Tulsa World: Video: Saving a prairie treasure

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Video: Saving a prairie treasure

The tallgrass glows in the morning light at the Nature Conservancy's Tallgrass Prairie Preserve near Pawhuska in October. TOM GILBERT / Tulsa World

By MICHAEL OVERALL World Staff Writer
Published: 9/13/2009 2:22 AM
Last Modified: 9/13/2009 3:31 AM

PAWHUSKA —The road turns to gravel just past the front gates, rattling teeth and dashboards alike to enforce a de facto speed limit that keeps traffic from moving much faster than a wild buffalo.

The bumpy ride eventually leads to the Tallgrass Prairie Preserve "headquarters," where the bathrooms are relegated to a separate building on the other side of the parking lot, and docents can wait all day to see just one visitor at the gift shop.

Obviously, the Prairie Preserve isn't trying to be a major tourist attraction.

Tourists come anyway — more than 20,000 of them a year.

"But for us, it's not about the visitors," says Bob Hamilton, who was part of the Nature Conservancy's original effort to establish the preserve and still serves as its science director. "It's about the grass."

A short drive from headquarters, Hamilton pulls his pickup off the road near one of the few barbed-wire fences that still cross the preserve.

On one side of the fence, the yellowed grass stands waist-high, but on the other, it barely reaches his knee.

"And, yes," he says, "the grass is always greener on this side."

More than 2,700 head of roaming bison keep it freshly mowed.

Most visitors come to see them, not the grass. But conservancy officials are fond of saying that the grass isn't here for the bison; the bison are here for the grass.

As the Prairie Preserve begins to celebrate its 20th anniversary this month, everything is still

ultimately about the grass.

"This place is about conservation," Hamilton says, "not tourism."

It wasn't always going to be that way.

In the mid-1980s, the federal government was planning to buy up thousands of acres of virgin grassland in Osage County to open a new national park, a kind of "Yellowstone on the prairie."

With it, presumably, would've come paved roads, hotels, campgrounds and other developments that always spring up near a national park.

"It probably would've been a bigger economic asset for the local economy," Hamilton says. "I think it's an interesting 'what if.' "

Instead, the effort fell short in Congress, and, in October 1988, the Nature Conservancy stepped in with Plan B: The conservancy itself would raise $15 million to buy the land and create an endowment to fund a privately owned preserve.

At the time, it was the largest capital campaign ever launched by the conservancy. And the plan seemed particularly ambitious, considering that the Oklahoma chapter was only 2 years old.

"I'm sure there were some people," Hamilton says, "who doubted we could do it."

The conservancy took possession of the historic 29,000-acre Barnard Ranch on Nov. 8, 1989, which is considered the preserve's birthday. But officials will celebrate early with an open house at 1 p.m. Sept. 26.

"I like to think of the last 20 years as our start-up phase," Hamilton says. "Now that we're settled in, we can really get to work."

The next 20 years, officials say, will involve "moving conservation off the preserve."

The preserve itself has grown to 39,100 acres. But that's only a fraction of the 3.8-million-acre region known as the Flint Hills, straddling the Oklahoma-Kansas state line with the largest remaining patch of tallgrass prairie on the continent.

"We think of the preserve as an incubation site," Hamilton says, "for encouraging conservation across the wider area."

Toward that goal, in recent years the preserve has developed a sophisticated system of controlled "patch burns" to mimic the role natural grass fires used to play on the open prairie. Hamilton hopes to see the practice spread like wildfire, so to speak, across private ranches in the area.

"Fire is a big part of what we do," he says. "Take away fire, and in a generation or two, the prairie will turn into a woodland."

Along with patch burning, private landowners could adopt methods of "conservation grazing" that are being developed on 12,000 acres set aside for domesticated cattle, to show how ranching can coexist with natural tallgrass.

Hamilton also wants to expand the use of "conservation easements" across the entire Flint Hills region, offering landowners financial compensation for agreeing to give up the right ever to disturb the natural tallgrass with plowing or development.

Easements might prove to be the most effective way to fight wind power, which Hamilton expects to become a major threat to the natural prairie over the next few decades.

While wind power generates clean energy, the vast networks of turbines, roads and power grids can disturb a natural ecosystem just as much as any other industrialization, Hamilton says.

"I think the next 30 or 40 years will be decisive," he says. "Whatever land that is going to be set aside for conservation will be set aside by then, and the rest will eventually be lost forever."

