This summer, we harvested 330 Echinacea angustifolia heads from 23 prairie remnants. Remnant harvest started on August 16th and ended on September 14th, when we finally collected the last 4 heads, 3 at Steven’s Approach and 1 at Landfill West. We harvested the most heads on August 23rd, a total of 109 heads in one day. The heads are located in 15 gbags labeled RA-RP (there is no gbag RJ).
We only visited sites where we recorded phenology this summer, so we harvested from fewer sites than last year. We did not harvest from Aanenson, East Elk Lake Road, Near Town Hall, On 27, Riley, Railroad, or Town Hall.
Volunteers Luk and Sue clean rem2022 heads in the lab
After Manogya and I completed data entry on the harvest list, I inventoried all of the bags that we brought back to the lab. There were a few mysteries to solve. We had several extra heads, but they mostly turned out to be heads that were supposed to be harvested, but someone forgot to check them off on the harvest datasheet, so it looked like they were missing. However, there was one perplexing puzzle that took some sleuthing to unravel. Two different people claimed to have harvested a head with a black twist tie from plant 18066 at Landfill West. In the lab, I found two heads with black twist ties labeled 18066, but I knew that they couldn’t both be the same plant. I donned my Sherlock hat and examined all the available evidence: survey, demography, and phenology data. From the survey data, I figured out that plant 18066’s neighbor, plant 27711, also had a head with black twist tie, so one of the duplicate heads was likely from the nearby plant. The phenology data revealed that 27711’s head had white gunk on it during the summer, and it had more rows of achenes than 18066’s head. Sure enough, one of the heads was larger than the other and had a speck of white on it. Mystery solved! I removed the imposter from the bag of heads to clean.
The volunteers started cleaning the 2022 remnant heads on October 11th. They are currently working on gbag RE, bag 5 of 15, so they are making great progress.
After a successful field season, Team Echinacea has moved back to the lab at the Chicago Botanic Garden.
Today, I received a cryptic email from CBG suggesting that there were free items left over from the Roadside Flower Sale, and they were located in Briller Hall, next to the pole barn. Lindsey and I decided to investigate, but we had never heard of Briller Hall or the pole barn. We looked for them on the map of the Garden, but they weren’t listed. We hunted for them on CBG’s website, but there were no search results. Mystified, we asked the volunteers in the lab whether these were real buildings. Neither Allen nor Char had been there, but Allen recognized the names and thought that they were located somewhere nearby. Determined to identify the elusive Roadside Flower Sale, Lindsey and I set off on a quest.
First, we walked south from the lab. We passed the greenhouses and spotted the maintenance sheds, but we didn’t find any pole barns there. How hard could it be to hide a barn? we wondered. When we passed some volunteers who were outside weeding, we asked them if they had heard of Briller Hall. They hadn’t, but they directed us to a CBG worker named Javier who was zipping by on his golf cart. Javier exclaimed that he was on his way to the pole barn just then! He invited us to hop on, so we crammed into the golf cart, and he dropped us off at the secret Briller Hall.
Inside, we found a wide array of marvelous items ranging from bags of acorns to stacks of staplers to a single wooden shoe. We collected many useful items, some for personal craft projects and some for the lab. Our glorious horde included:
5-gallon buckets with lids (they smell rather strongly of lavender potpourri)
duct tape in at least 7 vibrant colors
a sturdy rake for Jared to clear burn breaks
sharp scissors
small notebooks for the summer team’s pouches
a giant hot glue gun for Lindsey’s craft projects
I celebrate the many goodies we found at the top-secret Briller Hall
Overall, we were quite pleased with the success of our reconnaissance mission, and the lab now has a grand supply of staplers, colorful cardstock, and thumb tacks.
To record the flowering phenology of Echinacea, we visit plants every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday morning so we can estimate the flowering start and end date within 2-3 days. During peak flowering in mid-July, the full team spent the whole morning recording phenology. This year was a good flowering year for Echinacea across sites, but fortunately we reduced the number of sites and visited only a subset of plants at larger remnants and those that burned this year.
