top of page

 

 

Resources

​

This list was generated as a collaborative effort of the membership of the Iowa Prairie Network. Its primary intended purpose is to provide interested persons with a wide range of information concerning the life of and the life on the prairie.

​

General Background Information:

  • A Brief History of Iowa, Herbert Kersten

  • American Prairies, William K. Smithey

  • Edible Wild Plants of the Prairie, An Ethnobotanical Guide, Kelly Kindscher

  • Fragile Giants, A Natural History of the Loess Hills, Cornelia F. Mutel

  • Handbook for Butterfly Watchers, Robert Michael Pyle

  • How to Know Wildflowers, A New Edition of the American Classic, by Mrs. William Star Dana, originally published in 1893

  • Iowa's Natural Heritage, Iowa Natural Heritage Foundation and Iowa Academy of Science, Tom Cooper, Exec. Editor

  • Jewel of the Plains: Wildflowers of the Great Plains, Grasslands, and Hills, Claude A. Barr

  • Landforms of Iowa, Jean C. Prior

  • Land of the Fragile Giants — Landscapes, Environments, and Peoples of the Loess Hills, Cornelia Mutel and Mary Swander

  • Landscaping for Wildlife, Minnesota Department of Natural Resources

  • Medicinal Wild Plants of the Prairie, An Ethnobotanical Guide, Kelly Kindscher

  • Native Harvests, Recipes and Botanicals of the American Indian, Barrie Kavasch

  • Nature's Heartland, Native Plant Communities of the Great Plains, William Boon and Harlan Groe

  • New Pronouncing Dictionary of Plant Names, 'Florists' Publishing Co.

  • North American Prairie, J. E. Weaver

  • Prairie Directory of North America, C. Adelman and B. L Schwartz. Lawndale Enterprises. 2001.

  • Prairie Plants and Their Environment, A Fifty- Year Study in the Midwest, J. E. Weaver, U of Nebraska Press

  • The Prairie World, David Costello

  • A Sand County Almanac, Aldo Leopold

  • Seasons of the Tall Grass Prairie, A nature Conservancy Book, John Madson

  • Where the Sky Began, Land of the Tallgrass Prairie, John Madson

  • Wild Seasons, Gathering and Cooking Wild Plants of the Great Plains, Kay Young

​

Propagation and Management

  • Bringing Back the Prairie: A Restoration Guide for School and Community Sites, John Stiles

  • A Garden of Wildflowers, 101 Native Species and How to Grow Them, Henry W. Art

  • Going Native: A Prairie Planting Guide, Polk County Conservation Board, Loren Lown

  • Growing and Propagating Wild Flowers, Harry R. Philips

  • Growing Wildflowers, A Gardener's Guide, Marie Sperka

  • How to Manage Small Prairie Fires, Wayne Pauly

  • The New Wild Flowers and How to Grow Them, Edwin F. Steffek

  • A Practical Guide to Prairie Reconstruction, Kurtz Carl.

  • Prairies, Forests, & Wetlands, the Restoration of Natural Landscape Communities in Iowa, Janette R. Thompson

  • The Prairie Garden, 70 Native Plants You Can Grow in Town or Country, J. Robert Smith

  • Prairie Propagation Handbook, Wehr Nature Center, Whitnall Park (Franklin, Wisc) H. W. Rock

  • Restoring the Tallgrass Prairie — An Illustrated Manual for Iowa and the Upper Midwest, Shirley Shirley

  • The Wildflower Gardner's Guide: Midwestern Great Plains, Canadian Prairies, Ed., Henry W. Art

  • Wild Gardening, Richard L. Austin

​

Identification: Keys and Guides

  • Atlas of the Flora of the Great Plains, The Great Plains Flora Association, T. M. Barkley, Editor (Iowa State Press 1977)

  • The Audubon Society Nature Guides, GRASSLANDS, Lauren Brown

  • Distribution Maps of Iowa Prairie Plants, Paul A. Christiansen (Iowa D.O.T.)

  • Field Guide to the Grasses, Sedges and Rushes of the United States, Edward Knobel

  • Flora of the Great Plains, The Great Plains Flora Association, T. M. Barkley, Editor (University Press of Kansas 1986)

  • A Golden Guide: "Flowers", Zin and Martin

  • Grasses, and Identification Guide, Lauren Brown

  • A Guide to Field Identification: Wildflowers of North America, Frank D. Venning

  • Handbook for Butterfly Watchers, Robert Michael Pyle

  • Herbaceous Perennial Plants: Treatise on Their Identification, Culture, and Garden Attributes, Allan M. Armitage

  • How to Know the Grasses, Richard W. Pohl

  • How to Know the Wildflowers, A New Edition of the American Classic, Mrs. William Starr Dana (originally published in 1893)

  • Illinois Wild Flowers, (Illinois State Museum; Popular Science Series Vol. III) John Voss and Virginia S. Eifert

  • An Illustrated Flora of the Northern United States and Canada, in Three Volumes, Nathaniel Lord Britton and Hon. Addison Brown

  • Kansas Prairie Wild Flowers, Clenton E. Owesnby

  • The Key, Floyd Swink

  • Keys to Iowa Vascular Plants, Richard W. Pohl

  • Manual of the Grasses of the United States, (2 Vol.) A. S. Hitchcock

  • Newcomb's Wildflower Guide, L. Newcomb

  • Peterson Field Guide Series, A Field Guide to Wildflowers of Northeast and Northcentral North America, R. T. Peterson and M. McKenny

  • Pods, Wildflowers and Weeds in their Final Beauty, A Visual Guide from Flower…to Pod…to Dried Arrangement, Jane Emertson

  • The Prairie, Swells and Swale, Torkel Korling

  • Spring Flora of Wisconsin, Norman Fassett

  • The Vascular Plants of Iowa – An Annotated Checklist and Natural History, Lawrence J. Eilers and Dean Roosa

  • The Vascular Plants of South Dakota, Theodore Van Bruggen

  • Wildflowers and Weeds, Courtetnay and Zimmerman

  • Wildflowers for Nebraska Landscapes, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Agric. Res. Div. Institute of Agric. And Natural Resources

  • Wildflowers of the Tallgrass Prairie, The Upper Midwest, Sylvan Runkel and Dean Roosa

  • Wildflowers, Grass & Other Plants of the Northern Plains and Black Hills, Theodore Van Bruggen

  • Weeds of the North Central States, North Central Regional Research Publication #281, Bulletin 772 University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

​

The Romance of the Prairie: Fact and Fiction

  • Collecting Iowa’s Prairie History – transcripts of interviews conducted by Jean Eells

  • My Antonia, Willa Cather

  • Pioneers! A Classic novel of the American Prairie, Willa Cather

  • Prairie Memories, Izanna

  • Prairie Poetry, Patricia Kay Armstrong, Ed.

  • Prairiescapes, Photographs by Larry Kanfer

  • PrairieErth, William Least Heat-Moon

  • A Sand County Almanac, Aldo Leopold

bottom of page