I think I will never see …

Trees blot the landscape. Many will scoff at the idea of a tree as a blemish on the land for the simple fact people love trees, and with good reason. Trees represent life, they offer shelter for wildlife, they give shade on hot afternoons, and they’re completely recyclable. Who could say anything negative about trees?

Without fire, woody plants like the Eastern Red Cedar begin invading the tallgrass prairie.

Trees, however, have a bad side that frequently goes unreported, especially when it comes to their place in nature. We’re talking about the prairie ecosystem, of course, and in that setting it is a story of “trees-gone-wild.”

The problem has to do with how trees treat grass. Left to themselves, the two don’t get along and the trees become bullies. The tallgrass prairie is all about grass and not just any grass, but the most important grass on the planet. For millennia, big and little bluestem, along with side oats gramma and switch grass have nourished bison, cattle, and grasshoppers alike. Eastern gamagrass is a delicacy to young steers and heifers that graze the prairie in early summer. These and other native grasses make the prairie the important ecosystem that it is. None of these grasses, however, can stand up to the power of a tree that wants to dominate the ecosystem.

Trees, however, have earned all the respect among nature lovers, leaving grass in the Rodney Dangerfield role. I mean, nobody ever heard of an ecologically friendly person being called a “grass-hugger.” Trees, when one wants to save the planet, get all the love. Saviors of the planet also talk about forests, forgetting that grasslands have a very good record themselves for removing carbon from the atmosphere.

Early in this country’s history, to better manage environmental resources, the government organized the U.S. Forest Service. Quick, tell me the equivalent for grassland management. The tallgrass prairie, according to estimates, once covered 140 million acres of North America. Most of those acres were turned into farmland or developed into an urban environment. Some of it was also let go to trees, so today only four percent of the original prairie is left.

On the left side of the trail, the prairie is burned annually, but to the right it is burned only once every 20 years. The difference is obvious.

It takes three elements to make a tallgrass prairie. One is climate: too little rain and even tall grasses can’t survive. The second is grazers, which includes grasshoppers if there aren’t enough cattle or bison to do the job. The third is fire, because without fire there would be no prairie. Fire protects the grasses from the invasion of trees.

Not all trees are evil, however. There is a place for woody plants, even in the tallgrass prairie. That place is in the low areas, along creeks and riverbanks. Keeping trees in their place, however, isn’t easy. Burning the prairie to keep out trees doesn’t have to occur every year, but if it stops altogether, then the trees take over. First, the Eastern Red Cedar begins to grow, eventually shutting out the grasses. Other woody materials soon enter the picture, until hardwoods control the landscape.

It should be noted how red cedars spread. These evergreen trees produce a small purplish-blue fruit that birds like to eat. The seeds pass through the birds and are passed onto the ground where they take root and grow. So whenever you see a red cedar, you know what part of a bird it came from.

That’s why those who love the prairie aren’t thrilled by the sight of a tree. Grass may not get the same respect of a tree, but it deserves it. In his book, PrairyErth, author William Least Heat-Moon is asked, “How do you know when the prairie is in you?” He responds, “When you see a tree as an eyesore.”