Prairie grass takes on global warming

AUSTIN (KXAN) - An effort to restore native prairie grass at the former Mueller Airport in East Austin is not just a beauty thing. It is part of a larger attempt to use the gifts provided by "Mother Nature" to help save her.

First some background: Airplanes and deer along runways do not mix well. The animals, attracted to grazing opportunities on either side of the concrete landing and takeoff strips, sometimes wander onto the runways themselves. Collisions with landing or departing aircraft are extremely dangerous for the animals and the humans on board the planes. So, the grass is routinely mowed to discourage the deer. The trouble is the mowing also discourages the grass and some of the plants are very valuable.

In the 19th century, settlers arriving in Central Texas from the East encountered seas of grass, tall expanses blowing in the wind as far as the eye could see.

"Blackland Prairie used to stretch all the way from San Antonio pretty much up to the Red River," said restoration ecologist Dr. Mark Simmons.

He is a research scientist at the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center in Southwest Austin.

"And it's just one part of the 'tall grass prairie system,' which of course, goes all the way up to Canada," Simmons continued."So this is a big system, but it's all gone under the plow, to a large extent, or been developed on."

Which brings us back to the old airport. When workers mowed down the deer chow, they often destroyed ancient specimens of "little bluestem grass," one of the species of "tall grass" that made up the prairie system. Here and there, however, in tiny nooks and crannies where the large mowing machines could not go, pockets of little bluestem survived. Then the City of Austin moved its old Mueller Airport to the former Bergstrom Air Force Base in the Southeast part of town and renamed it, Austin Bergstrom International Airport.

The city partnered with Catellus Development Group to create a "new-urbanist" community on the Mueller site, complete with at least 4,600 single-family and multi-family homes and a variety of other amenities, including 140 acres of parks and open space. That's where Simmons entered the picture. The developers sought out the expertise of the wildflower center and Simmons answered the call. He walked the old runways, carefully looking for signs of native plants. He was flabbergasted when he found thriving specimens of little bluestem.

"It's a remarkable plant," said Simmons. "Of all the plants in the prairie, this is a real survivor."

Plowing by farmers, over-grazing by ranchers and urban development by city people virtually wiped out the prairies. In fact, according to the scientist, the Texas Blackland Prairie once covered 15 million acres of the state. Now that total is down to just a few thousand acres, less than one-tenth of one percent of the original amount. In the small samples of little bluestem, Simmons saw a way to restore the system.

The plants were dug up and taken to the wildflower center where they were nurtured back to health. Then, on March 13, Simmons led a team of volunteers, residents and employees of the Mueller Development, on a restoration mission. The little bluestem grass was replanted in the 2.5 acre Southwest Greenway, part of the development's new green space. Barring a "ten-year drought," Simmons predicts a full native prairie restoration on the site, offering modern residents a chance to imagine what their ancestors saw when they first set foot in this country.

As thrilling as that sight might be, however, it is only one positive development that could ensue from the restoration.

"One of the things about prairie is: It's important for our own health," said Simmons. "It creates oxygen; it cools things down; it infiltrates water; it cleans water, and in this day and age, it even does things really well like fixes carbon below ground. In these days of concern about carbon dioxide, prairie is one of the best ways to actually get CO2 from the air, down into the soil and lock it up there for hundreds of thousands of years."

Granted, a couple of acres of restored prairie in the middle of a growing city will not, by itself, make much of a dent in global warming. Simmons, though, sees the project as a demonstration of what can happen if people come to understand the importance of the grasslands and get behind broader restoration efforts.

"You know, we don't have a rain forest here, he said. "We can't fix that directly. Here's something we can fix directly and we have this massive educational potential to tell people, 'Hey, this has a value. We need to think very carefully about either destroying what's left or even putting it back. We can recreate this.' So I think it's quite a hopeful story to tell."