Prairies are really waking up in this part of the world. There’s a lot of green out there, an increasing number of wildflowers, and a big influx of breeding and migratory birds. Invertebrates are slowly becoming more abundant, too, though “slowly” is the operative word there, at least for impatient macro photographers like me. Late last week, the Fellows and I took some time to explore one of our Platte River Prairies that has a lot of sedge meadow habitat (the same site I found all the pill bugs at the week before that). We saw lots of spring flowers, including sedges, but I didn’t take any p ..read more

The Platte River Prairies got four to five inches of rain last week, filling up the sloughs (old river channels) in many of our floodplain prairies. This will help quite a bit with the lingering drought conditions we’ve been dealing with. It also provided a chance to photograph some of our sedge meadows with standing water, something I’ve not had much opportunity to do over the last couple years. I wasn’t able to get out on Friday, but arrived at one of our prairies before sunrise on Saturday. I was wearing rain pants, rain jacket, and neoprene boots, anticipating that I’d be wading through an ..read more

Over the weekend, my wife, Kim, and I were at Wilson Lake in Kansas. Longtime readers know that Kim runs ultramarathons and that I usually accompany her when she goes to races or long training runs. This weekend, she was signed up for a “backyard ultra” in which participants run an approximately four mile loop once an hour for as many hours as they can. They have to be back at the starting line at the top of each hour to avoid being disqualified. Sounds fun, huh? Kim was mostly using the race as training for another race coming up next month, so she only planned to run 8 loops. The serious rac ..read more

Quickly, for those of you who might be proximate and/or interested, we will be hosting another public field day at The Nature Conservancy’s Platte River Prairies this summer.  On July 13, 2024, we will have our staff and a number of guest presenters on hand to lead hikes and give presentations on a variety of topics.  At a minimum, we’ll have some live reptiles you can see up close, a demonstration of small mammal live trapping (for research), and opportunities to explore and learn about prairies, prairie restoration, land stewardship, and much more.  Mark your calendars and wat ..read more

I drove up to the Niobrara Valley Preserve last Thursday afternoon. I needed to be there to help with a prescribed fire on Friday, but I scheduled my trip so I’d have a little alone time to wander Thursday evening. My schedule has been pretty full lately and I needed some quiet time to explore. On my last trip to NVP, I’d tried to photograph some pasqueflowers, but they were all either covered with snow or wilted from cold and frost. This time, as soon as I arrived, I headed that direction again to see if I’d have better luck. On the way, though, I saw the little prairie dog town nearby and de ..read more

Like many people across North America today, I took a break from my afternoon to view (with safe eclipse-viewing glasses) the solar eclipse. I definitely looked up often enough to gauge the progress of the eclipse, which only reached about 80% coverage here. However, unlike many, maybe even most people watching today’s event, I spent the rest of my time taking photos of butterflies and wildflowers. An orange sulphur butterfly sheltering from the wind at our family prairie. It was a bright sunny day at our family prairie prior to the eclipse, which is not good light for photography. But as the ..read more

Today’s post covers a lot of ground, but is also a pretty good representation of the current state of spring in Nebraska. There are still hundreds of thousands of sandhill cranes on the Platte River (and there were more than 90 whooping cranes around last week). Simultaneously, spring wildflowers are starting to pop. I don’t remember many years when I could walk the prairies and see hordes of cranes and blooming wildflowers at the same time. This year, the cranes are being slow to leave and flowers are coming a little early. Does that mean anything? I have no idea. I guess it means a lot of sa ..read more

I want to thank everyone who submitted questions in response to a post from last month requesting them. I think I’ve responded to everyone, though not always with a robust or satisfactory answer. As I frequently tell people, I’m far from an expert on all things prairie (and am absolutely not the insect identification expert people often think I am). In fact, as many of the other ‘more mature in age’ readers will empathize with, my expertise seems to diminish each year as I become increasingly aware of how complex the world truly is. Anyway, if you haven’t already, I encourage you to scan throu ..read more

I often think one of the biggest issues we face in grassland restoration and management is that we’re a little too stuck in the past.  This expresses itself in various ways, but I think it’s a nearly universal issue with everyone involved in prairie ecology and stewardship.  To one degree or another, we’re all looking backward.  Let me explain. We’ve all stood on a hill and stared into the distance, trying to envision what that view would have been a few hundred years ago. An obvious example of what I’m talking about appears in prairie restoration (reconstruction) when someone’s ..read more

Do you have questions about prairies and don’t know what to do about it? “What are panic grasses so worried about?” or “What did Katy do, anyway?” Or maybe you have questions on more applied topics such as, “What factors should I consider if I want to manage my prairie for a robust pollinator community?” or “What are my options for prairie management if I’m not allowed to use fire?” Well, here’s your chance. I’m bringing back the popular (to me) segment of this blog called, “Ask the Prairie Ecologist.” Katydids always look a little guilty, I think. Some of you will remember this from a few yea ..read more