Depending upon how Midwest and Continental high and low pressure systems line up, rain may be hard to come by, or just right, or too much in certain places. The variations of how weather systems develop is an always changing set of circumstances.

I am seriously sympathetic to fellow Iowans in northwest and north-central Iowa who over the past week did receive much more rain than usual. Those heavy rain patterns simply followed the same track over and over again to inundate many areas with too much water too quickly. The excess water had nowhere to go but into every watershed stream and river, filling area rivers to overcapacity. The result was severe flooding in many communities in northern Iowa. Recovery will be a long process. Resilient Iowans will recover.

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Prairie habitats are now in full growth mode, thriving under full sunshine in some of the warmest, driest, sandy or loamy soil types. Iowa native grasslands, at the time of settlement, covered about 85 percent of Iowa. An additional 13 percent was forest lands and the final two percent was water in river systems and natural wetlands and lakes.

The Marietta Sand Prairie offers immense opportunities to enjoy, study and appreciate a diverse mix of native grasses and forbs at this time of year. From now and all the way through the fall season, native prairies will be putting on a show of new and different plant types.

The Marietta Sand Prairie began as a 17 acre acquisition in 1983. It has been documented by botanists who marvel at its diversity of common to not-so-common prairie plant types.

Because of these unique plant associations growing on fine wind blown sand deposits, many species of unique plant life thrive here. Botanists took serious note of these factors, and on Sept. 6, 1984, the original 17 acre acquisition was dedicated into Iowa’s State Preserves System. This protection offered within State Preserve status provides the maximum legal standing for public land.

Several years later, the adjacent land was purchased to add 212 acres to the Marietta Sand Prairie. Onto these lands, native prairie seeds were planted to reconstruct prairie vegetation. It has been a success story for conservation.

You might ask, how did the vicinity of the Marietta Sand Prairie come to have so much fine grained sandy soils? The answer is a geologic marvel of time.

I’ll condense it for you into several general past climatic conditions spanning 2.6 million years. Now fast forward to about 90,000 years ago. Yes, that is a long time indeed but that was the general time frame of the beginning of the last glacial episode, named the Wisconsinan by geologists.

Thick ice layers from Canada pushed southward from Washington State to Maine. Ice also pushed through the Dakotas and Minnesota into Iowa. I noted this was the beginning of this last glacial phase. The ice endured for another 70,000 years before the earth naturally began to re-warm, putting into place a long term trend of more melting of the glacier than was advancing. In fact, ice movement stalled out numerous times in a back and forth sequence of push/pulls until finally the ice margin was in full retreat.

A word is required here to help put earth’s glacial histories in context. Over the last 2.6 million years, the northern hemisphere has seen 33 glacial advances and in between those maximums, 33 inter-glacial warmer times.

While glacial system maximums were long and enduring, interglacial times were typically much shorter, only about 20,000 years. Grasping and understanding geologic time frames is a hard concept to deal with.

But it was real, and still remains a power of nature that is unstoppable in its cycles. Of the many glacial advances in North America, and for the Midwest, some ice advances covered all of Iowa and even into north central Missouri.

In fact, the course of the present day Missouri River between Kansas City and St. Louis was defined by an ice margin. When that phase of glaciation began to retreat, water flowing from under, within, from the top of the deteriorating ice margins carved a river channel of immense

size.

You can see that today if you travel into Missouri and see extensive broad flat floodplain lowlands before you finally cross a bridge over the present day Missouri River. Of all the glacial advances, not all were of the same duration or intensity. Interglacial warm times were also varied in duration.

However, in the long run, and leading up to the times we live in now, the current interglacial phase is where we humans live, work and prosper. So, not too long ago geologically speaking, when the Wisconsinan ice was retreating toward Minnesota and eventually into Canada and into Hudson Bay, the landscape left behind was a gently undulating but largely flat terrain.

On these glacially exposed soils grew low lying tundra plants, and later boreal forests, and later still a mix of boreal trees and deciduous trees. And as the climate continued to keep getting naturally warmer and dryer over thousands of years, grasses became a dominant vegetation type.

