According to the National Park Service, the tallgrass prairie is “one of the rarest and most endangered ecosystems in the world.” It once covered 167 million acres in the middle of North America, stretching from the Red River Valley in Canada into Texas. Only about 4 percent of the tallgrass prairie that existed before the […]
Neal Smith Wildlife Refuge
Neal Smith Wildlife Refuge’s growing bison population is also restoring long-gone prairie species
On June 4, 1888, the Barnum and Bailey Circus rolled into Keokuk, Iowa with all its wonders — hyenas, lions, leopards, a whole contingent of elephants, trick ponies, trapezists, contortionists, leapers and tumblers and trained monkeys — in tow. But the circus’s manager, J.A. Bailey, the same Bailey of the name Barnum and Bailey, saw […]

