The Square Meter Project: Week 1

 Chris Helzer, The Prairie Ecologist, is a naturalist and photographer whose fascinating work has inspired me. He conducted a project a couple of years ago in which he photographed a single square meter of a mature prairie every week for a year. In the process, he photographed 113 different species of plants and animals, including 15 plant species, 22 different flies, 18 beetles, and 14 bees. You can watch a brief video of his project. 

I'm going to try my own square meter project on our nascent prairie, just to see what I can observe here. So here are some of the first shots from the dead of winter.

This is my square meter.

The obvious occupant of the space is the tall Alamo Switchgrass plant, one of the "big four" tall-grass prairies.

Switchgrass seed pods or glumes

Inflorescence of the Switchgrass

Switchgrass glume, or seed pod

Switchgrass Inflorescence

The other obvious occupant of the ground is the Little Bluestem, another "big four." In the fall, Little Bluestem takes on a deep red-brown color. The tiny fuzzy white seeds are a treat for the sparrows and meadowlarks in the prairie.

The dried-up rustweed once carpeted the floor of the field in green with tiny white flowers. In the fall, it turned a deep rusty red. 

Rustweed with small bluebonnet plants sprouting around it

Not sure about this one. Possibly a sedge.

In December each year, you can begin to see the Sandyland Bluebonnets appear. These are not the Texas Bluebonnets with flowers bearing the distinctive white tops. These produce entirely blue flowers.

Sandyland Bluebonnets

So once a week, I plan to visit the site and see what shows up besides me.