It was during ice edge retreats, and the melting of ice margins, that exposed ground up till (primitive soils) were free to be moved by tremendous scouring winds coming off the glacial ice surfaces. Those winds were so strong that any exposed soil grains were lifted and suspended into the air. Like a great dust bowl type storm front, repeated sand storms blew from the northwest to the southeast.

Such was the case in the area we now call the Marietta Sand Prairie. Large sand dune deposits were made in a large area between the south end of Mormon Ridge, the Iowa River floodplain, and the rolling hills we know of now lying west of Marshalltown. Sand deposits over time reached over 30 feet deep at the Sand Prairie.

It is upon these old sand dune deposits that finally, over thousands of years, a stabilizing vegetative mat of grasses and forbs took root. The grasses held the sand tight in the grip of many types of prairie plant roots.

It was this unique combination of geologic time, wind blown sands, and the give and take of plant adaptations that we celebrate today in the site we call the Marietta Sand Prairie.

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Just one prairie plant out of hundreds is featured today, the Pale Purple Coneflower (Echinacea pallida). It is a herbaceous perennial native to North America.

Its name is derived from the Greek word Echinos because of its resemblance to a hedgehog or sea urchin. The center spiny cone is that resemblance.

The plant grows up to three feet tall and has a strong stem with numerous simple leaves that are hairy on both top and bottom surfaces. Pale pink flowers bloom in late June and July for about three weeks. The blossom petals span about three inches and the central spiny knob-like cone is reddish brown.

Pollen inside the cone is sought after by insects. Soil preferences are broad, but in general, it likes well-drained sites in full sun. A long tap root ensures contact with moisture deep underground.

This plant is drought tolerant, and this plant is widely adapted to and used in landscape settings in urban and home locations. It is waiting for you to examine closely when you visit the Marietta Sand Prairie.

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There will be clarifications and changes to Iowa hunting season regulations for 2024-25. Here is a very brief summary regarding waterfowl, deer and fur harvesting.

First, Migratory bird hunting requires hunters to register annually via Go Outdoors Iowa app on a smartphone or via website www.iowadnr.gov/waterfowl. The federal E-Stamp is now valid for the entire hunting season. A physical stamp will be mailed to the address on file after the waterfowl seasons close.

Second: Deer hunters take note. Party hunting for non-residents is not allowed. Residents can do party hunting during Gun season 1, Gun 2 and January antlerless seasons.

Non-residents may hunt as part of a hunting party but must shoot and tag their own deer. This is just a language clarification. Also on deer, population management January Antlerless Season will be available in Allamakee, Winneshiek, Decatur, Appanoose, Monroe, Lucas and Wayne counties if the number of unsold licenses on the third Monday in December exceeds 100. Monona, Harrison, Shelby, Pottawattamie, Mills and Fremont counties will be added to buck-only counties for gun-1 season. Antlerless quotas have changed in 12 counties.

Third: Fur harvesting by persons under age 16 does not require a fur harvester license to trap fur bearing animals if accompanied by a parent, guardian or other competent adult, who does possess a valid furharvester license. There needs to be one adult mentor for each person under age 16.

A digital version of the 2024-25 hunting regulations is available online at www.iowadnr.gov/Hunting/Hunting-Licenses-Laws. Printed copies will be available about Aug. 1. By State Fair time mid-August, printed regulations will be available.

Even though it is early summer, hunters need to be thinking about their responsibilities to comply with regulations, and any changes, prior to the beginning of any specific season come this fall. There will be ample time to bring oneself up to speed with any updates pertaining to

the hunts of interest to you.

And as always, a conversation with a game warden well in advance of season openers is a good thing to do. Game wardens serving and covering in Marshall County are Brett Reece (641-751-0931) or Jeff Barnes (515-290-4907).

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Garry Brandenburg is the retired director of the Marshall County Conservation Board. He is a graduate of Iowa State University with a BS degree in Fish & Wildlife Biology.

Contact him at:

P.O. Box 96

Albion, IA 50005