At this time the prairie is producing thistle plants all over the place. We think of this plant as something to avoid contact with, but the botanist sees it as Cirsium spp. and Carduus nutans. The flower has a beauty all its own. Can you eat it? Certainly you can!
Tasty midrib of the leaf: Carefully strip off the main part of the leaf, leaving the midrib. It is crisp and has a pleasantly sweet flavor. It is best eaten in the spring and fall.
Flower buds: Pick them when they are about 2/3 their full size. You can dice the buds and toss them into a soup, casserole, pasta dish, stuffing, or stir-fry. If you desire to eat them alone they should be boiled or steamed. Drain the water and season to your taste. Some people consider the buds to be the best part.
Pods and Silk: Pick them when 2/3 their full size. They make a great vegetable. To eat whole pick them when they are under an inch long. For the larger pods you can extract the soft and sweet pre-silk. They can be used in a stew, stir-fry, or eaten as a cooked vegetable. They are excellent with cheese and bread crumbs.
Roots: Dig the taproots before the plant has produced a stalk. Eat raw like a carrot. It is crunchy and sweet. The roots can also be cooked and eaten like a vegetable.
Stalks: My father introduced me to the thistle stalk many years ago. It is best before it is mature. Cut a piece of the stalk and carefully remove the leaves. Take a knife and remove the outer fibrous layer by scraping. What is left is crunchy with a mild flavor. It can be eaten to reduce your thirst if you are short of water.
Do you think differently about the thistle now?
Reference: The Forager’s Harvest by Samuel Thayer.
The lady who passed this recipe along said: This is the best thing that
I have ever put in my mouth.
Lemon Verbena Ice Cream
Makes five cups—
Bring the milk to a simmer in a small saucepan over medium heat. Add the ginger, remove pan from the heat, and let the milk steep and cool uncovered.
Process the lemon verbena and sugar in a food processor until the leaves are finely ground, about 1 minute. Stir the lemon verbena sugar into the cooled milk. Strain the mixture through a fine sieve. Refrigerate until chilled.
Whisk the sour cream in a medium mixing bowl to smooth it out. Gradually whisk in the lemon verbena milk, then whisk in the lemon juice and salt. Immediately freeze the mixture in an ice cream maker according to the manufacturer’s directions. Serve slightly softened.
Could biodiversity protect humans from disease? Conservationists have long suspected it might, and now they have the evidence to back this up…. See this link to the Newscientist article: http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20327154.800-disease-runs-riot-as-species-disappear.html?full=true&print=true.
The total number of visitors signing in during May was 969. There were 39 states (921) represented with the highest counts after Oklahoma (522) being Kansas and Texas tied with 38 each and Arkansas (29). There were 20 foreign countries with a total of 48 people. Germany had the most visitors with 8. We added three new countries in May when we had visitors from Chile, Hungary and Portugal. Just for a little history concerning number of visitors in May, we had 810 in both 2006 and 2007, 941 in 2008, and now 969 in 2009.
Please remind the visitors to sign the guest register. The number of visitors
to the Tallgrass Prairie Preserve from Asia in 2008 is shown below:
June was a spectacular month for the prairie wild flowers. I don’t think I have seen the Tallgrass Prairie any prettier. There were large clusters of the same kind of plant in bloom which reminded me of a bright crazy quilt.
Black-eyed Susan was plentiful, along with white Penstemon, White Wild Indigo, purple and white Lemon Mint, Coreopsis, Prairie Larkspur, Showy Evening Primrose, pink Common Milkweed, Green Milkweed, Coreopsis, Fleabane, purple Scurfy Pea, white Yarrow, pink Sensitive Briar, Indian Plantain, Pale Purple Coneflower, purple Lead Plant, and the spectacular orange Butterfly Weed. I am sure I have left some out. Because of the large masses of flowers there were beautiful vistas demanding that a photo be made.
On the long trail, just after passing through the gated fence, the Butterfly Milkweed was profuse. We are used to seeing the Common Milkweed sprinkled over the prairie, but near the place where the Butterfly Milkweed was so prominent, there was a large patch of the Common Milkweed making a wonderful show of bright pink.
I hope most of you were able to go to the prairie last month to enjoy the colorful display only wild flowers can provide.
Most noticed on the hiking trail are scattered clumps of tall grass sometimes
sporting a turkey foot
seed head. This is not Big Bluestem. It is the
granddad
of grasses found in the east and all the way west to Colorado.
It is Eastern Gammagrass, Tripsacum dactyloides. The seed spikes can be 1 to
3 in number and 6 to 10 inches long. The plant can be 3 to 9 feet tall growing
in distinct clumps. Livestock are very fond of this grass and overgrazing can
totally eliminate it from its habitat.
On June 27 Sandra Lemonier and I worked the gift shop. On our way to there in the morning we both had the pleasure of seeing nearly 2000 bison in one group on the west side at the Bison_Loop-Four_Acre junction. What a wonderful sight. Most of them were relaxing, but a few had sex on their mind.
There was only a small group visible coming from Pawhuska. We were delighted
that we could instruct all of the visitors to go west to see an amazing sight.
When going home I went to the west end to get pictures of this large group.
Bison have ways of playing tricks on us Docents. Not a bison in sight! I hated
to think of the many kind
thoughts the visitors had about us.
Back issues of the Docent Newsletter, to February 2009, can be found in the two green and one blue-black zip-binders, stored in the Perspex rack by the file cabinet in the office of the Visitor’s Center.
Deadline for submission of articles for inclusion in the newsletter is the 10th of each month. Publication date is on the 15th. All docents, Nature Conservancy staff, university scientists, philosophers, and historians are welcome to submit articles and pictures about the various preserves in Oklahoma, but of course the Tallgrass Prairie Preserve in particular.