○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ Minnesota School Nature Areas: NOTES ON BENEFITING THE BIOMES by Matt Nielsen and the School Nature Area Project INTRODUCTION Where Are You?. 3 How to Use This Booklet . 3 PART ONE BIOME BASICS The School Nature Minnesota: Touched by Three Biomes . 4 Area Project (SNAP), Climate . 6 a program of St. Olaf College, assists schools Landform . 8 ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ in establishing and using Vegetation . 11 outdoor learning sites for Prairie . 12 environmental education. Deciduous Forests . 14 If you would like more Coniferous Forests . 16 information on this publication, the School Aquatic Communities . 18 Nature Area Project, and grants that may be PART TWO BOUNDING THE BIOMES available for schools to 1854 – 1907 . 21 plan and fund school Surveying the United States . 21 nature area projects, please contact SNAP at Organizing the Landscape for Buying and Selling . 23 1520 St. Olaf Avenue, “Eyewitnesses to Wilderness” . 24 Northfield, MN, 55057, Surveyors Instructions . 25 by phone at Today: Protecting What Remains . 26 507-646-3599, or visit Effects of Settlement on Vegetation Patterns . 26 our World Wide Web site at http://www.stolaf. edu/ Biome Remnants – Protected Sites in Minnesota . 26 other/snap PART THREE SITE CHECKLIST: Guidelines for Planning School Nature Areas SNAP wishes to thank the Diversity . 30 following for their Limited Fragmentation . 31 assistance and generous contributions in the Native Plants . 32 production of this booklet: Rare Species Management . 34 Minnesota Department of Reasonable Access . 35 Natural Resources, the Wildlife Habitat . 36 Minneapolis Star Tribune, Dean Savola, University of Minnesota Press, St. Olaf PART FOUR A STEP BY STEP GUIDE FOR CREATING SCHOOL NATURE AREAS College, the Trygg Land Obtain a Base Map . 39 Office of Ely, Wild River Identify the Stakeholders . 39 State Park, Maria The Six Step Process . 39 Thompson, The Cannon 1. Gather Site Information . 40 River Watershed Partner- ship, Beth Holmes of 2. Analyze Objectives . 42 Holmes Art and Design, the 3. Plan Projects . 42 U.S. Environmental 4. Create a Site Plan . 44 Protection Agency, the C.K. 5. Implementation . 45 Blandin Foundation, and 6. Evaluation . 45 the Legislative Commission on Minnesota Resources of the Minnesota State CONCLUSION A Final Thought . 46 Legislature.2 Introduction Produced Spring of 1996, Reprinted in Spring, 1999 ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ How to Use This Booklet INTRODUCTION Whether you are begin- ning a new school nature area, or enhancing an established natural area, this booklet will assist you. The four sections take you from learning about Where Are You? Minnesota’s ecological regions to incorporating this information into a Simply— you are here. But where is here? project plan of your own. Put your finger on the map of Minnesota where you and your home and your Part 1 will familiarize you with the Biomes of nature area are. Imagine flying high above your nature area. Looking far beneath Minnesota from 10,000 you, what do you see? years before present to the time when European ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ settlement was just beginning. This section Perhaps you would describe winding roads surrounded by nature. If you look closely, illustrates three main cutting through forests, or bridges across you’ll discover that where you are is an ecological regions of the lakes and wetlands. Perhaps you’d describe a amazing natural community of living things. state, how they came to be complex “checker-board” of fields, forests, People, green plants and brilliant flowers, and the plant and animal communities that are and city blocks surrounding your nature area. browsing animals and darting birds, insects unique to them. It will help Each of these is certainly a part of where you and spiders and tiny bacteria each have a you locate your nature are. But your nature area is much more. From place where you are. area within them. towering blufflands, rolling prairies, wet- This booklet was produced by the School Part 2 is about the lands teeming with life, ancient bogs, dark Nature Area Project (SNAP) to help you Bounding of the Biomes forests and rocky shores, to fence-rows, farm discover your school nature area’s place in a and illustrates the pace of fields, mown lawns and city blocks, you are world of living things. It will assist you in change within the biomes planning a nature area that is beneficial to in the years following European settlement. It you and Minnesota native plants and animals. explains the system used By exploring the landscape of your nature to identify the biomes’ area, you’ll discover just how natural it is. resources and how the You’ll see how each animal and every