Western Minnesota Scientific and Natural Areas

[RickR]

I never realized you had 'desert' in Minnesota...those pics look like they could have been taken in Drumheller or Milk River area of Alberta.

Remember too, that this is late fall.  Things would be a lot greener in summer.  Gneiss Outcrops and Blue Devil Valley SNAs border the Minnesota River, and there is a natural pond (most people would call it a lake) not far from Yellow Bank Hills SNA that you can see in the photo.  However, Minnesota does have Weaver Dunes SNA, that contains active blowouts.

[Hoy]

Rick, a "blowout" is where the sand blows away?
We have deserts in Norway too. Some places the precipitation is less than 200mm (8inches) a year.
http://www.nrk.no/nett-tv/indeks/146755/

[RickR]

Yes, a blowout is where the sand blows away.  It may shift to another location or just disperse and "disappear."

I once found a Lupinus sp. (either the white or cream flowered species) in one of these areas.  It was clear that the crown was not near the surface as it normally would be.  I dug in the sand for about 12 inches  (31cm) down and never found where the root structure started.   It was buried by the shifting sand.

I have to say, though, that this is an extremely rare phenomenon in Minnesota.  Most dunes in Minnesota have been stabilized for centuries.

[cohan]

Some interesting species there, Rick, good to see!
Where I live is basically all farmland, but that does not mean all the land is cleared --a lot of it is used for grazing, and the cattle are simply turned out into the natural vegetation--wetlands, woods etc, and depending on how heavy the grazing is, there are still many native plants..

Nice that these areas have been consciously preserved, even in small chunks..

[RickR]

In late June I took a day trip to western Minnesota near the border of South Dakota. Specifically, I wanted to explore Clinton Prairie Scientific and Natural Area, as it hosts Lilium philadelphicum (Wood Lily), one of Minnesota's native lilies.

I arrived on a very humid and sunny, 95F day that was fiercely windy.  Terrible for photographing, but I think I would have melted were it not for the constant rush of fresh air.

Prairies are not exactly cornucopias of beauty for most people.  In fact I am continually warning the uninitiated who want to grow a mix of wildflowers in their gardens: wildflowers tend to look like weeds until they flower.  Add to that the "boring" grasses that dominate prairies, and well, you get the idea.  

Clinton Prairie is 160 acres of undisturbed soils, but was managed as a hay meadow in the past.  It is a shallowly rolling ground moraine of mesic to wet prairie bioms, with several small depressions just barely wet enough to support species such as Narrowleaf cattails (Typha angustifolia) and Arrowhead (Sagittaria sp.).

Leadplant (Amorpha canescens) is common in prairies throughout Minnesota. Typical growth seems herbaceous to the untrained eye, but in one part of the prairie, they grew taller than I have ever seen in the state (third photo).
        
              

Canada Anemone (Anemone canadensis) can be a thug in gardens, but here it has its niche, growing well in certain more moist parts, but absent in most of the prairie.
        
              

Thimbleweed (Anemone cylindrica) grew in the drier parts as singular plants.
        

Prairie Dogbane (Apocrynum sibiricum) looks almost like it could be an Asclepias sp., but the inflorescence structure is not umbellate.
        

[RickR]

Still at Clinton Prairie.
 Prairie clover grows to handsome clumps in the garden, but is usually just one to several stems in the wild.  I did not find Purple Prairie clover here, but
White Prairie clover (Dalea candida) was common.
        

Pale coneflower (Echinacea pallida)
              

Not to be confused with Giant hyssop which has a licorice smell, this is Wild Licorice (Glycyrrhiza lepidota).
        

Sweetclovers are terribly invasive species in prairies, and can easily grow six feet or more.  Here, Yellow sweetclover (Melilotis officinalis).  Yellow and White sweetcolvers are biennial.  The dead "brush" you see in the background in this pic (more prominent in other photos) is sweetclover.  Not thinking about this segment of a forum post, I had avoided photographing the large and typically unsightly dead material.  In parts of the prairie, it was so thick that it was difficult to walk through.
              

Maximilian Sunflower (Helianthus maximiliani) is our latest blooming native sunflower.  Every year one wonders if there will be time enough for it to bloom and seed, but it always does.
Second pic: Common milkweed (Asclepias syriaca).
        

[RickR]

In Clinton Prairie, the Wood lily (Lilium philadelphicum) does well.  The flowers are huge in comparison to the leaf area.  Leaves are  two inches long and cloth only the uppermost one-third of the stem.  There are not even any vestigial nodes on the bottom two-thirds that are typical of most other Lilium species of similar habit.  Lilium philadelphicum that I see on rock outcrops in the boreal parts of northern Minnesota bare leaves almost to the base of the plant.

  All the dead "sticks" in these photos, even in the distance, is the invasive sweetclover.
        
              

          

          

          

[RickR]

Continuing in Clinton Prairie,
Whorled loostrife (Lysimachia quadriflora) just opening, and not yet assuming its characteristic nodding position.  Rich prairie soil, freshly dug by a gopher.
          

