Greener Acres

Smack in the middle of Spotsylvania Battlefield lies a grassy oasis threaded by walking paths and topped by an assortment of stone monuments. To the casual observer, it seems the sort of peaceful, if slightly unkempt, field one might find at any number of memorial parks.

But this is no ordinary field. When Jeremy French, a grasslands expert, waded into the plot one rainy day last summer, he immediately spotted indicator species, such as Indian grass and a rare violet, that told him that this particular lea was a remnant of an ancient and endangered ecosystem: the Eastern grassland. Stumbling across these holdovers, which can be hundreds of thousands of years old, is like finding “a living T-rex in the middle of a national park,” said French, while twirling the pyramid-shaped seed head of a native love grass.

The wheels are now in motion to transform this “diamond in the rough,” as he called it, and the staff at Fredericksburg and Spotsylvania National Military Park in Virginia are elated. For years, park staff have struggled to tend this landscape in the absence of sufficient personnel, funding and expertise. With 1,100 acres of open space to maintain and multiple conservation objectives to meet — including the preservation of native habitat and historical resources — the team can’t consistently care for every site. As a result, uninvited guests, such as oak trees and fescue, have crept in over time.

The arrival of French, the director of ecological restoration and stewardship at Southeastern Grasslands Institute, heralded a new age for this struggling savanna. Not only will overwhelmed park staff get help with routine maintenance, they’ll also have the chance to turn the scraggly field into a natural showstopper complete with blazes of color, a profusion of pollinators and the sweet serenades of songbirds. The plan hinges on eliminating the woody invaders through a labor-intensive rotation of mowing, targeted herbicide application and prescribed fire. Once the vegetative competition has been removed, French expects the native species to rebound and a grassland to flourish. 

Spotsylvania Battlefield isn’t the only site about to experience a grassland renaissance. Nearly 40 Eastern national park sites, in states from New Hampshire to Mississippi, are queueing up to take part in a sweeping, five-year-long restoration effort that seeks to revitalize or re-create more than 4,000 acres of native grasslands. The project, which the Southeastern Grasslands Institute is shepherding, supplements existing grassland work at several parks, including Manassas National Battlefield Park and Chesapeake and Ohio Canal National Historical Park, and jump-starts other parks’ nascent efforts. With funding sunsetting in 2028, the timeline is ambitious. But those leading the charge know that, without prompt intervention, national park grasslands will continue to decline or could outright disappear. One National Park Service biologist called it “the moon shot.”

So, why invest in grasslands? For starters, they do yeoman’s work from an ecological standpoint. Vibrant grassland communities consist of a diversity of sedges, rushes, grasses and wildflowers, which buoy a wealth of life — from bugs to birds to badgers. These landscapes filter water, anchor soil and sequester as much as one-third of the world’s terrestrial carbon. In a warmer, drier future, grasslands are also expected to retain their carbon stores during droughts or fires, making them a more reliable sink than forests. What’s more, these spaces — which run the gamut from marshes and barrens to savannas, prairies and grassy woodlands — provide recreational opportunities, such as hiking, birding and picnicking.

Unfortunately, some 90% of the country’s grasslands have been paved over, plowed under or shaded out. And those in the East — home to maybe 10 times more biodiversity than their Plains counterparts — are the most at risk because they’ve been undervalued and understudied, according to French.

One of his goals while overseeing this work is to set the record straight about how extensive this ecosystem once was. “We operated off this basis, or this misunderstanding, that the Eastern United States was this giant deciduous forest,” French said. In reality, around 120 million acres of grassland once blanketed the East; bison grazed in Florida, and prairie chickens pecked across Long Island. Journal entries of early settlers and explorers allude to the sheer beauty and scale of these landscapes, with their poetic descriptions of vast uplands and rolling meadows. Historic maps — rife with names such as The Plains and Prairie Creek — similarly point to the ubiquity of Eastern grasslands.

Some of the parks scheduled for restoration have fields that resemble grasslands, but “they’re not functioning to their highest capacity from a biodiversity perspective,” said Dorothy Borowy, regional ecologist for the Park Service’s National Capital Region.

The process for every plot — whether fallow farm, struggling remnant or riverscour prairie — follows the same general steps. First, French and others walk the land and compile data, a practice that kicked off this past summer at 27 parks, including Gateway National Recreation Area in New York and New Jersey, Shenandoah National Park in Virginia, and Great Smoky Mountains National Park in North Carolina and Tennessee. They document what’s growing, identify any threatened, rare or invasive species, and determine the site’s climate, soil type and geology. Based on what they find, they develop site-specific plans. If the tract is 15 acres or larger, they might prioritize a design that supports grassland birds, whose populations are in free fall, having declined 53% across North America since 1970. At battlefield sites, where it’s often important to maintain a viewshed, they might opt for shorter plants. Once the groundwork is out of the way, workers remove unwanted or invasive species, an undertaking that will take years in some parks. Then, native seeds and plugs can be sown and planted, the more locally sourced the better. At Chesapeake and Ohio Canal, for example, park biologists have been harvesting seeds from species with high conservation value, including rare asters and mints, and sending them to a conservation garden for propagation. The resulting plants will help restore several grassland sites within the park.

Part of the challenge — and the fun — of this work is that no two plots are the same. Remnant sites might require extensive prep work but minimal seeding, whereas sites that were recently cultivated for crops might need the reverse. Take George Washington Birthplace National Monument in Virginia, where corn and soybeans have been grown on a 120-acre field for decades. Initial work began after the beans were harvested in the fall; in a couple of years there should be a functioning grassland there. 

Of course, the sowing and planting only gets you so far. Well after project funding fades, park staff will have to continue to combat invasive plants and problem-solve if a new pest appears. In most places, crews will also have to periodically mow or conduct prescribed burns.

“You’re always going to do work out there,” said Joe Calzarette, natural resources program manager at Maryland’s Antietam National Battlefield, one of the parks slated for restoration. “But by and large, you should have a self-sustaining meadow.” That’s his vision for Miller Meadow, a 40-acre expanse he described as “one of the bloodiest fields of the bloodiest day” of the Civil War. In the near future — thanks to the renewed attention — it will be “a mosaic of color and textures and heights.” Besides being aesthetically pleasing, the restored grassland should improve the water quality of Antietam Creek, boost pollinator numbers, provide refuge and forage for grassland birds, and increase habitat connectivity.

“It all works hand in hand,” he said, “and this is a perfect place to do it, here at a park that’s protected.”