plant, biomes’ plant and animal communities have fared. each person past and present, Part Two also provides a has connections to the list of organizations that landscape where you are. protect the best examples Through this connection, of Minnesota’s woodlands, wetlands, and prairies. you may address real environmental problems Part 3 is a Checklist for a and discover ways to protect Natural Area. It suggests and enrich your nature area. Most the general qualities of ecologically healthy nature importantly, involvement in your areas. nature area will provide an opportunity for a closer personal connection with nature. Part 4 is a Step by Step The pages that follow are filled with Guide to creating school nature area projects. It resources that will aid your effort to look at explains how to document your nature area in Minnesota and answer the the existing features of question “where are you?” With the turn of your nature area and how every page useful publications and programs to use this information in a project plan of your own. are identified to assist you in finding more information about your nature area and the larger landscape of which it is a part — what its past was like, what it’s like today, and what it might be like tomorrow. 3 Introduction ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ PART ONE BIOME BASICS BIOME BASICS: Climate, Landform and Vegetation Patterns Minnesota: Touched By Three Biomes Your nature area in Minnesota is a part of one, two or even three large ecological regions, or biomes, that cover over 84,000 square miles of land and ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ inland waters in Minnesota. A biome is a major type of ecosystem with distinctive organisms determined by climate, soil, and landform. Minnesota’s location on the North American conti- nent at the merging of the northern coniferous (or Boreal) forest, eastern decidu- ous forest, and the prairie resulted in tremendous diversity. Each ecological region supports distinct plant and animal communities that together include over two thousand five- hundred species of plants and animals. Although the changes in the past two hundred years have drastically reduced the popula- tions of plants and animals distinct to each biome, the Coniferous conditions that influ- Forest ence their distribution remain. Deciduous Forest Prairie 4 Part One ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ North American Prairie Minnesota is on the northeastern edge of the North America Prairie. The mountain ranges of North America block a large amount of the moisture that moves across the continent from the west. This rain shadow creates a dry, arid climate on the downwind side of the ranges, providing conditions favorable for a mixture of prairie grasses and forbs – or prairie wildflowers. In the west, where there is little moisture, a short grass prairie thrives. As moisture increases toward the east, and the prairie is able to grow taller, a mixed- Minnesota’s Natural grass prairie results. Minnesota is in the Heritage: an Ecological Perspective tallgrass prairie region characterized by John Tester. 1995. $29.95 vegetation reaching six feet or more. The Univ. of Minnesota Press 11030 S. Langely Avenue Chicago, IL 60628 ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ 1-773-1550 1-800-621-8476 (fax) www.upress.umn.edu Unfolding chapter after chapter are the stories of Minnesota’s familiar ecosystems - lakes, rivers, forests, prairies, and wetlands. The books informa- Deciduous Forest tive text and many engaging The North American Deciduous Forest is an maps, diagrams, and ecological region of trees, shrubs and herba- photographs illustrate the ceous plants that are characterized by the loss ecological processes and relationships happening in our of leaves in the winter. Minnesota is on its own backyards. northwestern edge. In Minnesota deciduous forests are found primarily on glaciated soils where there is adequate rainfall and moderate temperature variation. In Minnesota, this Minnesota Volunteer biome forms a boundary between the grass- Magazine lands to the west and the coniferous forests to Minnesota Volunteer the northeast. Circulation, MN - DNR 500 Lafayette Rd St. Paul MN 55155 800-766-6000 (toll free) 651-296-6157 www.dnr.state.mn.us Minnesota residents may request a free subscription to this attractive and informative magazine that presents timely articles and stories about issues affecting Minnesota’s ecological regions. It includes a feature called “Young Naturalists.” Coniferous Forest Minnesota is touched by the southern edge of the Northern Coniferous (or Boreal) Forest. Pines, spruce and fir are typical in this ecological region where the growing season is short, the winters severe and the soils shallow from repeated glaciation.