Showy Blue lettuce (Mulgedium(Lactuca) pulchellum)
   

Silverleaf scurfpea (Pediomelum(Psoralea) argophyllum).  Like artemesias with leaves covered with a whitish tomentum, these scurfpeas are heavily clothed with very reflective whitish hairs.
          
              

White meadowsweet (Spiraea alba) and what appears to be a hybrid of native Rosa spp. that are supposedly common in the area.
        

[RickR]

Last pics for Clinton Prairie:
Marsh Hedge nettle(Stachys palustris)
              
          

Teucrium canadensis?
        

Mountain Death camas(Zigadenus elegans) just ending.  Impossible to find if it were not flowering, but the seed pods are quite distinctive.
        

[Hoy]

Rick, I would grow a whole prairie if I had room for it! However with limited space I have to be satisfied with some nice species.
I grow the Canada Anemone and it spreads slowly with my permission 

The sweetclover is a weed here to but only in warm areas with deep soil.
Interesting stuff you tell us.

[RickR]

More pics from wild western Minnesota in other areas near the South Dakota border:

Missouri milkvetch (Astragalus missouriensis)
        

Missouri milkvetch habitat: the south, east and north sides of the topmost knolls, 1-5ft. below the summits in gravel substrate.
              

Prairie larkspur (Delphinium carolinianum), and its seed pods.  Not exactly a well formed inflorescence, but the hodgepodge of flowers is fairly normal for the species here.
        

Pale coneflower (Echinacea pallida)
        

Little bluestem (Schizachyrium scoparius). We had practically no snow last winter.  What you see is last season's seed heads.  Second pic, Little bluestem and Prairie fleabane.
          

[Lori S.]

I really enjoyed the prairie tour, Rick!  Thanks for taking us along!  How tall does Amorpha canescens typically get?  I grew a bunch from seed this year, and this time, they are still surviving... (and if they are successful, I'll have to weed many out.)  Stachys palustris is very showy, and I like the Teucrium also.   Gorgeous lily photos!

[cohan]

Nice stuff, Rick!
Lots of familiar species as well as many that don't make it this far north or into the mixed woods zone..
Sweet clover is common here too, though mostly restricted to roadsides, so it doesn't have a major impact on native species; the true clovers are much more bothersome..
The Stachys is a fave here, along with both Anemones; lots of cylindrica wild in my yard, and I'm encouraging some big patches- I've realised its lack of showy flowers is more than made up for with the seedheads giving nice interest/texture all winter; Stachys and A canadensis I plan to introduce to my yard in places where they can go to town, the Stachys I think is just as aggressive as the Anemone..

Love some of the real prairie plants that I mostly don't have- Psoralea, Amorpha, etc..
I'm sure you are right that people aren't clearly envisioning true prairie when they think of 'wild' gardens, and most wild plants have a much shorter season than garden forms- for a small city lot you would need to carefully think out your sequence of blooming etc, or you could have an empty lot look much of the year.. here, I have enough space (and selective vision) that I just don't look at those areas that are past their prime (before is less of an issue)..
However, the time I find native plants at their best (compared to exotics) is the late late season- very few flowers of course, because they know what they are doing, but I find once frosts have begun, native plants age into winter much more gracefully than exotic garden plants which may be flowering incongruously amid the ruin or just be a prematurely blackened mess, or halfway between those! while the natives are gone to golds and browns and seedpods!

[RickR]

How tall does Amorpha canescens typically get?

They usually seem to stay around 2.5ft.  I've grown Amorpha canescens from seed too, but I don't have any in my garden.   Now that I think about it, could it be grazing that keeps them short?  Never really thought about it before... and never investigated the plants to see if they had ever been "pruned".  I would have noticed the uncharacteristic growth pattern if they were grazed to a foot or so, but if they were eaten to the ground, I would never know.  Amorpha might be tasty to deer and moose...  Clinton Prairie is surrounded by miles of farmland, and it is conceivable that grazing animals do not venture there.  The tall Leadplants were only in one small part of the 160 acres, and shorter specimens of the species were scattered everywhere.  The prairie is managed with fire as part of the regime.  Perhaps they have not set fire to that one small part?

native plants age into winter much more gracefully than exotic garden plants...

i couldn't agree with you more!  And I thought I was the only seed pod freak (I mean enthusiast) here...

[RickR]

Last bunch of photos:

More Prairie fleabane (Erigeron strigosus)
        

Long-headed coneflower (Ratibida columnifera)
        

Hoary Vervain (Verbena stricta) and an excellent specimen of Wooly plantain (Plantago patagonica).  It seemed to like the relative lack of competition.  Now that you know what you are looking for, Trond, you can pick out a few leaves from this previous photo, too: http://nargs.org/smf/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=299.0;attach=34838;image
   


In some gneiss outcrops:

Prairie fameflower (Phemeranthus parviflora) and Long-leaf bluet (Houstonia longifolia)
        

Ball cactus (Escobaria vivipara) and Fragile cactus (Opuntia fragilis)
        

And the last 2 posts I uploaded 9 and 10 photos all at once, and it worked great! I think our behind the scenes IT experts are hard at work... still!  (We can't thank you all enough!)