Prairie

1. Fox Sedge / Carex stipata

-slender, bunchgrass-like perennial sedge grows 2-3 ft. tall, with a cluster of brown seed capsules clinging high on each stem.
-Leaves are coarse, elongate, narrow, 0.6 cm wide, smooth with rough margins; clustered at the base of the plant and usually taller than the stem, growing up to 1.2 m tall.
-Common Fox Sedge actively grows during the spring and fall when soil temperatures are cool.
-Stems are slender and firm, triangular, brownish at the base and have whitish, thin sheaths that are conspicuously cross-wrinkled near the top.
-The inflorescences are made up of densely flowered spikes that are 4 to 10 cm long and up to 1.5 cm wide. The distinctive inflorescence makes fox sedge easy to identify.

-The seedheads mature in late summer and spray out from the center of the clump, resembling a fox’s tail.

Special Adaptations:
-Makes up 25% of the diet of the swamp sparrow

2. Soft Rush /Juncus effusus L. – common rush

Order Juncales Family:Juncaceae

-Each stem is medium green, terete (round in cross-section), soft, and hairless; it is typically about 4 mm. across at the base, becoming gradually more slender to about 2 mm. across near the inflorescence. Because each stem lacks cauline leaves, it has a naked appearance.
-At the base of each stem, there is a prominent dark-colored basal sheath; it is usually about 2-3" long and lacks any blade. Older sheaths often exist underneath this basal sheath, but they are withered and inconspicuous.

-It can be distinguished from most other rushes by the absence of alternate leaves along its soft stems.


3. Crinkled hair Grass / flexuosa

Family: Poaceae Genus: Deschampsia

-tight clump of narrow, wiry foliage 6” to 12” tall.gold or purplish panicles twisted or "crinkled" later in summer
-individual flowers silver, green or purple often all in same panicle; bloom mid-summer to fall.
-In mid-Summer, glossy, nodding, frothy-looking panicles emerge & mature to golden color

4. Side Oats Granma /Bouteloua curtipendula



-The larger leaf blades often have [Raceme of Spikes] prominent central veins. The leaf sheaths are light green, finely ribbed, and hairless.

-The alternate leaves are more common toward the base of each culm.

-The root system has fibrous roots and short rhizomes. Side Oats Grama often forms tight bunches of culms from its rhizomes, although it also occurs as scattered plants. In moist areas where there is little competition, it may form a dense sod.

Special Adaptations:

Many grasshoppers feed on this prairie grass, as do the stinkbugs Moromorpha tetra and Mecidea major. Some upland gamebirds and granivorous songbirds are known to feed on the seeds of Grama Grasses. In Texas and states of the Great Plains, the McCown Longspur and Wild Turkey eat the seeds of various Grama grasses. Some hoofed mammalian herbivores, including bison, horses, and cattle, graze on Grama grasses readily, including Side Oats Grama.

5. Panic Grass


-The culms are green to reddish green and terete, branching occasionally to produce side stems. Each node of the culms has a dense ring of long white hairs; sometimes the culms are reddish near the nodes.

-The seeds of Panic Grasses are an important source of food to many birds, particularly upland gamebirds and granivorous songbirds (see the Bird Table for a listing of these species). Panic Grasses are eaten occasionally by the Cottontail Rabbit and hoofed herbivores (primarily livestock); the foliage of these grasses is palatable while it is young.

-grasses remaining in the Panicum genus tend to be taller warm-season grasses that bloom from mid-summer to the early fall, after which they die down and become dormant during the winter.


6. Rosinweed


-A panicle of composite yellow flowers appear at the top of the plant, resembling small sunflowers. Each flower is about 2–3" across, consisting of numerous disk florets surrounded by 12-25 ray florets. There is no noticeable floral scent.
Often, there are side stems that bear smaller panicles of flowers.
-The blooming period occurs from mid-summer to fall, and lasts about 1-2 months. The seeds are large, flat, and lightweight – they can be carried several feet by the wind. -The root system consists of a taproot and short rhizomes, which enable this plant to form clumps.
-This plant can survive significant degradation, and recovers readily from occasional wildfires. It competes well against most prairie grasses and forbs in mesic to dry areas.


7. Prairie Dropseed / S. heterolepis
Order: Cyperales Family: Poaceae Genus: Sporobolis

- a beautiful ‘clump’ grass found in high-quality prairies throughout the region. -Narrow long leaves, rarely wider than 1/8 inch, which spring from the soil and fall to the ground like a smooth waterfall.
-Leaves grow densely around a circular base. They vary in color from green to steely blue-gray, and grow up to three feet long.

