Zebulon Pike, a mediocre explorer at best, led his small and ragged group of men west through what would become Kansas, eastern Colorado and New Mexico more than 200 years ago.
Said to be of "limited letters," it is perhaps not surprising that the man whose name the most famous peak in the Rockies would one day bear would fail to see the beauty and complexity of our vast, unique prairie.
He later dubbed the area between the Mississippi River and the Rocky Mountains "The Great American Desert."
Whether Pike's pronouncement actually forestalled westward expansion for decades, as some have suggested, is open to question. The region was, until relatively late in the 19th century, populated with native tribes who believed the land to be theirs, and who defended it with stoic determination and not just a little violence.
My husband and I visited the Black Kettle National Grasslands in western Oklahoma last month, hoping to see what an intact prairie looks like. I was reminded of Pike's term for this rolling, diverse landscape when we drove to the area marked off on the map as the National Grasslands. Turns out the land under control of the Interior Department (and, thus, the actual National Grasslands) are large inholdings within privately owned rangelands.
Despite that -- and partly because much of the rangeland is still dominated by prairie vegetation -- one could still get a feeling for prairie in late fall and early winter.
At Black Kettle National Grasslands, mixed-grass prairie covers the land as far as the eye can see. Gnarled old cottonwoods trace riparian areas through valleys. Dense shelterbelts planted during the dust bowl string along the edge of an occasional field. But mostly there is grassland -- a remnant treasure of what once, along with tall grass and short grass versions, covered a full 40 percent of our country.
This vast, fascinating ecosystem supported a wealth of wildlife: Tens of millions of bison, elk and pronghorns roamed these lands. Prairie dogs lived in enormous colonies. And birds that today are in steep decline flourished.
Burrowing owls, upland sandpipers, bobolinks and meadowlarks were abundant. With westward expansion of settlers from mostly European stock, this life-giving grassland was tilled under and wildlife populations began a decline that largely continues to this day.
Bison and pronghorns are doing better in recent times, but all populations of prairie birds continue to fall.
There is good news: Non-profit organizations like The Nature Conservancy, Ducks Unlimited and a new player in prairie restoration, the American Prairie Foundation, are working to secure and improve habitat on America's rich grasslands.
Private efforts are also significant. Landowners like CNN founder Ted Turner are working to restore enormous tracts to their pre-settlement conditions. Many ranchers, like our Texas friends Don and Ellen Weinacht, do what they can on behalf of the wildlife -- especially the birds -- on their lands.
When my husband and I headed out for a visit to Black Kettle National Grasslands, our focus was, of course, to see what birds we could find. It was also to see the grasslands itself. We were not disappointed on either count.
Summer's bright and varied colors had given way to hues of brown and tan, but the prairie was beautiful nevertheless. The grasses, especially the dominant little bluestem, bowed gracefully under the north wind like waves on a gentle sea. A lone northern harrier coasted on air currents over the fields in search of a meal. Meadowlarks rose from fence lines and veered away from our moving vehicle. Scissor-tailed flycatchers nest here in summer and, occasionally, mountain bluebirds are found in winter.
We stopped for lunch at Skipout Lake, hoping to find rafts of waterfowl. Instead, we found a host of migrant songbirds in a shelterbelt. There were robins, juncos and a single grasshopper sparrow.
Best of all was the flock of Harris' sparrows moving along the backside of an old fence row. Summer residents of stunted boreal forests, these birds are found infrequently in Michigan only during migration. The best way to see them is by making a fall visit to one of our National Grasslands like Black Kettle.
Kay Charter, of Omena, is executive director of Saving Birds Thru Habitat, an organization that teaches people how to help migrating birds whose populations are declining.
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