Central Prairie
Long gone reminder
Diverse grasslands
Periodic disturbance
The expansive American prairie’s demise was caused by human agricultural conversion. Plowing and cultivation of the native land compromised grass root systems and interrupted survival and renewal patterns.
“We have taken into our language the word prairie, because when our backwoodsmen first reached the land and saw the great natural meadows of long grass—sights unknown to the gloomy forests wherein they had always dwelt—they knew not what to call them, and borrowed the term already in use among the French inhabitants.” – Theodore Roosevelt