Scattergood seeks not only to be a refuge from a chaotic world for its students and faculty; it also serves as protective habitat for many wild animals. Walking or cross-country skiing on our 40-acre restored prairie during different times of year will provide glimpses of white tailed deer, pheasants, quail, bobcats, skunks, opossums, rabbits, squirrels, raccoons, field mice, voles, red-tailed hawks, Canada geese, owls, and other animals. Scattergood maintains paths around and through the prairie, and when conditions and timing allow, staff and students use prescribed burning to help maintain grass vitality and to keep too many trees and bushes from becoming established. The prairie is an excellent place to get some exercise and relax, and is an example of one of the many ways the Scattergood landscape is designed to accommodate and encourage biological diversity.

Inclusion into Classes

Although Scattergood students come from a variety of states and countries throughout the world, they quickly become familiar with the Midwestern ecosystem through regular contact with the farm and prairie. Students regularly enjoy the prairie during free time, but they also interact with the prairie through their academic classes. We have had night walks to the pond and prairie to allow students to observe the night sky, and drawing project has recently incorporated an exercise in which students sketched on the prairie. In biology classes, students make observations and collections to understand the prairie ecosystem. Advanced Biology students recently co-authored and received an Iowa Conservation Education Council grant. As part of their science classes, many students also experience the excitement of burning a portion of the prairie, an activity that we do almost every year to help maintain the prairie.

Specific Projects

Iowa Conservation Education Council awarded a $500 grant to a long term burn/no-burn experiment in the Scattergood Friends School Prairie Outdoor Classroom that will be used to study the effects of burning on various aspects of prairie ecology by biology classes and the spring Prairie Restoration Project. Also, other students and staff will be involved in the project through our prairie workdays. This long term experiment will be used to quantitatively study an incredibly wide variety of subjects including the study of vertebrates, invertebrates, and plants, native and non-native plant recruitment, and biodiversity. Also it will provide recreation for students and staff, both by creating a more pleasant place for walks, and prairie workdays to keep the project in shape.

Other recent and current grants for prairie restoration include:
75% cost share on $750 REAP grant from NRCS to reconstruct 5 acres of prairie on an area that was very degraded.

60% cost share on 17,185 WHIP (Wildlife Habitat Incentives Program) from the NRCS to rehabilitate the rest of our prairie and reconstruct 4 acres of savanna and 1 acre of wetland. Students in advanced biology will be involved in developing seed mixes for various areas under this grant.

$2,000 from the Friends Council on Education helped cover 40% of our WHIP cost-share. This money will be specifically for seed mixes and plants chosen by groups in next fall's advanced biology for various sections of the prairie.

We have also purchased a lot of safety equipment for controlled burns: a drip torch, two backpack water sprayers, an anemometer and sling psychrometer to measure wind and humidity before burns, and mud-flap tools to extinguish fire along fire lings.