asclepias stenophylla)
19. Plains milkweed (Asclepias pumila)
20. Showy milkweed (Asclepias speciosa)
21. Spotted bee balm (Monarda punctata)

A new activity I engaged in this year, and one which I hope to continue in 2023 and beyond, is augmenting populations of selected species with transplants of seedlings that have been grown offsite over the winter/spring. I transplanted 250-300 plugs of in mid to late May this year. They had been grown in greenhouse space at SDSU by staff working with my friend, Dr. Perkins. Other than some transplants of the four species of milkweed listed above, the seedlings were grown from seed gathered by me on my prairies. They would have been better off had they been transplanted several weeks earlier to allow for more rooting before hot weather occurred, but health issues didn’t allow that to happen. When I evaluated them during the first week of June, a couple weeks after planting, I estimated 70-75% survival, a success rate I would have been very happy with. However, a very hot and windy three day spell just after that evaluation dropped survival to 25-30% Would 2-3 weeks longer in the ground have provided enough roots to keep more alive? It’s impossible to know, but is likely, and the lessons that I learned will be implemented next spring with several hundred more seedlings. We will see what we can accomplish. Subsequently, I received a couple hundred left over seedlings of several species from another graduate project at SDSU and planted as many as I could in October with the hope that they will overwinter and begin growth next spring.

The final activity of my year was the seeding on the 20 acres in the northeast corner of the quarter, labeled “still farmed” on the map above. I recently did an entire post on that so won’t dwell on it, but will just mention that with that final piece in place the entire quarter was accepted by the U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service for a grassland easement, a topic that is likely to get its own blog post in the future. This will be a perpetual easement, meaning the restoration will have a chance to “live long and prosper”, a phrase that I think is a fine coda to this post, as I hope the same thing for myself and for anyone who reads this. Happy New Year!

Additions from 2023:

1. Culvers root (Veronicastrum virginicum) Late last summer I saw a tall wildflower from a distance and was amazed when it turned out to be a 4′ tall culvers root. As far as I know I did not plant any, and there are no native examples for close to 100 miles (though there is always the chance there are a few nearby that have never been documented). Most likely it was a hitchhiker in some purchased seed that I spread. One plant of any species will certainly die out, so I am trying to decide whether to add more or just let nature take its course.
2. Western snowberry, Buckbrush or Wolfberry(Syymphoricarpus occidentalis) Wolfberry is a common shrub of the area, with colonies (it is rhizomatous) in every native pasture, often many thick colonies in overgrazed pastures. It is likely called buckbrush because the big deer use it for sleeping and hiding in during the day, but my memories are of searching through patches looking for calves whose mothers had stashed them there while off grazing. I have a clear memory of spooking a 1-2 day old calf out of a patch, which immediately sprinted in the opposite direction through a barbed wire fence. I remember my father was quite upset with me, as I don’t think we ever found it.
3. False indigo (Amorpha fruticosa, though there is a possibility it is a close relative, A. nana) Like the snowberry, this is a small native shrub that found its own way into the restoration from adjacent native pasture.
4. Sand sage, or Field sage (Artemisia campestris) These are common on the site, but I had neglected to mention them in the past as they are a somewhat weedy biennial.
5. Field gumweed (Grindelia squarrosa) Another biennial weedy native I have decided to list. Unlike the sand sage which is ubiquitous in my better prairies, gumweed is more clearly a weed which infests overgrazed pastures. only a few in the restoration.
6. Showy goldenrod (Solidago speciosa) A close relative of Canada goldenrod that can hybridize with it, but I think that I have identified some. These tall, aggressive goldenrods are the bane of restoration practitioners in true tall grass prairie restorations farther east, but are a welcome addition as pollinator candy in my harsher environment.
7. Oval leaved milkweed (Asclepias ovalifolia) Transplanted from Dave Ode seed out by Pierre last summer.
8. Unknown milkvetch (Astragalus sp.) This is an addition from old seed that my friend Dr. Arvid Boe had gathered in western SD some years ago. It was mislabeled and of uncertain identity .
9. Sand/Field sage (Artemisia campestris) This is a short-lived weedy native that is common in the gravel hills, filling up extra biotic space when conditions allow which worked its way in.

