[To see photos and stories of this prairie in other years, go to the links on the main Indian Grass Point page.]
This year we burned the prairie in April. We raked a strip along the top to act as the initial fire break, and then burned carefully across, up into that bare area, using the big water tank on the gator to control the fire at the top.
4/2/2004 A few days before the burn – raking the line along the ridge top
4/3/2004 This is the “black line” of the first burn line.
4/3/2004 The black line after a little more burning. (I don’t have photos of the fire because we were too busy burning to take pictures.)
4/3/2004 The finished burn
4/3/2004
4/18/2004 Plants are just starting to green up in the burned area.
4/18/4004 Hoary Puccoon
4/18/4004 Prairie Dropseed
4/18/4004 Silky Aster
4/18/4004 And, unfortunately, lots of seedlings of White and Yellow Sweet Clover. It took me a while to figure out what these were, and then I didn’t know how bad they were, so I didn’t pull them right away. They turned out to be a huge problem.
5/1/2004
6/27/2004 Mist in Center Valley
7/3/2004 Ragwort Opening – still hemmed in by brush and birches, although I’m slowly clearing at the edges
7/6/2004 The east slope of Indian Grass Point has one of the few Butterflyweed plants we have here. I cleared around it so it would get more sun and have room to expand.
7/25/2004 The burn area – dominated by Big Bluestem
7/25/2004 More flowers bloomed this year, and everything grew taller.
8/1/2004 Monarda, Leadplant, Whorled Milkweed
8/2/2004 Purple Prairie Clover
8/1/2004 Prairie Coreopsis on the point
8/1/2004 Looking back into the savanna area
8/1/2004 The savanna area looking toward the point
8/16/2004 There are still a lot of weeds in the savanna area. We mowed the honeysuckle, rather than cutting and poisoning the stumps, so it’s growing back. Burdock is a biennial, so we’ll have to cut it and remove seeds for a few more years to get rid of it.
8/16/2004 Looking from the savanna out to the point
10/9/2004 Lots of tall Big Bluestem with an understory of sweetclover
11/29/2004
11/30/2004 The path into the point from the north