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September 27, 2000 Restored
prairie on Iowa roadsides Michael
Corey DES MOINES, Iowa.--The prairie dominated the Iowa landscape for thousands of years. Though most of it was plowed under in the last 150 years to make way for the farms of settlers, conservationists and state officials are trying to keep the prairie alive. And it even saves taxpayers money. Prairie land once covered 20 million acres of land in Iowa. Today, only about 20,000 acres of prairie remain, said Greg Houseal, who works with the Roadside Management Office at the University of Northern Iowa. Now transportation officials have teamed up with biologists to bring native prairie grasses to Iowa roadsides, and both groups say the arrangement is mutually beneficial. For Tom Rosburg, assistant professor of biology at Drake University in Des Moines, the planting makes ecological sense. "People saw it as a great way to bring back a native plant community. Prairie is basically why Iowa is such a rich agricultural state," Rosburg said. "Ecosystems are always more stable if they have more biodiversity." The prairie also provides a natural habitat for many birds, insects and small mammals that are out of place in other environments. For Mark Masteller, chief landscape architect for the Iowa Department of Transportation, planting prairie makes good practical and economic sense. The initial cost to grow prairie plants is higher than the cost of growing other grasses. But the more "traditional" roadside grasses cost more to maintain, he said. "The non-native species have shown that they really don't have the ability to fight invasions of weeds over the long haul," Masteller said. The native plants, which are more adapted to the local climate, local diseases and other local species, cost less because they require less care. Highway caretakers said they save a lot of money when they don't have to spray herbicides regularly and don't have to mow the area along the highway. Masteller said prairie species, which have thick root systems, also reduce erosion better than other commonly used grasses. Since restored prairie is not cut short, caretakers mow a 15-foot buffer zone between the road and the prairie area. This gives drivers a place to pull off the road in an emergency and helps prevent snow from drifting onto highways in the winter, Houseal said. Masteller said the DOT has been planting native grasses for about 15 years every time it replaces a state or federal highway. The DOT uses money from its budget and several state and federal grants to fund the restoration. Many counties have also planted native prairie along their roadways. Houseal said 70 Iowa counties have roadside redevelopment plans in some form. Rosburg said planting prairie along the highway also helps keep the plant species vital by linking distant native plant populations, which can widen the pool of genetic material in a population. "The prairie preserves we tend to have are a little more isolated. It would be some advantage to try to make connections between fragments of prairie," he said. "Our ideal would actually be able to get our remnants more healthy." Though Rosburg and Masteller said there is growing public support for prairie restoration, they said they still have to contend with people who don't understand the concept. "There are all kinds of schools of thought when you're dealing with the general public," Masteller said. "When we started making those changes, some people thought if it wasn't a grass that could be mowed and it wasn't a crop, then it was a weed." Rosburg said he has seen a different problem. Some people have embraced the idea of prairie restoration but don't know enough concerning what species are really native to the area and plant foreign prairie seed mixes they find in catalogs. "I would like to see us shoot toward the types of prairie landscapes we had originally," Rosburg said. "When we stray from that, I don't really feel like we are doing what we should be doing." Not all roadsides are right for prairie restoration, said Loren Lown, a natural resources specialist for the Polk County Conservation Board. Restoration is not practical in more urban areas, and not all landowners want to have prairie grass adjacent to their property, he said. Lown said roadside prairie restoration is one part of a more cost-effective approach to maintenance. He said two employees can now manage all of the herbicide spraying in Polk County--a result of more targeted application. Before, Lown said he had to contract out for a truck to spray the whole roadside with herbicide. "We use a lot fewer herbicides now than they used to use to do just a small section of the county," he said. "It's a difference in philosophy." |