Remnant phenology is currently wrapping up for the summer. Most of the plants are done flowering now, and we have stopped visiting several of the smaller sites. Landfill West is the exception; the site burned in late May, so the plants flowered several weeks later than at other sites.
On Monday morning, the crew split into two groups. Half of the team did remnant phenology, which is going much faster now that most Echinacea are done flowering. The other half did total demo at prairie remnants nrrx and rrx, where we revisited a subset of the plants that flowered in previous years. Johanna made a fabulous illustration for the cover of total demo binder. Can you identify all the prairie species? It was also my birthday on Monday, so we celebrated by eating Stuart’s famous vegan chocolate cake at lunch.
The total demo pros hard at workI spy a lead plant…Cake!
In the afternoon, I joined Kennedy and Johanna to finish total demo at rrx and start on27. At rrx, we spotted several robber flies laying their eggs on Echinacea heads. It was a busy day for insects, and Johanna also spotted two walking sticks climbing through the grass at on27. Overall, it was an excellent birthday!
Biology and Environmental Science, University of Minnesota-Morris 2021
Research Interests
I am interested in studying plant and insect conservation, plant-insect interactions, and the effects of fire on plant reproduction.
Statement
I am from St. Paul, MN, and I joined Team Echinacea as an intern last summer in August. I’m excited to actually see some flowering Echinacea this year! In my spare time, I like to climb trees, bake pastries, and read books about dragons.
A new ice cream store just opened in Morris! Understandably, Mia, Lindsey, and I had to check out its grand opening. Just Chillin’ serves Bridgeman’s ice cream, and we tried the Wolf Tracks, Carmelicious, and Banana Buttercup. The first two flavors passed our rigorous ice cream evaluations, but Mia described the Banana Buttercup as “interesting” in true Minnesotan fashion, which means it wasn’t very good.
The ice cream gang
Since Lindsey had never been to Morris, I had to give a full tour of town. We checked out the creepy, derelict florist shop and drove through the University of Minnesota-Morris campus. We did not spot any horses on campus, unfortunately.
Just chillin’ on the porch swing
Next, we visited the West Central Research and Outreach Center. We wandered through the horticulture garden and found some suspicious ornamental orange Echinacea, which Mia identified as Echinacea purpurea. We also discovered a porch swing and a croquet game. The most challenging obstacle required us to hit the ball up an incline and through a hollow log. Lindsey was a pro croquet player, but Mia and I struggled, and it took us more tries than we would like to admit. If anyone challenges us to a croquet tournament, I’m placing my bets on Lindsey.
Hole in one!Mia struggles with the hollow logAn exhausting ordealThe croquet champion
Last summer, we located 71 Asclepias viridiflora (green milkweed) plants in the remnants, and we collected pods from 22 plants. We brought the seeds back to the Chicago Botanic Garden, where Cathy Thomas propagated them at the production greenhouse. We were hoping for 392 milkweed seedlings, but the seeds germinated better than expected, so we now have 505 baby milkweeds!
On Friday, Jared and I planted 149 Asclepias viridiflora plants south of p8. These plants represented 13 maternal lines. We flagged out five 30-m-long transects. Two transects are partially within the west Andropogon pilot plot, and three transects are partially within the east plot. Along each transect, we dug holes with soil knife 1 m apart, watered the holes, and planted the Asclepias plugs. We placed a toothpick 2 cm north of each plant and recorded the toothpick color. We were glad that we decided to add toothpicks; when I returned to water the milkweed plants, they were already nearly impossible to see!
The west unit of Staffanson burned this spring, so we expect a multitude of flowers this year. When Jared, Lindsey, and I visited Staffanson to stake random points on Wednesday, we noted which plants were flowering after the burn. Here’s what we found, from A to Z:
It’s been a busy spring at the lab: 11 volunteers and 6 students from Northwestern and Lake Forest College contributed to the Echinacea Project. We are currently wrapping up before field season starts, and we want to celebrate everything they accomplished in the last few months! Since January, volunteers and students:
