Since the last daily update on the 7th, Team Echinacea has been busy! Last week was the start of the mark recapture project lead by Grace and Kyra. Tallgrass prairie in Minnesota currently exists in fragmented and isolated remnants across the state. These plants suffer from inbreeding and reproductive failure due to a lack of compatible mates. Research has shown that prairie plants in these remnants still receive frequent visits from pollinators, but it is unknown if these pollinators are moving between fragmented prairie sites. Therefore, we as a team are studying the movement patterns of a common pollinator, Agapostemon virescens, using mark recapture techniques to analyze movement between isolated Echinacea angustifolia populations in prairie remnants. In order to do this Grace and Kyra have been teaching the team how to do a mark recapture pilot study where we mark Agapostemon virescens with three alternating colors of paint pens on their thorax. There has been many trials and tribulations with finding the right approach and making sure we are getting out quickly and promptly when the time is right, but we are learning and on the right track, and have the beginnings of a great data set!
An update on projects in our remnants sites is also in store. We have also been working on total demo at numerous sites. Our objectives for surveying remnant Echinacea angustifolia populations are twofold this year: Document the spatial location of each flowering plant in every remnant using a GPS unit, and Collect demographic data about the Echinacea plants in each population. Total demo gives us a valuable glimpse into the lives of non-flowering Echinacea including factors that influence survival and population growth. The team has been working hard and taking some exceptional data this year. We’ve even found a few plants with a tag in the 500’s meaning they are plants that we’re originally planted at the start of the Echinacea Project. Now those are some long-lived perennials! We’ve also been working on staking, demoing, and decapitating Echinacea pallida over at Hegg Lake. Echinacea pallida is a species of Echinacea that is not native to Minnesota. It was mistakenly introduced to our study area during a restoration of Hegg Lake WMA, and we don’t know how it may impact our local Echinacea angustifolia so we decapitate it to stop the spread. Be gone pallida!
Finally, for the experimental plot update we’ve been working on adding twist ties to flowering Echinacea heads in plot P1 to get them ready for measuring. Measuring is going to look a little different this year as we are not looking at phenology like we have done in previous years, but I will let Maddie D. discuss that in a future post!
Bonus: currently writing this after being rained in for the afternoon where Gael and I (Maddie S.) were working to stake the transect at Staffanson to get ready for total demo there soon!
This morning most of the team met Jared! He gave us a really nice, knowledgeable, and interesting talk about TOTAL DEMO. We headed to tower to start our introduction to TOTAL DEMO, we as a whole found that it’s really easy (mostly because of the low number of flowers and the fact that it wasn’t 85 degrees) I think we all enjoyed not only learning more about TOTAL DEMO but also being able to do it!
After doing Tower we headed to East of Town Hall to keep doing TOTAL DEMO, and were met by Shawn Papon a worker for US fish and wildlife and he happily explained to us their efforts to restore prairie remnants and how he was so excited to finally meet someone in our team! Shawn said how he has heard of us but never had the opportunity of meeting any of us!
After East of Town Hall we headed back to Hjelm for lunch, and currently we all are working on independent projects while in the watch for a big storm or even hail. Not all of us are excited for hail (I am) Well that was the daily update, I hope you liked it and THERE ARE MORE TO COME SO KEEP READING!
I attached some interesting pictures!
Two Echinaceas tangled with each other.The team with Jared at Tower doing TOTAL DEMO.“Freaky” Echinacea found by Aaron.Sky picture taken by Maddie D.
The Viola Pod experiment has been going well! Pods have been monitored consistently. The following is the data of their pod counts over the past couple weeks.
After four years on Team Echinacea, today is my last official day with the project. As a write this from the Chicago Botanic Garden, it’s hard not to get all retrospective about it. I’ve been on the team for 1/6th of my life! But also, only for about 1/8th of the span of the Echinacea Project’s existence. Now that’s crazy. I feel so fortunate to have been with this project in so many capacities—first as a summer REU student, then a work study, a grad student, and lastly a lab manager/research assistant. My time here has profoundly shaped me as a scientist and person, and I will always be grateful.
My last weeks in the field in Minnesota were at the start of June, first with just Stuart, Maddie, Maddie, and Jared, and then joined by the rest of the summer 2025 team. We got a lot done, and had fun to boot!
During the first week, the Maddies, Jared, and I staked, flagged, and searched seed addition transects in the remnants. Many seedlings juveniles were found!
Yummy meter stickMaddie’s car stands sentinel at alfSelfie from my trip to Krusmarks!Jared demonstrates searching a transect at Nice Island
After the rest of the team arrived the following Monday, we did some onboarding activities, including a visit to Staffanson and Hegg Lake. Both these sites burned this spring! This, plus the fact that we burned p1 and p8, means that p1, p2, p3, p4, p5, p7, p8, and p9 all burned this year. Gee whiz! A bountiful harvest lies ahead, I suspect.
The team takes their first steps into StaffansonA thunderhead threatens our day 1 itineraryStuart surveys Hegg Lake
The other big activity/accomplishment from this week (at least when I was there) was flagging p1. Usually, this is an endeavor that takes at least a couple days. However, with a brief head start and Ruth’s help, the team was able to flag the entire plot in one day! We benefitted from the fact that p1 burned in the spring because old pin flags, staples, and plants were easier to find. Huzzah!
Gael, Aaron, Kyra, and RuthLook at that progress!Hooray! Done! I’m so proud
After my last day in the field, Wednesday the 18th, the team gathered at Elk Lake for a potluck and swimming. Everyone brought delicious food, from fruit to beans to pasta salads to baked goods. Sooo satiated. After some diving shenanigans, the Maddies and I headed to the last stop on my Hoffman bucket list: Bullfrogs. Bullfrogs was not hoppin’, but we still got in a couple rounds of Maddie Sadler trouncing us at pool. The next day, my dad picked me up to fish for smallmouth bass (classic) east of Sauk Centre before we headed back to the cities.
Elk lake, pretty as everIs this allowed? The right ball went in, for what it’s worthCan’t leave without one last fish pic!The summer team at our Elk Lake picnic. Left to right: Stuart, Maddie S, Maddie D, Kyra, Grace, Aaron, Gael, and Chelsea. Summer team not pictured: Britney, kinda Grace H, kinda Jared, kinda Ruth, kinda me, kinda others
Side note – I recently acquired a bare-bones digital point-and-shoot camera and have been enjoying clicking it at people. Below are two unique reactions to realizing your photo is being taken.
Smile!Or that.
Now that the recent field pics are posted, I want to leave off with some of my fav pictures/moments/memories from the last few years that may or may not have made it on the flog before.
Burning:
Maddie runs the torch in the paddocks (Spring 2025)Hulze after a fire. Pure satisfaction. Third time’s the charm! (Spring 2024)Smoky torgen burn! Not all our smoke (Spring 2024)A paddock burns behind a private property sign. Not the best time to trespass, anyway (Fall 2023)Me and Rina at my first burn ever in Dixon Prairie at CBG (Fall 2022)
Flora and Fauna:
A white Liatris aspera? (Summer 2021)A friend among foes (Summer 2023)A triple lily we found during the orchid trip! (Summer 2024)Does Abby count as fauna? Anyway, look at all those asters (et al.)! (Summer 2024)
Minnesota skies:
Ian with a canoe before sunrise (Summer 2024)A storm cloud carrying baseball-sized hail (Summer 2024)The Elk Lake house at dawn (Summer 2021)Abby stands in a just-burned paddock at sunset. I love this photo. (Fall 2023)
Shenanigans:
Lindsey proudly picks up litter (Spring 2023)Jan, Abby, Luke, and me on a weekend trip to Duluth (Summer 2023)Wyatt + Abby Prairie Gothic (Summer 2024)Mia and Allie play cards in my van (RIP) while we wait out the rain during the orchid trip. Note the donuts (Summer 2021)I inadvertently discover the site “woeth” (Summer 2024)Swany White flour and oats are strapped in! (Summer 2024)Alex enjoys a tamale during our Chicago Independent Bookstore Day outing (Spring 2023)Ian and Abby pose with our canoe setup (Summer 2024)
Thank you to everyone who’s made the last few years on the team such a treat. I’ll miss the prairie immensely during my upcoming stint in California, but there’s something to be said for new adventures, too. I’ll see you around!
