Donna VanBuecken
Iowa State University initiated a program in 2003 which focuses on planting tallgrass native prairie strips in farm fields, benefiting soil, water and biodiversity. It is called STRIPS. The benefits determined so far can be found in their easy to read report Prairie Strips: Small Changes, Big Impacts.
The Science-based Trials of Row-crops Integrated with Prairie Strips (STRIPS) program studies the effects of native tallgrass prairie on soil, water, and biodiversity on farms.
As I’ve written before, fireflies are in peril. Reference my post entitled Fireflies are Glowing. The Xerces Society sent out an announcement this past week that they were mounting a new firefly conservation campaign: Conserving the Jewels of the Night.
“Fireflies are some of our most celebrated insects. Not only are they important components of natural ecosystems, but also they have immense cultural, biological, and economic value. Despite their significance, firefly populations appear to be in decline….This concern gains greater significance in light of numerous diversity and abundance studies that have emerged in recent years documenting severe population declines in both better-studied insect groups and overall insect biomass. ” (Xerces)
Xerces has developed a wonderful guideline for protecting fireflies in the USA and Canada. It is available on-line in pdf format and it is entitled Conserving the Jewels of the Night. On page 26 it starts talking about “Creating, Restoring, and Protecting High Quality Habitat.”
As we’ve discussed about wildlife many times before, “In general, all fireflies require four basic things: food, shelter, moisture, and protection from pesticides*. Individual species will have more specific habitat or food requirements, but by keeping these requirements in mind, you can easily provide for fireflies in your yard, park, or natural area. In particular, most fireflies need:
Some species also need:
These are the things we Wild Ones and other native landscaping enthusiasts talk about almost every day, because these things are important for maintaining a healthy ecosystem – a healthy habitat – especially the part about native vegetation. So let’s keep talking and we’ll help The Xerces Society with its new firefly conservation campaign: Conserving the Jewels of the Night.
*The conservation section of the Hunter Education class materials also includes space.
I found a new Dance of the Fireflies video. It’s the music from Tangled by Walt Disney Pictures.
Reference my post dated December 5, 2016 entitled Fall Habitat Maintenance and the comment from Stephen Thomforde regarding heterogeneity as it relates to leaving the leaves. Specifically Stephen wanted to remind us that we should “manage our landscape in ways that mimic biomass harvest by grazing animals and biotic fire.”
I thought with this post I would add to the to-do list of things for fall clean-up mentioned in the above referenced post.
Fall is the time to collect seed to do a winter overseeding of your prairie or gardens or a new seeding of a new area. See Winter Seeding your Prairie.
Its also a good time to plan for next spring’s cold frames to use for starting those new seedlings from the seed you’ve collected. Find a sunny spot for nurturing next spring’s seedlings and plan to sow the seed this winter. The tops of cold frames can be made from recycled sturdy old windows. Don’t forget to label the seeds you are planting!
If you have more formal gardens, don’t clean native plant flower beds in the fall. Wait until spring after hibernating insects — bees and butterflies — have left the security of the stalks and leaf beds they’ve used to overwinter. See Flower Stalks for Bees and Autumnal Equinox.
Along with the fall rains and winds come a myriad of broken tree branches. Instead of hauling them away, consider building a brush pile to shelter birds, rabbits, snakes and other wildlife from pending inclement weather and predators. The fall and winter months are also best for pruning oaks and other native trees prone to modern day disease and non-native insects.
And last but not least, late fall is the best time to conduct your buckthorn census. Buckthorn is one of the few deciduous trees that is still green into November. So now is the the time to identify the invasive noxious weed buckthorn. Pull buckthorn seedlings and either cut and paint the stems of larger trees with herbicide or mark them for future removal later into the season. Make certain to include in your plans for the spring, planting native shrubs and groundcovers in the areas from which you’ve removed the buckthorn.
If you have rain barrels, this is a good time of the year to sanitize them using the last of your salvaged rainwater, and then disconnect and empty the barrels.
See also Nature Scoop September 2018 by Toni Stahl for more hints for fall maintenance of native landscaping.
The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources (WDNR) has declared that our habitat development has added up to a good summer for monarchs
“Wisconsin’s ‘supergeneration’ of monarchs are now flying 1,700 miles to their overwintering sites in Mexico where official population counts will be taken. Already, citizen reports to Journey North* show monarch numbers were impressive during this summer’s breeding period.
Thank you to everyone who planted or maintained milkweed and other native plants in 2019 to aid monarchs and other pollinators. You are making a difference!
The information above was taken from the Natural Heritage Conservation newsletter dated 10/3/2019.
See also Wisconsin Monarch Collaborative.
*Journey North is a web-based platform tracking migration in real-time, now hosted by the UW-Arboretum in Madison, Wisconsin.
**HabiTally is a new mobile app that helps ensure all habitat efforts for Monarchs are documented.