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Description
The American tallgrass prairie is one of my favorite places to visit. Unfortunately, it is also one of the most damaged and decimated ecosystems on the planet, as scientists estimate that less than 5% of the original ecosystem remains. Today, most of it has been converted to monoculture croplands, much of it growing corn used to feed cattle. The United States would not be what it is today without the agricultural productivity of its heartland; unfortunately, that productivity comes at the cost of the near elimination of a beautiful and biologically diverse ecosystem.

Fortunately, there are a few remnants of the prairie, mostly in areas that were too rocky to plough. The Tallgrass Prairie National Preserve, shown in this photo, is one of the largest remnants. It even has a large section where bison freely roam!

Photographing the prairie is challenging. Because there is so little to break vertical plane, it translates into the camera as a bunch of green and some sky. Distances are difficult to judge. But because there are few trees, there is usually always a breeze, so the grass is always swaying, shifting, moving, like waves of an ocean. The light changes constantly, and is even more dynamic than rain forests I've been to. Unfortunately, this movement is impossible to capture in a still photo, and the thick tangle of grass and plants becomes a flat wash of color. Still, I tried here to capture part of the prairie. The road creates an interesting contour to help give you a sense of how vast the scene is. Imagine these grassy hills stretching unbroken for hundreds of miles, as it did less than 150 years ago!

Notice that the prairie is not a single color. It is made up of hundreds of different kinds of plants, all with their own subtle shade of green. In my photo, you can see that the grass on the right side of the road is brighter and greener than the left side: this is not photo-manipulative exaggeration, but a result of the area on the right having been burned by the preserve's stewards. We often think of wildfires as being forces of destruction, but on the prairie, they returned nutrients to the soil, cleared away dead plant matter, and helped to maintain the primacy of grasses across the land. Fires were life.

Walking on the prairie is an amazing experience. There are few trees. There is only the land, the sky, and you. Should you ever have the chance to visit one, I recommend it. It is not just a field of grass. Thanks for stopping by.

Tallgrass Prairie National Preserve, Kansas

Description
The American tallgrass prairie is one of my favorite places to visit. Unfortunately, it is also one of the most damaged and decimated ecosystems on the planet, as scientists estimate that less than 5% of the original ecosystem remains. Today, most of it has been converted to monoculture croplands, much of it growing corn used to feed cattle. The United States would not be what it is today without the agricultural productivity of its heartland; unfortunately, that productivity comes at the cost of the near elimination of a beautiful and biologically diverse ecosystem.

Fortunately, there are a few remnants of the prairie, mostly in areas that were too rocky to plough. The Tallgrass Prairie National Preserve, shown in this photo, is one of the largest remnants. It even has a large section where bison freely roam!

Photographing the prairie is challenging. Because there is so little to break vertical plane, it translates into the camera as a bunch of green and some sky. Distances are difficult to judge. But because there are few trees, there is usually always a breeze, so the grass is always swaying, shifting, moving, like waves of an ocean. The light changes constantly, and is even more dynamic than rain forests I've been to. Unfortunately, this movement is impossible to capture in a still photo, and the thick tangle of grass and plants becomes a flat wash of color. Still, I tried here to capture part of the prairie. The road creates an interesting contour to help give you a sense of how vast the scene is. Imagine these grassy hills stretching unbroken for hundreds of miles, as it did less than 150 years ago!

Notice that the prairie is not a single color. It is made up of hundreds of different kinds of plants, all with their own subtle shade of green. In my photo, you can see that the grass on the right side of the road is brighter and greener than the left side: this is not photo-manipulative exaggeration, but a result of the area on the right having been burned by the preserve's stewards. We often think of wildfires as being forces of destruction, but on the prairie, they returned nutrients to the soil, cleared away dead plant matter, and helped to maintain the primacy of grasses across the land. Fires were life.

Walking on the prairie is an amazing experience. There are few trees. There is only the land, the sky, and you. Should you ever have the chance to visit one, I recommend it. It is not just a field of grass. Thanks for stopping by.

Tallgrass Prairie National Preserve, Kansas