New members of team Echinacea! This week, we moved in our newest members—goats. The goats assist in weed removal. These animals are particularly good at removing the persistent and invasive buckthorn from patches around Hjelm. They’re also great for team morale. We have also had some time with Gretel and Stuart’s dog (Blue) and cat (Teenie).
Demography and surveying Echinacea angustifolia is a long-lived perennial, but we are unsure how long they actually live. To track individual plant lifespans, we “demo” every season. This marks the 30th year of demography data for the Echinacea Project! This week, we have made good headway demo-ing and surveying the remnant prairie field sites. As a team, we have taken demography on over 300 plants in the past two days. Our high school and REU students practiced their echinacea spotting, visor usage, and GPS skills.
Pollinator projects REU interns Grace and Kyra have solidified their experimental design on their pollinator mark and recapture project. We used nets and vials to capture local honey bees as practice before we move on to bee populations in the remnants. To mark them, we placed the bees in our constructed “bee plungers”, easing them to the top of a mesh-covered tube, where we could them use paint marks to place tiny dots on their abdomens. The order and color of these dots will allow Grace and Kyra to keep track of each individual bee that they capture throughout the project.
The project I will be working on this summer is transplanting and growing Comandra umbellata with either its field host or with a Galium boreale plug. Today, I prepared the growing container for the plants. We leveled off the ground, drilled holes in the container, cut and placed the drainage tile, and purchased river rock, black dirt, and beach sand, which we used to fill the container. See pictures below.
The next step is to decide which sites and which plants we are going to collect. Finally, we will plant the plants in the growing container and record observations about their growth.
Yesterday Team Echinacea took the afternoon to do some transplanting in P8. We planted 4 different species: Dichanthelium leibergii, Solidago missouriensis, Bromus kalmii, and Carex bicknellii. All of these species we want to establish in P8 because seed collection is very difficult and by starting plants from plugs we hope to establish enough plants to be able to successfully collect seeds to distribute in other areas of the experimental plot. These species are of interest to prairie restorationist and could serve a basis for future projects by members of the Echinacea Project. Solidago missouriensis are a colonel species but flower infrequently making them hard to collect seed from. In the past we have had another member of team Echinacea research Dichanthelium leibergii and could be used as a great focal species to conduct a future study on pollination biology.
The transplanting yesterday also served as good experience for folks to come together and design a plot together, get experience flagging out a new plot, as well as give them good experience with planting different types of plugs in different settings. Everyone did a great job in working together and delegating tasks and got 120 plants planted in only ~90 minutes!
Planting List:
Species
# of plugs planted
Dichanthelium leibergii
40
Solidago missouriensis
20
Bromus kalmii
30
Carex bicknellii
30
Bonus Update: The robin babies are growing up and getting big enough to watch while at lunch. Soon enough they’ll be off on their own!
Today we went to the surrounding areas of P1 and P8 —Experimental Plot number 1 and Experimental Plot number 8 respectively— to take care of the weeds found in those places (birdsfoot trefoil aka Lotus corniculatus, and sweet clover aka Melilotus officinalis).
We know that invasive plants have been expanding around the remnants of prairie and that these invasive plants represent a risk for native prairie plants (Echinacea angustifolia, porcupine grass, little bluestem, big bluestem) as they compete for the remaining space and resources, but after trying for some time we have not found a herbicide that eliminates those weeds without damaging native prairie plants, therefore we choose to manually get rid of these weeds. We spent the whole morning getting rid of the invasive plants and we did enjoy it and it made us very happy to make plants happy. 🙂
Grace with a jumping spider found in P8Kyra with the painted turtleFemale painted turtle found near P1Grace with the pile of bird’s foot trefoil by P1Aaron with the longest taproot of the bird’s foot trefoil we extracted (he did)Gael surprised by the amount of bird’s foot trefoil we got rid of
This week the team went out to experimental plot one with one clear goal, locate Hesperostipa Spartea, commonly referred to as Porcupine Grass. The team divided the plots and went off and searched–rows 42-49 were excluded from data collection. With an average time of 13 minutes per row and an extraordinary performance by Gael being the team member with the most data gathered with 17 rows. While the plants were not dry enough for seed collection, they were marked for a quick trip back to gather seeds.
