For the past several years we have been investigating effects of prescribed fire on native ground-nesting bees in remnant prairies and restorations across our fragmented prairie landscape. We have a paper about effects of fire on the abundance and diversity of nesting bees in prep for a peer-reviewed journal. We are posting recommendations from this investigation now as a one-page non-technical document.
Funding for this project was provided by the Minnesota Environment and Natural Resources Trust Fund as recommended by the Legislative-Citizen Commission on Minnesota Resources (LCCMR) and by the National Science Foundation.
For the past few years we have been studying effects of prescribed fire on pollination, pollinators, and plants across our fragmented prairie landscape. We have a paper about effects of fire on pollen that we are preparing to submit to a peer-reviewed journal. We are posting recommendations from this investigation now as a one-page non-technical document.
Funding for this project was provided by the Minnesota Environment and Natural Resources Trust Fund as recommended by the Legislative-Citizen Commission on Minnesota Resources (LCCMR) and by the National Science Foundation.
For the past few years we have been studying effects of prescribed fire on pollination, pollinators, and plants across our fragmented prairie landscape. We have three papers we are preparing for submission to peer-reviewed journals. From each, we have recommendations for land managers interested in conserving native prairie bees and plants. We are posting these recommendations now in a one-page non-technical format.
The first paper is about prescribed fire effects on pollination and pollinator visitation. Read the recommendations that are based on the paper.
Expect two more one-pagers tomorrow.
Funding for this project was provided by the Minnesota Environment and Natural Resources Trust Fund as recommended by the Legislative-Citizen Commission on Minnesota Resources (LCCMR) and by the National Science Foundation.
The Echinacea Project flog has been silent since shutting down lab activities at the Chicago Botanic Garden. Even though lab work has ceased, other work has been progressing quietly. After Thanksgiving we will post updates.
I want to be in two places at once. I am shutting down & packing up my lab at Chicago Botanic Garden and wrapping up the field season in Minnesota. The lab’s been running for decades and there is a lot of stuff to pack. The annual harvest of Echinacea heads from experimental plots is also underway–this year the crop is big and it’s late due to late spring fires. Two big jobs in two distinct places. Thanks to everyone who is helping!
Due to technical issues I can’t be in two places at once. Please stop by the lab or field site and say hello or goodbye.
Team Echinacea has begun the annual census of Echinacea plants. Each year we census all flowering plants at over 30 prairie sites. Each plant gets a digital census record, a flag, and a tag. Most plants already have a tag, so we don’t give them a new one. But some have lost their tag or are flowering for the first time, so they need a new tag. New tags this year are numbered starting at 30,001. Plants get neon flags and we will come back and survey them so we can make a map of the location of every plant. Once they get surveyed, we replace the neon flag. All of these efforts help build a long-term dataset about the survival and reproduction of these very long-lived plants. These plants face many challenges living in small prairie patches, but they are tough.
Below is a summary of the number of census records taken so far at nine sites
site rawSite demo.id
1 other 1
2 alf around landfill 11
3 cg common garden 23
4 eelr east elk lake road 19
5 lfe landfill east 118
6 lfw landfill west 99
7 lce loeffler corner east 78
8 lcw loeffler corner west 81
9 rrxx railroad crossing 36
Amy Waananen’s just had a paper published in New Phytologist. She reports how the difference in flowering time of a plant’s two parents influences the plant’s fitness. Many researchers have investigated how differences in the location of parents (close or far) influences progeny fitness. Few, if any, have investigated how differences in flowering time affects progeny fitness.
Differences in flowering time are not as straightforward as differences in location. In space, parents can be far or close and we use distance to measure it. To state the obvious, negative distances do not makes sense. In time, parents can be far (asynchronous) or near (synchronous). But maternal plants can be earlier or later than paternal plants. This aspect of distance in time is fundamentally different than distance in space. Amy used positive and negative values to indicate which parent flowered earlier. Remarkably, this perspective really mattered to the fitness of progeny. Wow!
Amy’s discovery is really cool, it’s a surprise, and it’s a useful contribution to basic science. Amy also suggested some non-intuitive management strategies that can help promote plant fitness and resilience of populations in the face of changing environments.
Here’s the citation:
Waananen, A., Ison, J.L., Wagenius, S. and Shaw, R.G. 2025. The fitness effects of outcrossing distance depend on parental flowering phenology in fragmented populations of a tallgrass prairie forb. New Phytologist. https://doi.org/10.1111/nph.70240
Ian Roberts presented his thesis research “Impacts of Prescribed Fire and Land Use History on Ground Nesting Bees” at the Chicago Botanic Garden on April 30th. The presentation was well received by those attendees in the room and those who attended via zoom. After the public presentation, Ian successfully defend his Masters thesis for the program in Plant Biology and Conservation at NU. Congratulations, Ian!
Ian’s research advances our understanding of ground nesting bees, prescribed fires, and nesting habitat for bees in remnant and restored tallgrass prairie. Stay tuned for a publication and recommendations for land managers!
This is part of our project “How Do Prescribed Fires Affect Native Prairie Bees?”
Funding for this project was provided by the Minnesota Environment and Natural Resources Trust Fund as recommended by the Legislative-Citizen Commission on Minnesota Resources (LCCMR).
Jared gave a presentation at the Chicago Plant Science Symposium on April 19th about our big prescribed fire experiment. He focused this talk on fire effects on plant reproduction & demography.
This is part of our project “How Do Prescribed Fires Affect Native Prairie Bees?”
Funding for this project was provided by the Minnesota Environment and Natural Resources Trust Fund as recommended by the Legislative-Citizen Commission on Minnesota Resources (LCCMR).
Emma presented results of her honor’s project at the poster symposium on April 15th at the U of MN. Emma assessed concentrations of several types of sugar in nectar collected from tiny florets of Echinacea plants. We are learning how prescribed fire affects sugars in nectar because nectar is an important food for pollinators, like bees. Emma worked in the lab of Dr. Rahul Roi at St Catherine University and was advised by Dr. Ruth Shaw at University of Minnesota. We are so proud of Emma!
Emma presenting her poster with Rahul & Ruth.
This is part of our project “How Do Prescribed Fires Affect Native Prairie Bees?”
Funding for this project was provided by the Minnesota Environment and Natural Resources Trust Fund as recommended by the Legislative-Citizen Commission on Minnesota Resources (LCCMR).
