Seeding the Snow

It surprises people that we sometimes seed the snow.

But it makes the seeds very happy.

The seeds of wild plants don't function best sitting dry in bags all winter.

They are adapted to being cold, and wet.

During periods without snow, to get buried, they are adapted to the freeze thaw-cycle, 

which churns the upper soil and covers up the seeds.

We stewards are busy, and it's important to broadcast seed right. 

We try to broadcast them into the most receptive habitats before the snow falls.

But it's February. Spring is on the way. 

Un-broadcast seeds are eager to get out. 

Our mixes contain hundreds of species.

All different sizes and shapes.

Propagules for flowers of every color.

Grasses, sedges, ferns, lilies, orchids.

Do these seeds look to be scattered awful thin?

Yet this is precious rare stuff. 

And every plant will be wide or tall or compact in different ways when it grows. 

We've tried different densities, and this seems about right. 

Some seeds will be eaten by birds.

But snow is predicted again tonight.

So these will be safer then.

Some species will not be quite right for this habitat.

So they may germinate and die.

Or the seedling may be eaten by a snail.

But many will thrive. We know that, from experience. 

Keep in mind that these rare or uncommon plants

as they mature, will be from six inches to three feet wide

and from a few inches to many feet tall.

Scattered as the seeds are, this space will be full of life.

Here is the before. 

Beautiful, but lonely.

We have cut out the buckthorn.

We have weeded and herbicided the invasives to prepare for this day.

We will cut more pole trees to "let there be more light" next summer.

We will pull noxious weeds for a year or two -

while this patch still needs intensive care.

But now it looks like this.

Formerly pristine snow trampled in concentric circles.

Enigmatic specks de-purify the crystalline whiteness.

Perhaps half the speckles are bits of chaff.

The other half are future life: embryos, swelling with potential. 

Yes, lost nature is returning.

The ecosystem is pleased. 

Afterword - 2023

Volunteer stewards gathered those seeds in 2017 and broadcast them in winter 2018.

The ground under the snow had been mostly bare dirt. The long-ago thriving grasses and wildflowers were then long dead from too much shade.

In fall 2023, after six growing seasons and many burns, this area, Fourth Pond Meadow at Somme Woods, yielded the photo below:

All you see growing in the foreground came from those seeds.

This restored ecosystem is still young. It will be many years before the returning plants and animals have achieved a relatively sustainable, highly-diverse ecosystem maturity.

Some of the easily identifiable vegetation in this photo includes:

Little bluestem - the reddish grass here and there, especially in the lower left.

Prairie dropseed - dense clumps of pale, fine leaves.

Wood reed - tall plumes to the right

Gray goldenrod - all those fluffy seedheads.

Golden Alexanders - leaves still bright green on November 16 when this photo was taken.

Indiangrass - tall plumes in the middle distance.

Invader trees - that whole dark stripe at the top of the photo.

Soils and early surveys show that this area was on the edge between oak savanna and prairie. Nearby trees were oaks, well separated, not that cluttered invasive chaos still visible in the distance. Our goal will be to restore quality vegetation throughout, by thinning, weeding, planting, and fire. 

Perhaps 50 other restored species are now common in the open meadow, including wild quinine, prairie dock, rosinweed, compassplant, and quite a few species of conservation concern including savanna blazing star and bearded wheatgrass.

We use different mixes around the trees. Plants doing well there include wood mint, blue-stemmed goldenrod, woodland puccoon, and forked aster.  

Stewards Rebeccah Hartz and Christos Economou continue the work. Last year they planted "plugs" of three important species that do not restore readily by seed - bastard toadflax, pussytoes, and yellow star grass. We also broadcast more seeds in various ways into areas that still need them. Different species emerge from those later plantings. 

The still-poorly-understood drama of recovery will take at least decades to well play out. So perhaps it's fitting to end this updated post with the photo below, Rebeccah's son Micah, here joining the work for the first time. Bless him, Somme Woods, and the future of the planet.