Fun in the Cold, November 2022

The latest addition to the Narem prairie restoration family is now seeded and put to bed for the winter. The Day County Conservation District came the first week of November and seeded the 20 acres with their Truax drill, using a mix of about 20 species I’d worked out with the Pheasants Forever employee who helps with seeding plans. Because of my experience and history at this they tend to follow my lead and work with me to get a mix that I want. Once the “official” mix of seed that has germination and purity tests went in I then began to augment the base mix with the hodgepodge of stuff that I have gathered and bought.

Here’s what one afternoon looked like. My friend Roger, a retired soil scientist, drove up from Brookings and we hand spread about 12-14 acres of the restoration with most of what is in the picture. Though we were dressed for worse, the weather turned out to be reasonable for November 20, with sun and just a moderate breeze to go along with the 25 degree temperature. We got a lot done, and with the dusting of snow it was very easy to see our tracks and the seed on the snow, so seed coverage was decent. Because the drill had already covered every acre completely there was no need for Roger and me to attempt 100% coverage. I would mix up each batch and divide it between two five-gallon pails a little over half full. With that we would cover about 1.5-2 acres. Thus, I could adjust the blend to match the soil type every couple acres. The gathered seed we spread was mostly forbs/wildflowers which I blended with some native grass seed I had purchased to help get a more even mix. I had spread 3-4 acres a couple days before and finished the last 3-4 acres a couple days later.

There are several species whose seed doesn’t “play nice” and can’t really be blended with the main seed mix. They wad up into balls that defy mixing and demand concentrated attention on them , picking out a few seeds at a time to spread – not an efficient way to get the seeding done, but the only way if I am going to have those plants in the restoration. One of these species is porcupine grass (Stipa spartea).

Take a look at this mess. I wrote about this several years ago and I believe I referred to a lump like this one as a “ball of spiny hell”. I haven’t changed my mind. Somehow they self organize as they shift in the container they rest in, perhaps induced by bouncing down rough section line trails. I don’t know how it’s done, but it’s pretty freakin impressive. To the right you see all the awns wound into a tight circle while the weapons, the spears, all point to the outside, like a phalanx of Greek soldiers under Alexander the Great about to do battle with the Persians.

I tossed out three pails of the porcupine grass, 5-10 seeds at a time, on all the mesic soils in the new restoration, plus a few acres of the old restoration which are without that species. That leaves about three more pails of seed. I am saving most of that for an attempt to augment the population in the original 100 acre restoration after the spring burn we hope to accomplish next spring. There is an area of about three acres of mesic soils in the 100 acre patch that has less diversity than the poorer soils (30-40 species rather than 80-100), and I am going to experiment on those acres to see if I can get some new stuff to germinate after a burn takes off the residue. I plan to purchase some mesic forbs to go with some that I have held back from spreading this fall, as well as some of the porcupine grass, stratify the seed in some vermiculite or sand in the garage at our place in the Cities, and then spread the seed, now with dormancy overcome and ready to germinate after the burn. If there is still too much residue interfering with seed to soil contact I may hire the neighbor to roll the area with a packing roller that all farmers have nowadays, to get the seed down to the ground. The big flaw in this plan is that there may be no free seats at the table for the new seed even after the burn. The root coverage of the various grasses and forbs, and their subsequent regrowth after the fire may mean that very few seeds get to germinate or new plants to establish. Thats why it’s called an experiment.

The other half of the experiment is to see what the burn does to the wormwood sage (Artemisia absinthium), an introduced sage that is the second most vexing weed in my restoration after Canada thistle. I have no hope that the burn will kill the sage, but wormwood starts growth very early, and I hope that burning off the new growth weakens the plants. The experiment area has perhaps the thickest stand of wormwood on the restoration, and at the very least, it will set the stage for me to use the gun on my ATV sprayer to do a very targeted job of spot treating, which will impact very few of the seeds that I spread, and very few of existing desirable forbs. A plan to do something similar went to hell last year because of health problems I experienced, but perhaps I will have better luck next spring.

