Thanks for posting the editorial. It was interesting and
thought-provoking.
One small point -- I wish that we could encourage the REGISTER
and other media to use another term for what the wind now sweeps
across in Iowa besides "prairies."
(Plains? Rolling fields? Landscape?)
Those of us in the conservation community know that Iowa only has about
30,000 acres of surviving prairie left on our 36,000,000
acres, which is about three tenths of one percent of the original
amount. And even if one added in public and private
prairie reconstructions and (very generously) CRP native
grass plantings, we're still not talking about much land for
the winds to sweep across.
It wouldn't be as picturesque to talk about the
"abundant winds sweeping across Iowa's rowcrops and pastures."
But it wouldn't be misleading and it wouldn't add to any conscious or
subconscious public misperception that there are plenty of prairies left.
ch
Cindy
Hildebrand
[log in to unmask]
Ames, IA 50010
"The heaviest
timber land can be purchased for from $5.00 to $12.00 per acre. There are black
and white walnut, basswood, different kinds of oaks, elms, etc....Of the
fertility of the soil -- it can't be excelled. The prairie is rolling, a most
magnificent sight." (Arden B. Holcomb describing Boone County, Iowa, in
1855.)