The SGI Blog
I’m an optimist at heart, which makes the topic of extinction a sobering contrast to my personality. Yet, extinct plants have captured my imagination for some time. . . . When I would attend conferences or talk with other botanists, I would often ask “What extinct plants are known from your State?” I was surprised to discover most botanists had no idea.
How do I fight for the preservation of the rain forests and the indigenous tribes that call them home? How do I stand in front of a bulldozer in SE Asia in defense of an Orangutan’s last tree? How do I make a dent in the marine plastic pollution to which our Tennessee River contributes so much? How do I contribute to a solution when I’m locked into a life of time clock punches, daily commutes (or zoom meetings), and mobile banking notifications? Where does one start?
Anyone who has ever suffered the loss of a special place to “progress” can relate to this blog from SGI’s Chief Ecologist, Theo Witsell. “One of the biggest failures of the conservation movement is that sites that are small, or isolated, or expensive (which are often the rarest and most critical) get sacrificed.”
The Georgia State Botanical Garden and the Georgia Native Plant Initiative are collaborating through a host of programs to “cure plant blindness” in the state. This includes “resetting” the land toward diversity, preventing species extinctions, and providing “cues of care” to those who cannot yet recognize the beauty of a native grassland.
The flat to gently rolling surface of the Cumberland Plateau has grasslands, yet they are hard to come by today. Once common and widespread, these formerly open pine and oak savannas, prairies, glades, and acidic open wetlands have largely disappeared, and with them many of the species they supported. For this reason, the Tennessee Valley Authority is working with SGI to support an inventory and assessment of Rights-of-Way (ROWs) in the Cumberland Plateau, and field work began May 2019.
May 2019 marked the kick-off of SGI’s project exploring and documenting riverscour grasslands in the Big South Fork National River and Recreation Area along the rugged and beautiful Clear Fork River. This work, funded by the National Park Service, will document the flora and plant communities of open habitats in the riparian corridor as well as map populations of rare and invasive species.
Mailing Address: Southeastern Grasslands Institute, Austin Peay State University, PO Box 4394, Clarksville, TN, 37044