In addition to the porcupine grass I spread several gallons of needle and thread grass (Heterostipa comata), a close relative of porcupine grass which also tends to ball up in an amorphous mass which demands patience to pull small groups of seeds with their twisting awns to spread. This was the first year that I was able to gather needle and thread, so I felt this was a great opportunity. Needle and thread is adapted to xeric sites, so I scattered their seed across the hilltops. I did the same with the pasqueflower (Anemone patens) that I had gathered and some locally sourced prairie smoke (Geum triflorum) that I purchased. I found an interesting new way to spread those two species. I wadded a combination of the two (they live in the same droughty sites) into a ball and repeatedly rubbed the ball against the rawhide strip in the palm of my leather glove. Seeds kept rubbing off and would drift away on the ever-present breeze of November. I did that on the xeric acres of the new restoration, some similar sites nearby on the 100 acre restoration and on the restoration a half mile away that had been seeded two years before. This had been a good year for gathering pasque seed, and I had enough to cover the hills on 50-60 acres.

In the end, after a tough start, it was a good and satisfying finish to the year. It had been an excellent year to gather 15-20 species that aren’t always available, and I had been able to get them out on the land where they can become contributors to the prairie. In addition, I saved back some seed of about twenty wildflowers to attempt to grow seedling plugs next spring that I can replant into the restoration. I even had visions of going out one more time to toss out a few odds and ends that have not been spread, but we are likely to get a good winter storm in a couple days which will end that illusory hope. And I end with a self-portrait of a silly old man (me) out spreading seed on November 29, on a day the temperature was 25 degrees (not bad) but the wind was 30 mph (colder than snot). I wrote a post a couple months ago with a title that began: “The fall of my dreams”. I don’t know if I accomplished that, but it was a damn good fall for a 67-year-old with my health challenges. I am very content.

Going Deep in the Weeds on Gathered Seed

Here is the second part of my digressions on seed gathering. The first, “Getting Serious About Seed Gathering” was published a couple weeks ago.

There are several undercurrents of ideas regarding the use of “locally adapted” seed, and the strategy of gathering that seed from existing native vegetation to accomplish this. The ideas center around the concept of genotypes, sub-populations of species that share combinations of genes (and thus traits). In effect, a genotype is a derivative of the idea of the species, dividing species into smaller and smaller increments. The core concept of the species is a group of organisms which can breed and have viable and fertile progeny. That definition is much more difficult and messy than it sounds, but even without introducing the myriad exceptions to the rule (and absolutely needing to ignore micro-organisms) there is the stumbling block that, while populations of plants and animals may breed true, that doesn’t mean that they are interchangeable. Many of the species that I find in my prairies have ranges that encompass much of the continent, and occasionally are even found in Eurasia. Genetic differences develop in different geographies. A personal example which brought this fact home occurred when I seeded the original restoration in 2018. The blanketflower seed that I purchased turned out to be grown in Colorado, and looks very different from the blanketflower that is found in my relict prairies. It is not as winterhardy as the plants native to my prairies, and starts blooming earlier than my native plants. While some are still alive, their eventual demise seems certain. Clearly there are genetic differences which make it less suited to a long, productive life on my restoration; thus, even without any deeper knowledge of its genome, I feel safe in calling it a different genotype. This was clearly not locally adapted seed.

It is fair to ask, then, what implications this has for the stability and longevity of my restorations. One of my stated and explicit goals for the restorations is enhanced populations and spread of the prairie plants that have been able to survive on these gravelly, godforsaken hills my grandfather purchased well over a hundred years ago, my local genotypes. Have I already shot myself in the foot, or whatever old metaphor you like for describing ineptitude? Well, I admit that I would really like to have known everything that I know now when I began this process, and had not purchased blanketflower which originated in Colorado. Why didn’t I just use seed from my relict prairies?

