Big Changes on the Prairie: Missouri Botanical Garden Scientists Look to Prairies of the Past to Support Future Conservation

Throughout her iconic Little House book series, Laura Ingalls Wilder shared vivid descriptions of the “waves of green grass” and vibrant wildflowers of the tallgrass prairies in the late-19th century. “When the sun came up, the whole prairie sparkled. Millions of tiny, tiny sparks of color blazed on the grasses,” she wrote in On The Banks Of Plum Creek, first published in 1937. Today, only about 1 percent of those prairies still exist. Remaining prairies can struggle to support native wildflowers and grasses when invasive species take over. To better understand modern prairies and support their conservation, Missouri Botanical Garden scientists used herbarium specimens to study changes in tallgrass prairies over the past 130 years. It is one of the first times scientists have looked at changes in prairie plants over more than a century. “As we continue to see more prairie restoration projects to support this critically threatened ecosystem, data from herbarium specimens can help inform effective conservation techniques for our future,” said Matt Austin, Curator of Biodiversity at the Missouri Botanical Garden and lead author on a 2025 paper on the topic, discussed more below. What is a Prairie? Prairies are temperate grasslands in North America, home to thousands of diverse species of grasses, wildflowers, and animals. Early French explorers used the word “prairie,” which means “meadow” in French, to describe these unfamiliar landscapes. Prairies are one of the rarest, and most biodiverse, ecosystems on Earth. Tallgrass prairies are one of the rarest, and most biodiverse, ecosystems on Earth. These prairies are characterized by grasses like big bluestem that can grow up to 10 feet tall. Historically, these prairies covered most of the Midwest. When the Ingalls family moved to the Osage Diminished Reserve near Independence, Kansas, where Little House on the Prairie is set, the landscape featured vast tallgrass prairies with abundant wildlife. Within Laura Ingalls’ lifetime, European settlers had converted most of America’s prairies to farmland. What can the Herbarium tell us about plants of the past? An herbarium is a collection of preserved plant specimens that are pressed flat, dried, and glued to special paper with a label. The Missouri Botanical Garden has one of the largest herbaria in the world, with 8 million specimens dating back to the 17th century. Researchers can use these specimens to study changes in plants and plant populations over time. Through the Revolutionizing Species Identification project, the Garden’s entire herbarium collection will be available online, creating countless opportunities for research. Getting a big picture of prairies, past and present Thanks to its location in St. Louis, the Garden’s Herbarium includes an abundance of Missouri species, including many prairie specimens. For this study, the team looked at 65,000 digitized herbarium specimens of 522 species to see how the distribution of native and non-native species in tallgrass prairies in Missouri has changed since the 1890s. This study is one of the first to compare abundance of species represented in herbarium specimens to field data of the same species. To ensure they had accurate information, they compared herbarium data to field studies to see if the most common native species in nature were also more common in the Herbarium. They found that generally, the most common species in field surveys of prairies also had more herbarium collections. “This means herbarium data can provide a good first estimate of the distribution of native and non-native species in a particular area,” Austin said. Changes in prairies across Missouri Using this data, the scientists examined if non-native species were more likely to increase than native species. They also compared patterns of change across ecoregions. Missouri comprises three ecoregions: the northern plains, scientifically known as Interior Plain; the Ozarks referred to as Interior Highland; and the Mississippi alluvial plain in the bootheel of the state, referred to as the Atlantic Plain. The data indicated that non-native plant species are expanding more than native species in both the Interior Plain and the Interior Highland. In the Interior Plains, 31% of non-native species increased, and about 6% declined, compared to 12% of native species that increased and nearly 10% declining. For the Interior Plains, 20% of non-natives increased with only 4% declining, while 14% of native species declined and only 13% increased. In the Atlantic Plain, however, prairie plant species decreased over time, regardless of whether they were native or non-native. Only 4% of native species and 2% of non-natives increased, while 14% of native species and 11% of non-natives declined. The team, which included Austin, Smith and Garden Scientist Andrew D. Kaul, along with Matthew Rothendler and Richard B. Primack from Boston University, published the results in a 2025 paper. The paper, “Herbarium specimens reveal regional patterns of tallgrass prairie invasion and changing species abundance across 130 years,” was recently highlighted in the “State of the World’s Plants and Fungi” report from Kew Gardens. While this study focused on tallgrass prairies, the same methods could be applied to study changes in time across any ecosystem, which digitization projects like RSI will enable. How can this support Prairie Conservation Long-term data on the impact of non-native species on prairies provides essential information to support prairie conservation. It can tell scientists where to prioritize prairie restoration and set goals for the diversity of native species. For instance, the data showed the noxious weed Cockspur grass, Echinochloa crus-galli, increased significantly in all three ecoregions. This means scientists could use herbarium specimens to identify problematic invasive species earlier, before their impact has been fully realized. The data can also identify native species in decline, prompting scientists to see if they face broader threats to long-term stability. This data also shows that natives of the Atlantic Plains, which are historically rare, may need special conservation attention as most were in general decline. “Restoring America’s beautiful, and once prevalent, prairies, can be challenging when so much is already lost,” said Kaul, Restoration Scientist in the Garden’s Center for Conservation and Sustainable Development. “This data provides another tool we can use as we assess best practices.” See Prairies at the Missouri Botanical Garden Visitors looking to enjoy the natural beauty of prairies can see prairies both big and small at the Missouri Botanical Garden’s campuses. To see this habitat on a grand scale, visitors can explore 400 acres of prairie plantings at Shaw Nature Reserve in Gray Summit. Since the 1980s, Shaw Nature Reserve has been a leader in native habitat management and restoration, including prairie restoration. The restoration team has collected and planted seeds from more than 200 prairie species. This includes wildflowers like goldenrods and sunflowers, as well as prairie grasses. One recent project, the Wolf Run Grassland, is reclaiming 120 acres for native prairie habitat restoration. On the main Garden grounds, the Lucy and Stanley Lopata Prairie Garden displays colorful ornamental grass, asters, and goldenrod. As part of the Kemper Center for Home Gardening, this display garden offers an example of how home gardeners can recreate Missouri’s vibrant prairies on a smaller scale. Grow a Pocket Prarie in your yard Even on a small scale, planting prairies supports biodiversity. Pocket prairies, or micro prairies, are spaces less than 1 acre in size that feature native prairie species. Consider adding a pocket prairie to your yard to create your own house on the prairie. The wild flowers Ingalls Wilder described like prairie roses, Rosa setigera, larkspur, Delphinium tricorne, and goldenrod, Solidago canadensis, can add sparks of color to your landscape. 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