The Tall Grass Prairie, Kansas, Peregrine Falcon

by Thomas Pollart

Title

The Tall Grass Prairie, Kansas, Peregrine Falcon

Artist

Thomas Pollart

Medium

Photograph - Photograph

Description

The Tall Grass Prairie, Kansas, Peregrine Falcon

Last Stand of the Tallgrass Prairie

Where's the tall grass? Tallgrass prairie once covered 170 million acres of North America. Within a generation the vast majority was developed and plowed under. Today less than 4% remains, mostly here in the Kansas Flint Hills. The preserve protects a nationally significant remnant of the once vast tallgrass prairie and its cultural resources. Here the tallgrass prairie makes its last stand.

WHY THE FLINT HILLS?

Tallgrass prairie once covered more than 170 million acres, from Canada through Texas and as far as Ohio in the east. Rich prairie soils made the region prime for agricultural development. Most of the tallgrass prairie was converted to cropland within just a couple of decades, making this once expansive landscape North America’s most altered ecosystem in terms of acres lost. Of the roughly 4 percent that remains today, most (about two-thirds) survives in the Flint Hills of Kansas and Oklahoma.

Alternating layers of chert (flint) found in the limestone gave the Flint Hills region its name. The preserve and surrounding Flint Hills were spared from the plow because it was too rocky. Because the land couldn’t easily be farmed, homesteaders soon found that the region was best suited to cattle ranching. Ranching continues to dominate the local economy and is the primary agricultural use of the Flint Hills.

ONE OF THE MOST DIVERSE ECOSYSTEMS IN THE WORLD

Tallgrass prairie is an incredibly diverse ecosystem. The preserve is home to over 500 species of plants. Prominent grasses such as big bluestem, Indian grass, switchgrass, and little bluestem appear to dominate the plant community; however, they are far outnumbered by the diversity of herbaceous plants (wildflowers). Fauna ranges from large grazing animals like deer, bison, and cattle to a multitude of insects, amphibians and reptiles and other animal life. Grasslands birds, like greater prairie-chicken (a type of grouse), which have lost much of its native habitat, are of particular interest.

Uploaded

March 7th, 2019

Statistics

Viewed 1,434 Times  -  Last Visitor from Ottawa, ON - Canada on 04/18/2024 at 11:02 AM

Colors

Embed

Share

Sales Sheet

Tags