How to get there

To visit the Tallgrass Prairie Preserve, turn north in downtown Pawhuska at the intersection of Kiheka Avenue and U.S. 60 and follow Tallgrass Prairie Preserve signs for about 18 miles to the preserve headquarters. The preserve is open daily from dawn to dusk with no charge for admittance. The gift shop and visitor center is open from March through mid-November.

Michael Overall 581-8383
michael.overall@tulsaworld.com By MICHAEL OVERALL World Staff Writer

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	Report Comment Okie Dutch, Tulsa (9/14/2009 1:14:43 AM) My wife and I have been up to the prairie twice this year. It is quite an asset to Oklahoma. We suggest you drive up and take a look. Dirt and gravel roads are less intrusive to the bison herd than a hardtop would be. Those wooly guys wonder around right next to your vehicle. You have to go to Custer Park or Yellowstone to find a wild life experience like it. Same goes for the deer, coyotes and such. More land can probably be purchased from some of the huge ranches that surround the area in Oklahoma and Kansas. Sooner would mean cheaper, if money can be found for that purpose. I'd love to see a starter herd of pronghorn. They lived here once. The area is too small for cougar, elk, or wolves. They would stray and make themselves a problem.
	Report Comment Okie Dutch, Tulsa (9/14/2009 1:27:01 AM) PS: Bob Hamilton says his main focus is the wild grass, preserving a disappearing asset. That's a good thing and true enough. But I'll bet the funding would be easier to find if we could talk more about reconstructing a historically complete prairie eco-system. The reserve needs to occupy many times its current size in open range land to begin to accomplish that.
	Report Comment Eagle 4, Tulsa (9/13/2009 8:35:19 AM) A preview of the Earth AM(After Man) if our hate and greed are not checked.
	Report Comment owen, Tulsa (9/13/2009 2:41:09 PM) This is a great place to visit. Try to go at least once every season.
	Report Comment WhereIsThought, Raleigh (9/13/2009 10:12:46 AM) Herbert, put a sock in it. Geez, Mr. Buzzkill. I was just telling my friends last night that I was thinking of going up there to photograph Bison today. BISON, not "Commercial Development", you idiot. We're up to our ears in "Commercial Development". There's a Subway Sandwich 40 feet from Turner Falls. Thanks, so much for that.
	Report Comment dustyoutlaw, Tulsa (9/13/2009 4:24:51 PM) This outstanding Tulsa World. Thanks for sharing.
	Report Comment dustyoutlaw, Tulsa (9/14/2009 7:53:34 PM) they should do a public offering. If you put up the money to buy an acre of land or more you get your name on a plaque inside the main lodge or whatever. Most people can't afford to do much but if they could get land out there reasonable and it wasn't too expensive to chip in for an acre I would do that. And I've never been there. Yet.
	Report Comment dustyoutlaw, Tulsa (9/14/2009 7:57:05 PM) It's easier to "sell the idea" of a real Oklahoma "animal safari" site than a grass site. The preservation of prarie grass is, as you say, good and noble. But Marketing is another thing. Could you imagine a million acres sprawling across Oklahoma and Kansas with all kinds of protected and managed wild life? I've been through various drive through "photo safari" places and they can do it without disrupting the wildlife or grass. Great idea.
	Report Comment okie ridgerunner, Small Country Town State Line (9/13/2009 1:19:09 PM) This is wonderful. There is a lot of land and Prairie left.But most of our youth will never know it. A lot of real beauty left, but so many will never see it. Concreat steel and glass is all most care about.what a shame so many are missing out on the real beauty and enjoyments of life.thier minds are on cement ranchs (parking lots) Ball parks, amusement parks and shopping centers and malls.I am glad all do not think like that. are we would be in worse shape than we are in. Thank God some have good sense.
	Report Comment redbeard, Stillwater (9/13/2009 10:59:09 AM) We do need to preserve more of the land in it's original state so our kids can see what this country looked like before it was turned into shopping malls and parking lots.
	Report Comment mayor_maynot, Tulsa (9/14/2009 10:25:56 PM) See Oklahoma First. Try Mt Scott Wild Life Preserve. I used to cruise through buffalo herds On my motorcycle in the moonlight as the herd spanned over the roadway. Arriving on the top of Mt Scott my friends said man you were lucky to get through. But for a minute I was one with the buffalo. I do not reccommend that you try this and I most likely will not attempt it again myself.
	Report Comment Herbert Rogers, Jenks (9/13/2009 7:59:51 AM) Bone-ratteling road: Check Conservation wins over Commercial Development: Check Main focus, Grass: Check

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