-The seeds are quite fragrant, and Native Americans used to ground them into a tasty flour.



8. Big Tooth Aspen / P. grandidentata

Order: Salicales Family: Salicaceae Genus: Populus

- medium-sized tree that grows up to 60 feet tall. The trunk is one to two feet wide. It has rounded leaves about four inches long with large teeth.

-Aspens get flowers early in the spring, before they get their leaves. Aspen flowers are called catkins. Catkins are 2 to 3 inches long, tan-colored, and droopy. Later, catkins are replace with fruits. Bigtooth Aspen fruits have small seeds combined with silky hairs. They travel by wind to new places, where they may be able to grow into a new tree. One tree can make over a million seeds.

-Bigtooth Aspens do not like shade. They usually grow on the edges of woods or along streams. They grow fast, but do not live long. These trees live for about 50 years.

On our Own Species...

Self-heal
Order: Lamiales
Family: Lamiaceae
Genus: Prunella


-Growing from 1 to 2 feet high, with creeping, self-rooting, tough, square, reddish stems branching at leaf axis. The leaves are lance shaped, serrated and reddish at tip, about an inch long and 1/2 inch broad, grow on short stalks in opposite pairs down the square stem.

-The flowers grow from a clublike, somewhat square, whirled cluster, immediately below this club are a pair of stalkless leaves standing out on either side like a collar. Flowers are two lipped and tubular, the top lip is a purple hood, and the bottom lip is often white, it has three lobes with the middle lobe being larger and fringed upwardly.

-Self-heals are low-growing plants, and thrive in moist wasteland and grass, spreading rapidly to cover the ground. They are members of the mint family and have the square stem common to mints.
-Prunella vulgaris has been shown to be an antioxidant, immune stimulant, viral replication inhibitor and an anti-inflammatory agent


Little Brown Bat /little brown myotis / M. lucifugus
Order: Chiroptera Family:Vespertilionidae Genus:Myotis

Characteristics:
-its fur is uniformly dark brown and glossy on the back and upper parts with slightly paler, greyish fur underneath.
-Wing membranes are dark brown on a typical wingspan of 22–27 cm (8.7–11 in).[
-Ears are small and black with a short, rounded tragus.
- Adult bats are typically 6–10 cm (2.4–3.9 in) long and weigh 5–14 grams (0.2–0.5 oz).
-All teeth including molars are relatively sharp, as is typical for an insectivore, and canines are prominent to enable grasping hard-bodied insects in flight.
Little brown bats are insectivores, eating moths, wasps, beetles, gnats, mosquitoes, midges and mayflies, among others. Since many of their preferred meals are insects with an aquatic life stage, such as mosquitoes, they prefer to roost near water. They echolocate to find their prey.

Special Adaptions:

Bats perform valuable ecosystem services to humans, in terms of suppression of insect populations that can be agricultural or forest pests and these bats do eat some insects that are annoying or pose health risks to humans. An individual bat can consume its body weight in insects in a night, so the loss of a regional population of millions of bats adds up to a huge number of uneaten insects in the night sky.

Most temperate bats either migrate or hibernate, but little brown bats do both. In summer, the males and females live apart, the females raising young. When fall comes, both sexes fly south to a hibernaculum, where they mate and then hibernate.

White Nose Syndrome is known to affect all six species of hibernating bats that occur in the northeastern U.S. and has recently been confirmed in three other species — making the total number of species affected at nine. Two of the species are already listed as federally endangered (Indiana bat, Gray bat).


Little Blue Stem /S. scoparium
Order:Poales
Family:Poaceae
Genus:Schizachyrium

-Also known as Beard Grass, is an American prairie grass. Little bluestem is a perennial bunchgrass.
-The leaf sheaths are light green or light blue, hairless or slightly pubescent, and finely ribbed. Each culm terminates in several ascending racemes of spikelets.
-Little Bluestem grows to a typical height of 3 feet. Although it has a blue tint in the spring, in fall its predominant color is more red, which color it may retain throughout winter into spring. The culms and leaves become various shades of tan, brown, or wine-red during the fall and winter.



