Hello, and welcome to another edition of Spotlight on Natural Resources. Here with me today is Erin Garrett, and Erin is an Extension Educator with Natural Resources, Environment and Energy. How are you doing today there, Erin?
Erin Garrett: 00:27I'm doing well. How are you doing, Gavin?
Gavin Flure: 00:29I'm doing well myself. So, you know, it's a, we were talking about how busy we've been. So, we're trying
Erin Garrett: 00:36yes, yes
Gavin Flure: 00:37to take a little breather right now to get this thing going here. So, but today we're going to be talking about one of Illinois state symbols here, but it might be one that not a lot of people are very familiar with. You know, our state flower is the violet, our state bird is the cardinal, and our state tree is the white oak. But Erin, we're going to be talking about Illinois state grass. Is that right?
Erin Garrett: 01:05Yes, indeed. So, Illinois does have a state grass. And while that may sound a bit odd, about 17 out of our 50 states actually do have a designated state grass. So ours in Illinois is big bluestem. And you may know the grass by the name Turkey Foot. If you're into Latin at all, the scientific name is Anthropogon gerardii. So lots of different names. But I like to call it big blue for short. And interestingly enough, we're not the only state that chose big bluestem as our state grass, but Missouri also shares the same grass.
Gavin Flure: 01:47Very interesting. I don't really hear a lot about big bluestem myself. So I'm interested to hear what other information you have for us here. Can you tell us a little about the designation process and when and how was big bluestem chosen?
Erin Garrett: 02:05Yeah, so some of the other symbols that you mentioned were designated, you know, close to 100 years ago. So flower, tree, and this is run through the Illinois Department of Natural Resources. So back when this was designated, they were known as Department of Conservation. But essentially, what they did is they put together some options of grasses that you could find in Illinois across the state. And it was put together in a poll that was sent to elementary through college age students across Illinois, and they were able to vote on which grass they wanted to be the state grass. So Big Bluestem came out on top. And this officially happened on 08/31/1989. So it's been a little while. But over thirty years, we've had officially a state grass for Illinois.
Gavin Flure: 02:59Well, is a that's very interesting. And you know, you don't think that it happened such a short time ago either. So, that's a very interesting tidbit of information there. So, yeah, thank you on that one. For those of us unfamiliar with big bluestem, can you tell us why this might have been chosen as the state grass?
Erin Garrett: 03:21Yeah, so big blue is one of kind of the three dominant grasses of the tallgrass prairie. And as the prairie state in Illinois, of course, that was our dominant ecosystem type right that we had across the state prior to agriculture. So because big bluestem is one of those dominant grasses that likely covered most of the state. And today you can still find it in prairies, in savannahs, and of course along roadsides. So that's kind of why it's been it makes sense that it was chosen right for our state to represent our state.
Erin Garrett: 04:01A little bit if you're unfamiliar with Big Bluestem, the name is fitting because it is large in size, it can get six to eight feet tall when fully grown. So you might not realize that some of our grasses do get that tall and robust, but Big Blue is one of those, especially you know, in the tall grass prairie, as opposed to like a mixed or a short grass prairie, the size of the grasses classify the type prairie. And it's also something that we call warm season grass. So that means that it puts out much of its growth and flowers in the heat of the summer. So if you were out right now, as we're in late September, you would see big bluestem in bloom. But if you were on a hike in May, it wouldn't have been flowering yet. It'd be too early for that.
Gavin Flure: 04:47Wow, that that is a lot of interesting information packed in one little punch there. Yeah, that's interesting. I did not know that it got that that large either.
Erin Garrett: 04:59Yes, yes, it can even get 10 feet sometimes. But yeah, typically six to eight is kind of the normal for that grass.
Gavin Flure: 05:07So how can you tell big bluestem apart from other grasses?
Erin Garrett: 05:12Yeah, so we're going to get into grass identification a little bit. So there's some signs that you can use. And one of the things that you might think right off the bat is, well, it's called bluestem, so obviously it has a blue stem. Well, not necessarily. Really, the stem is usually more red than blue. So for some reason, botanists like to name things that are red, blue, just to I guess confuse us a little bit. So look for a reddish stem. Sometimes it does indeed look blue or purple, but for the most part looks red. Another thing is grass stems are round. Okay, so if you roll them between your fingers, they will roll because it's round. But Big Bluestem and some of our other grasses they have a slightly flattened stem so it's a little bit more football shaped I like to call it. So it will roll but not perfectly so. So that's one way to tell it apart from some other grasses.
Erin Garrett: 06:14And then there's there's another structure that you can look for on a grass that's called a ligule. And a ligule can be found where a leaf joins the stem so kind of at that juncture right at the base of a leaf. If you pull the leaf blade back a little bit, you can look for something called a ligule. And if it's there, it either looks like a membrane, or it can look like a cluster of hairs. And so determining if there's a ligule and what type can help you tell grasses apart. And in big bluestem it has a short membranous ligule so it kind of looks like a whitish piece of skin a little bit. So that's vegetatively how you'd identify it.
