Monday, September 10, 2012

Prairie Dock



Last Wednesday evening I walked up to Greene Prairie at Grady Tract (UW Arboretum). The prairie was ablaze with prairie dock (shown), saw-tooth sunflowers and goldenrod. Yesterday afternoon I was glad I'd been there earlier in the week, as almost all the prairie dock had gone to seed since then. What a difference a few days make!

If you think it looks similar to a sunflower, you are not mistaken, as they are in the aster family. This plant is generally 3 to 10 feet in height. These particular plants ranged from about 5 to 7 feet in height.




2 comments:

Shelley Munro said...

Yellow is such a cheerful color. I bet they look pretty altogether

Heather said...

Hi Shelley! Between the saw-tooth sunflowers, prairie dock and several variety of goldenrod it truly was amazing. Undulating shades of gold and orange as far as one could see!

Now there are several shades of purple (asters and gentians) mixed in, but you have to really look for them.