Big bluestem /A. gerardii /"turkey foot"

Order: Poales
Family: Poaceae
Genus: Andropogon

-Big bluestem, is a perennial bunch grass tolerant of a wide range of soils and moisture. Depending on soil and moisture conditions, it grows to a height of 1 – 3m (3 – 10 ft).
- The stem base turns to a blue-purple as it matures. The seed heads have three spike-like projections, resulting in another common name for big bluestem — "turkey foot."
-Each culm terminates in 2-6 narrow racemes of spikelets. These racemes originate near the base of the inflorescence and spread outward, forming a claw-like V-shape. Each raceme is up to 6" long.
-The spikelets are dull greyish green to purplish red in color; their anthers are yellow to dull red. The blooming period occurs during late summer or early fall. Pollination is by wind. Each spikelet produces a single grain.
-The root system is fibrous and produces short rhizomes.
-Big Bluestem is an important food plant of many grasshoppers

Rosinweed / Silphium integrifolium
Aster family (Asteraceae)



-This native perennial plant is 3-5' tall and unbranched, except near the inflorescence. The stout central stem is usually covered with stiff short hairs, but sometimes becomes glabrous with age.

-The opposite leaves are up to 5" long and 2½" wide. They are broadly lanceolate to ovate, and have stiff small hairs on both the upper and lower sides, providing a sandpapery texture. The margins of these leaves are usually smooth, or they may have tiny teeth. As they ascend the stem, the opposite leaves rotate their direction by 90°.

-composite yellow flowers appear at the top of the plant, resembling small sunflowers. Each flower is about 2–3" across, consisting of numerous disk florets surrounded by 12-25 ray florets. Only the ray florets are fertile. There is no noticeable floral scent. Often, there are side stems that bear smaller panicles of flowers.

Indian grass /Sorghastrum nutans
Grass family (Poaceae)

-This native perennial grass is 3-7' tall and unbranched. It typically consists of tight bunches of flowering culms and their leaves. The culms are terete, glabrous, and light green to pale yellow. The blades of the alternate leaves are up to 2' long and ½" across; they are dull green to dark green, flat, and hairless.

-The floret of each spikelet has 3 stamens with yellow to brown anthers and 2 stigmas that are white and plumose. The blooming period occurs during late summer to early fall. At this time, the branchlets of the panicle spread outward slightly; afterwards, they become more appressed and ascending.

-Various kinds of soil are tolerated, including those that can loam, clay-loam, sand, and gravel.

Cottontail rabbit
Order: Lagomorpha
Family: Leporidae
Genus: Sylvilagus

-Apple, willow, dogwood, hickory, rose, sumac, clover, corn, soybean - you name it, and the rabbit will probably eat it. Although some plants are favored foods, almost any plant, if it’s tender, will be eaten. In the spring, the rabbits feed on the new tender shoots of grass and clover. The young leaving the nest eat their first meal away from the doe by nibbling on the leaves of clover, grass and plantin. In the late fall and winter, when grasses have dried up or been covered with snow, the main diet is the bark of sprouts and seedlings grown the previous summer.
-At birth, the young are furless, blind and weigh less than one ounce. Each usually has the white blaze on the forehead, characteristic of the cottontail. They are nursed each night soon after dark and again before dawn, with an occasional nip between these times.
-The only other rabbit native to Indiana is the swamp rabbit (Sylvilagus aquaticus) found only in the swamp lowlands along the Ohio and Wabash rivers. It spends much of its time up on stumps and logs, and swims readily when pursued. The swamp rabbit is larger then the cottontail, reaching almost six pounds. It is currently protected in its historical range in southwestern Indiana.


Woodchucks / groundhogs

Order: Rodentia
Family: Sciuridae
Genus: Marmota
Species: M. monax

-Active above ground for only a few hours each day, they have an elaborate system of burrows that are constantly changing. Groundhogs are herbivores (vegetarians).

-They eat alfalfa, clover, and dandelions, They begin accumulating fat in July and early fall they have half inch of fat over all of their body They hibernate through the winter in the main chamber of their burrow that has been lined with grasses and leaves and is closed off with soil. When hibernating they curl up in a ball, their body temperature lowers and they breath about once every six minutes. They come out of hibernation in February or March.


White-tailed Deer /O. virginianus
Order:Artiodactyla Family:Cervidae Genus:Odocoileus


Characteristics:
-the whitetail, is a medium-sized deer native to the United States (all but five of the states), Canada, Mexico, Central America, and in South America as far south as Peru. It has also been introduced to New Zealand and some countries in Europe, such as Finland and the Czech Republic.
Fossil records indicate that its basic structure has not changed in four million years