Synaptic

I appreciate Zach’s passion for and understanding of the natural world as well as the philosophical questions that he explores in this short journal.

-Mary Stark

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Two months ago, a solid blanket of six-foot-tall grasses towered over my head. The blanket danced with every breeze like an ocean with the come-andgo of the tide. It is hard to believe that in the span of a few minutes, almost all five acres of this prairie was burned to the ground. Less than one month ago, this area was a bare expanse of charred earth. Some crisped, naked stems of stiff goldenrod (Solidago canadensis) were the only signs that a mighty prairie was once there. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers had performed a controlled burn on the area, allowing the dense buildup of grasses to be thinned out.

Now, as if through some magical transformative power, the land is alive once again with fresh green shoots. What was once dead and black is now bursting with life and hope for the future of this ecosystem. The land has transformed itself and bounced back from what some would see as a death sentence. As I waltzed through the prairie, the words of Walt Whitman came to mind: “Oh how can it be that the ground itself does not sicken? / How can you be alive you growths of spring? / How can you furnish health you blood of herbs, roots, orchards, grain?” (Whitman, “This Compost,” 6-8). While I was at the prairie, two themes continued to run through my mind. Looking at the unripe regrowth poking up through the black earth, I pondered the resilience of nature as well as the small pieces of life that make up an entire ecosystem.

Because the area was so open and the plant life was so short, I was able to get a new point of view of the prairie as I freely walked about it. It is bewildering to me to think that these one to two inch tall plants could eventually grow into the large plants that used to dominate the prairie biome. I bent down and observed one small green plant, to see if I could tell what it was going to grow up to be. Judging by the square stem and minty smell it was emanating, I concluded that I was looking at wild bergamot (Monarda fistulosa). There were also countless ankle-high shoots of different kinds of grasses which I could not identify at this point in their life cycle. The smallness of the living things here forced me to be more observant and appreciative of finer details. I kicked over a tuft of partiallyburned dead grass to see what was beneath it. “I found a ball of grass among the [prairie] / and proged it as I passed and went away; / and when I looked I fancied something stirred” (Clare, “Mouse’s Nest,” 1-3). To my surprise, there was a large amount of activity below the surface. It was not a mouse, as the persona in Clare’s poem found, but a bustling ant colony. In this large open place, these hundreds of small creatures had made their home—their society— in a single square foot of space. The tiny black ants frantically rushed around, trying to gather their senses and their eggs and get to safety. Feeling bad for having disturbed their peaceful goings-on, I flipped the grass ball back over in hopes that they could rebuild after the destruction I brought upon their little world. I realized that everywhere I look, invisible or nearly-invisible activities and relationships occur right in front of me. These relationships hold the Earth together, but I simply don’t think about them most of the time.

Just as the ants were able to defy odds to pack such a dense population into such a small space, the prairie ecosystem is able to defy odds by recovering from a fire. What amazes me is that the prairie doesn’t just grow back; it grows back healthier and stronger than before it was burned. An area can be engulfed and consumed by flames, all living things being burnt to the ground, and still manage to recover within a short period of time. Nature truly is magical. With more sunlight available, new plants are able to grow where before they could not. It is a race against time and against other plants to establish a foothold in the prairie before the dominant grasses take over. Akin to the carpe diem theme, the smaller plants must struggle and try to grow quickly before the grasses grow up around them; otherwise the “… flower that smiles to-day, / To-morrow will be dying.” (Herrick, “To the Virgins,” 3-4). As I left the prairie, I had hope that the small, unseen workings of nature will reinforce its resilience and resistance against change brought by human activity. If this little five acre prairie, with its deep roots, can come back from being nothing but burnt black soil, there is hope for the reestablishment of habitats and ecosystems across the world that were thought to be once lost. This prairie’s rebirth is a story of hope and optimism in the face of great adversity. Nature has something to teach us all.

Works Cited

Clare, John. “Mouse’s Nest.” 1832.

Herrick, Robert. “To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time.” 1648.

Whitman, Walt. “This Compost.” Leaves of Grass. 1881.