Bloomin’ Fields of Wildflowers - Naturalist Notes

The flowers are a bloomin’ at the Nature Center and the colors, shapes, and sizes of them are all over the spectrum. While on Fox Ridge or Cottontail Pass trails you’ll find yourself in a prairie restoration spot. These rolling hills are dotted with some wildlife action: bees buzzing or humming birds humming to find sweet nectar from wildflowers.

Here are some of the wildflowers you may see in late summer:

Purple coneflower (Echinacea purpurea). Photo courtesy of the University of Michigan Herbarium.

Smooth Aster (Symphyotrichum laeve). Photo courtesy of the University of Michigan Herbarium.

Wild-bergamot (Monarda fistulosa). Photo courtesy of the University of Michigan Herbarium.

What do the shapes and colors of the coneflower, aster and bergamot remind you of?

Do you know how the nature center keeps the prairie habitats healthy? One way the Nature Center helps maintain healthy prairie habitats is to do prescribed burns. These burns are done every other year at the end of winter/start of spring to revive the soil with nutrients. This year the prescribed burn was completed on March 23, 2021. 

This video documents the process and purpose of prescribed burns. The prescribed burn was organized and facilitated by burn boss David Borneman and his team (David Borneman, LLC).

Submitted by Cass Arsenault, Lead Naturalist, July 2021

Video created and edited by Zach Mork, Guide, March 2021