Tall Grasses and Open Skies

This landscape preserves a glimpse of the tallgrass prairie that once covered 85 percent of Iowa. By the time of Herbert Hoover's birth in 1874, farmers were converting much of the state's prairie to cropland, and when Hoover was a boy, Isaac Miles raised crops here. In 1971 the National Park Service replanted prairie grasses, complementing the solitude of the president's gravesite and helping control erosion and runoff. Big bluestem, Indian grass, and wild rye now dominate the scene, while shrubs are removed so native grasses can flourish and prescribed fire suppresses trees and shrubs, discourages non-native plants, returns nutrients to the soil, and encourages native plants. Herbert Hoover's love of the outdoors as a boy led to his geology studies at Stanford, his mining career, and his establishment of national parks and forests as president. Grasses grow as tall as 10 feet, and tallgrass prairie plants have extremely deep roots, reaching as much as 12 feet below the surface.

West Branch, Iowa · United States