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.