First, as I wrote about in the last post, it is very difficult to gather enough seed for a complete restoration. Relict prairies with sufficient seed to gather are not a dime a dozen. I have gathered as much of my blanketflower as I have been able and has seemed prudent, but it has only made a small contribution to the restoration. That is one reason that I want so badly to expand the reach of my genetics. Second, adding new homes for my local species is only one of the purposes of the restorations. There is a whole panoply of ecosystem services that I hope my farm can deliver, and I need more seed than I can gather to accomplish the other goals of carbon sequestration, food for pollinators, wildlife habitat, water quality enhancement, etc. Thus, the question isn’t really whether I will add more seed than I can gather; rather it is how to get the most out of the seed that I do gather, and how to purchase seed that can further all my goals. Before I return to the idea of the value of my gathered seed, I will delve into its limitations and potential weaknesses

First, imagine what the prairies looked like 175 years ago, before the plow found the prairies. There was an expanse of grassland that extended over 1000 miles from north to south, and perhaps 400-600 miles from east to west. Individual prairie species rarely inhabited this entire geography, but many covered hundreds of thousands of square miles. If a species inhabited even 100,000 square miles and occurred an average of only 1 plant per acre, that would still give a population of 64,000,000 plants of that species. Many species likely had populations in the billions. On a local level, if an event occurred that extirpated that species in an area, there was an almost limitless ability of the surrounding landscape to resupply seed to recolonize. If an ice age began or ended, there was a path for each species to follow the climate north or south, east or west, to find its niche; to literally put down roots. Because of the number of plants of each species that were reproducing in an area there was also almost unlimited opportunity for each species to accumulate genetic mutations, weed out deleterious changes and, in effect, create a storehouse of possibilities in the genomic bank that was available for future use. In evolutionary terms they were increasing their “fitness”, the ability of their descendants to thrive and reproduce. Unfortunately, times have changed.

Now, on my land, I have a substantial amount of the diversity of species one would hope for in this area, but the number of plants available to provide that depth of genetic possibility is greatly diminished. The conversion of prairies to cropped acres, overgrazing and herbicide use on remaining native pastures and the insidious spread of smooth brome have all impoverished the genetic storehouse. Not only are there far fewer plants of each species creating new genetic possibilities with mutations and crossbreeding, but even the bank of genes that remains diminishes as the plants come and go. Mutations regularly occur that have no immediate positive nor negative effect and thus can quietly creep into the metagenome of a species. However if there is no positive selection pressure which insures that plants with those mutations survive, and there are only a few plants of that species in a geographic area, pure chance will mean those mutations, those traits and potential traits, will often disappear. In a large, robust population pure chance will more often leave some individuals with that mutation reproducing. Later, when that gene becomes important because of a change in conditions, it is available to allow that species to thrive even while challenged by a new disease, insect, or a change in climate. To fully explain the process, called genetic drift, would take examples and perhaps graphics, but in short, more is better, and a lot more is a lot better. A larger population will provide more genetic possibilities to respond to the inevitable challenges to survival.

Here’s an example I have been thinking about lately. There are perhaps 30 plants of standing milkvetch (Astragalus adsurgens) on my prairies, and I don’t know how far one would have to go to find the next example, perhaps several miles. It will only take a very small bit of bad luck to lose the entire population, and genetic drift is likely diminishing the variability of the groups’ collective genome, leading to inbreeding. If I want to save my local population steps will have to be taken. Without help this local population is likely to eventually perish. What is my response to this?

A good starting point is trying to gather the seed from my prairies and other nearby prairies, giving me the confidence that the seed that I plant is adapted to the climate and soils of the adjacent restoration, and to use that seed to establish a lot more plants. However, as discussed earlier, the amount that I can gather is insufficient and perhaps impoverished genetically to respond to challenges going forward. Simply increasing the number of reproducing plants, providing a larger number to create new mutations, new genes, is a big deal. Turning 30 standing milkvetch plants into 300 is a big deal. That’s still not many plants, however, and again, it’s derived from a very narrow genetic base, likely with low diversity of genetic possibilities. Thus, while increasing the number of plants with obviously adapted genetics is great, I feel that I need to do more. I feel a need exists to import some new genetics to add to my burgeoning population.