Erin Garrett: 06:56But of course, just like if you're looking to identify a flower when you're on a hike and you see a white flower, we can use the flowering part of the grass to identify it a little bit easier. So on big bluestem remember we called it turkey foot, it has a turkey foot shaped flowering cluster. So really what it means is it has three or more finger like clusters of spikelets. Spikelets are grass flowers, and they're attached at a single point. So again, think about the fingers on your hand all attached to the single point. Big Blue is kind of like that. It has all of its little grass flowers, its spikelets all clustered together in those finger like clusters. So that's how to tell. It's hard without a picture, but if you can imagine it in your head, like a turkey foot, if that sticks, that should help you out.
Gavin Flure: 07:51Yeah. I've got some pictures in my head from, you know, my dad and my grandfather raised cattle. So, I try to I'm going back in my memory there to think of what some of the grasses looked like. Yeah. Okay, I think I have an idea. But it's like, okay,
Erin Garrett: 08:09Yeah.
Gavin Flure: 08:09It will be something that I would have to Google a picture for.
Erin Garrett: 08:13But once you see it, it's pretty distinctive. As far as grasses go, it's a pretty easy one, especially with the size, right? If it's six to eight feet tall and it has that, you know, it makes it a little bit easier.
Gavin Flure: 08:24Right. Yeah. So, does big bluestem have wildlife value?
Erin Garrett: 08:30Yes, it does. So thinking about our prairie ecosystem, one thing that's really important is supporting our insects. So our native grasses, big blue included, are used by skipper butterflies as a host plant. So what that means is a host plant is a plant that is eaten by the larval form of an insect, so in this case the caterpillars. So the caterpillars of skipper butterflies will eat grass leaves. That's the food source that they need. Kind of like the milkweed is the host plant for the monarch butterfly, right? Those caterpillars need the milkweed in order. That's what they eat. So skipper caterpillars, they need grass leaves. And then other insects will eat the foliage, like grasshoppers in particular is one that comes to mind. But if we look at other critters, some of the seeds that are produced can be eaten by some birds like sparrows. And then big blue is also considered a good forage grass for our hoofed mammals as well. So it can be used in that regard too.
Gavin Flure: 09:41So I think if I'm not mistaken here, is big bluestem can it be baled for the hoofed mammals there?
Erin Garrett: 09:55I think so. Possibly. I'd have to look into it. As far as I know it's not like the top choice as a forage grass, but if you were you know putting in an area for wildlife, you know, it would be one that you could include and would be eaten.
Gavin Flure: 10:19Very interesting. Can I plant big bluestem?
Erin Garrett: 10:25You can. So depending on what your purpose is, right, we can go home landscape, we could go larger like restoring farmland. You can find Big Bluestem for sale both as a potted plant or as seed. And the best way to find it is at a native plant nursery. But I'd be a little intentional about where you plant it.
Erin Garrett: 10:52So it's very popular in prairie restorations, of course, because you know, it was one of those main grasses. But you often only need a little bit and that can go a long way. So Big Blue is is pretty aggressive in a restoration setting. And our dominant grasses in general are kind of aggressive. So a lot of the times you don't just want a grassy field. If you're trying to make a prairie restoration, you want to include those wildflowers with those forbs or flowering species. So typically, you'd want to establish those flowers for a few years first and then maybe add in some grass seed. And a lot of the time depending on what has happened to the seed bank, some of those grasses may just find their way in on their own, and you don't necessarily have to add them in. So that's, that's at the large scale, and more of a restoration setting. If you want to put big bluestem in your like home landscape, I wouldn't necessarily stick it in the middle of my flower garden.
Erin Garrett: 11:46But I'd save it for more of like a border or kind of a more isolated spot in your garden so that it doesn't spread and push out the other plants. There's definitely ways to use it and incorporate it or put it in a spot and like have it be a bunch grass that's on its own is kind of more of a statement piece that you mow around, right? That would keep it contained. But just throwing it in with all of your other flowering plants might not be the best idea.
Gavin Flure: 12:16Right. Oh, that's, that's some wonderful information there. Thank you very much. You know, where, where can people learn more?
Erin Garrett: 12:25So if you're interested in learning more about grasses in general and how to identify them, I do have a blog that I started this year called Grasses at a Glance. And if you're interested, you can find it at go.illinois.edu/grassblog. And I put up posts every other week, not just about big bluestem, I promise it's about a lot of grasses that you can find in Illinois, how to identify them tips and tricks, lots of pictures and good stuff there. So there's an option to subscribe if you're interested, You can do that or you can just look up if you, you know, have a grass question, you can look through the blog and see if your answer is there. But that's one place to go for for more info.
Gavin Flure: 13:13And this will be included in some of the additional information on the podcast here, so just look for that when you're looking for the podcast. Erin, thank you so much for all of this wonderful information on Big Bluestem today is our main topic. So, thank you so much, Erin. Really appreciate all of your knowledge here. Thank you.
Erin Garrett: 13:36Of course. Thanks for having me, Gavin.
Gavin Flure: 13:38And that concludes this month's edition of Spotlight on Natural Resources. Thank you for listening and have a wonderful day.