2008's newly discovered plants

While our controlled burns were a bit of a flop this past spring, I did manage to add a few new species to the checklist.

Lactuca Canadensis (wild lettuce) is a plant most often found in savanna type habitats, however my first sighting of this tall plant was in the middle of our mesic prairie. After I was able to identify this plant, I began to recognize it along the sides of some back roads and in a few heavily shaded areas. It is an interesting plant that can achieve incredible heights. I found one across the street that was growing in a dead stand of white ash that was approximately 10 feet tall. The one discovered in the prairie was only about 4 feet tall, and being a biennial that probably means it grows best in semi-shaded areas. See photo.

Another interesting plant was dudley's rush, a dry prairie rush. In fact, I believe it is one of the only non-wetland rushes that are characteristic of dry prairie habitats. Hopefully it will naturally spread with the introduction of fire to that area.

moving forward

This journal has gotten a pretty slow start since it's inception in March. Though, now that summer is winding down I thought that it would be a good time to bring things up to speed.

We got off to a bad start with a weak controlled burn in the mesic prairie this past spring, and as a result, the autumn olive has been nearly impossible to control. As it was already about 3 feet tall before the growing season, the plants that were not hand cut during the summer put on another 2 or 3 feet of vertical growth. Isolated plants were cut with loppers in July and August, and one dense stand in the middle of the prairie was mowed down with the brush hog. However, there are still a few dense stands that I was afraid of mowing with the brush hog due to some recognizable good forbs. Maybe I'll have a chance to hand cut them before dormancy.

If I don't have a chance to hand cut them, maybe I will try brush hogging them directly after next spring's burn before any plants emerge. While this won't eradicate them, it will at least take the height off of them. Planting semi-aggressive prairie grasses like big bluestem in the densly patched areas might be a good idea too, as to give the space good fuel for future fires.

On another note, in the roadside prairie I was able to plant a small patch of grasses and forbs in June after I treated the area with glyphosate and then burned the dead thatch (photo above). This method proved to be quite effective due to the fact that the ground and the weather was warm enough for the prairie plants to germinate immediately. However, we got lucky this year because June proved to be wet enough for the young plants to prosper without the risk of drying out. I think normally it would be a good idea to try this method a few weeks earlier (like the middle of May). As of now, I have indian grass that has gone to seed, big bluestem half a foot tall, butterfly milkweed seedlings, common milkweed about a foot tall, and wild bergamot seedlings.