The question now becomes: From where? How do I best accomplish this genetic enrichment? For some species I have the obvious choice of gathering seed from the prairies owned by friends. Most notably, we have several native pastures in my wife’s grazing unit, Whetstone Grazing, 30 miles east of the restoration. This is a more mesic site than my restoration, and at 800’ lower in elevation it will provide genetics adapted to a little warmer and wetter climate, just what we are likely to get over the next hundred years. Near the Whetstone Grazing pastures is a small prairie owned by my best friend, on a dry mesic site, and he has kindly allowed me to gather seed there the past several years. There are a couple other corners that I get to gather on, and these have been my main sources along with the relict prairies adjacent to the restoration. They have been a good source of 40-50 species, but that leaves 40-50 species for which I would like to find additional genetics, including the standing milkvetch.

Which brings me back to purchasing seed. Many of those 40-50 species are sold by native seed vendors, and now that I am a more informed shopper, I can try to buy more seed that I have the ability to gain some knowledge about, to ascertain the source. I am doing that with Milborn Seeds in Brookings, my main supplier, and will begin communicating with Prairie Moon Seeds in southeast Minnesota, my secondary source. I have come late to this knowledge, as I am almost past adding seed to my first 100 acres of restoration, but am trying to do a better job on the last couple patches, the last 40 acres., and on any future restorations that I contribute to.

And now to circle back, going back to the title of the piece, the great worth of the gathered seed is that it has a base of adapted genetics which might not be available in the marketplace. I know for certain that the seed from my relict prairies is going to have the ability to grow in my soils and the present climate of my site. In that sense it is almost priceless and irreplaceable, and all my hours of wandering and gathering is priceless as well. I might only gather $50-100 worth of seed in a session, if measured as retail price of that species from a seed vendor, but I feel it could be worth many times that to me as the beating heart of the restoration. That is not to denigrate the purchased seed, for even poorly adapted purchased seed, such as my stupid Colorado blanketflower, may have genes that are valuable and can enter the gene pool through cross pollination. There is a concern I have read that poorly adapted genetics will weaken the population of the local plants, but I doubt that is likely. Deleterious crosses will lose out, and will be destroyed in the meat grinder of evolutionary pressure. Good riddance to bad garbage. Traits and crosses that add to evolutionary fitness will thrive and increase, sending their progeny down the generations to the future. I know that sounds like a hopelessly optimistic view of the brutally efficient process of evolution, but the logic is really pretty direct. Occam’s razor says the simple, direct explanation is most likely to be the correct explanation, and I think this is it: Evolutionary processes, survival of the fittest, will sort out the genetics that can survive and reproduce at my site, and that genotype with maximum fitness may change as time goes on. Efficient working of that process will depend upon the base of the adapted genetics from gathered seed, a large population that allows a multitude of mutations and crosses to occur, and additions of new genetics, outbreeding if you will, to provide a deep bench of traits which will provide resilience down the years.

And it depends upon time, a lot of time. I have stated in several posts that I am playing the long game here, and I am presently waiting for an offer from the US Fish and Wildlife Service for a perpetual easement on about 200 acres of restoration and pasture which will guarantee the time for this to become a real prairie. It is often said that once prairie is plowed up it will not return, and even the best restoration is but a pale imitation of the glory of the real thing. Baloney! People who believe that are correct if their time scale is ten or twenty years. Twelve thousand years ago the glaciers were melting away and we didn’t even have a prairie until perhaps 8000-9000 years ago. Somewhere in that span of time a dynamic prairie developed, and changed with time and the management of the indigenous people who lived there. Patience is required. If my descendants care to look at and walk in the restoration in three or four hundred years my bet is that they will find a functioning ecosystem. I can’t say what that will look like, and I certainly can’t say what the climate will be. However, I expect that the restorations will be whatever native prairie has become in South Dakota in the 23rd century. And with that I humbly bow, and submit to the unknowns of the future with a smile and a wave.

Postscript: I recently received an offer from the US Fish and Wildlife service to accept a permanent easement on 140 acres of the restorations and I immediately accepted the offer. The restorations will have their time to develop. Maybe my descendants really will get to see what happens.