Research Report: Survival of the western prairie fringed orchid at Pipestone
Willson GD and Akyuz FA. 2010. Research Report: Survival of the western prairie fringed orchid at Pipestone. Park Science. 27(1):50–55
A small population of the threatened western prairie fringed orchid (Platanthera praeclara) occurs at Pipestone National Monument, Minnesota, in a tallgrass prairie with shallow soil and altered hydrology. During dry years, the population at Pipestone may be subject to greater moisture stress and lower survival than plants growing in other orchid habitat with deeper soils and intact hydrology. For a nine-year period we monitored the survival of 30 flowering plants at marked locations at Pipestone and compared the results with those from another monitoring study of orchid survival in unaltered habitat at Sheyenne National Grassland, North Dakota. We found plants were short-lived at both Pipestone and Sheyenne (half-lives of one to two years) and few surviving plants flowered again after the second year at Pipestone. The low survival of flowering orchids at Sheyenne following one dry year suggests that even in habitats with intact hydrology, below-normal precipitation can substantially lower survival in this species. Following a very dry year or series of dry years, survival of plants at Pipestone could be very low. Restoration of the natural hydrology at Pipestone might enhance survival but is unlikely considering the costs and likely opposition. We recommend the suspension of prescription burns at Pipestone during extended dry periods to avoid possible further lowering of survival.
- Type
- Journal Article
- Authors
- Willson, Gary; Akyuz, F.
- Units
- NRSS , PIPE
- Keywords
- Hydrology, Pipestone National Monument, Prescribed Fire, Restoration, Sheyenne National Grassland, Western Prairie Fringed Orchid