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Forgotten Grasslands of the South: Natural History and Conservation
Forgotten Grasslands of the South is a literary and scientific case study of some of the biologically richest and most endangered ecosystems in North America. Eminent ecologist Reed Noss tells the story of how southern grasslands arose and persisted over time and addresses questions that are fundamental for conserving these vital yet poorly understood ecosystems.
The author
The final chapter presents a general conservation strategy for southern grasslands, including prioritization, protection, restoration, and management. Also included are examples of ongoing restoration projects, along with a prognosis for the future.
In addition to offering fascinating new information about these little-studied ecosystems, Noss demonstrates how natural history is central to the practice of conservation. Natural history has been on a declining trajectory for decades, as theory and experimentation have dominated the field of ecology. Ecologists are coming to realize that these divergent approaches are in fact complementary, and that pursuing them together can bring greater knowledge and understanding of how the natural world works and how we can best conserve it.
Forgotten Grasslands of the South explores the overarching importance of ecological processes in maintaining healthy ecosystems, and is the first book of its kind to apply natural history, in a modern, comprehensive sense, to the conservation of biodiversity across a broad region. It sets a new standard for scientific literature and is essential reading not only for those who study and work to conserve the grasslands of the South but also for everyone who is fascinated by the natural world.
The author
The final chapter presents a general conservation strategy for southern grasslands, including prioritization, protection, restoration, and management. Also included are examples of ongoing restoration projects, along with a prognosis for the future.
In addition to offering fascinating new information about these little-studied ecosystems, Noss demonstrates how natural history is central to the practice of conservation. Natural history has been on a declining trajectory for decades, as theory and experimentation have dominated the field of ecology. Ecologists are coming to realize that these divergent approaches are in fact complementary, and that pursuing them together can bring greater knowledge and understanding of how the natural world works and how we can best conserve it.
Forgotten Grasslands of the South explores the overarching importance of ecological processes in maintaining healthy ecosystems, and is the first book of its kind to apply natural history, in a modern, comprehensive sense, to the conservation of biodiversity across a broad region. It sets a new standard for scientific literature and is essential reading not only for those who study and work to conserve the grasslands of the South but also for everyone who is fascinated by the natural world.
336 pages, Paperback
First published December 3, 2012
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125 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews
March 23, 2022
The godfather of South Eastern United States Grasslands. Only about 1% of these prairies, savanna, long leaf pine open forests, etc left on earth.
This guy has written their literary, and scientific natural history.
This guy has written their literary, and scientific natural history.
May 29, 2013
Fascinating book describing how much the landscape of the southeastern US has changed over the past century or two, to the point that most people who live there have little inkling of the degree to which even undeveloped "natural" areas have been altered by human impacts. Noss explores the remnants of these grasslands where he finds them and describes the ecological factors that formed and maintained them over centuries and millenia. He gives descriptions of dozens of different types of grassland communities found in the region and the species that inhabit them. These descriptions are often illustrated by visits he made to examples of these systems and what he learned from various experts who work in them. Many of these ecological communites have been reduced from formerly covering vast expanses to just a few small patches. Others are relictual assemblages from historical periods when the climate was cooler and drier and are now naturally restricted to a few small pockets. Noss also takes on and demolishes the view (pushed recently by a number of archaeologists and historians) that these grasslands were "created" entirely by land management carried out by American Indians, demonstrating that most of them existed long before the continent was colonized by humans. Very interesting reading for anyone interested in natural history, ecology, or conservation.
May 23, 2013
The first thought you might have upon seeing this title is understandable; WHAT grasslands? The south is the land of woodlands and swamps, mountains, the deep forests of the Appalachians, and of course farmland and cities. But grasslands? You mean like the African savanna or the Great Plains? What are you talking about? If you think about it for a minute, you might remember something from school about how Native Americans and early settlers burned woods from time to time, opening up the forest and maybe creating some grassy areas. But grasslands? The word sounds so big, so natural, areas with open vistas, bison grazing, wildflowers waving in the breeze. How could this be?
If you thought this, you wouldn’t be alone. So little known are southern grasslands and so thoroughly reduced in area they are (one depressing chart shows the various types of grasslands in different regions of the south and what percentage has been converted to other uses; in some cases it is nearly 100%), even some experts debated in the past whether the south ever had any real natural grasslands of any extent. Citing traveler’s tales, looking at current land usage and plant distributions, and most of all clinging to outdated notions of what causes a grassland to exist – chiefly rainfall, or the relative lack thereof, not a problem in the American south – many over the decades concluded that if grassy areas ever existed in the south, they were the product of man’s intervention, not natural processes.
Not so! Author Reed F. Noss clearly, concisely, and definitely shows that the south had extensive grasslands (and in some areas still does). Riding skillfully the fine line between scientific study with real data and first hand observations while producing a readable book for the educated layperson, Noss discussed the many types of grasslands that exist in the south, how they arose, what keeps them grassland, and how he knows that they have been here well before even the arrival of Native Americans.
So elegant and understandable are his many reasons for the long, long (long) existence of grasslands – naturally – in the American south one wonders how others missed or ever disputed this. Tackling not only the traveler’s accounts of pre-European settlement (and early Colonial) wild lands in the south, he brings to the reader evidence of fossil pollen preserved in various locales, demonstrating the types of plants found in the region, the fossil record of Ice Age mammals (many horses and other grassland animals were once common here until nearly historic times), and most interestingly to me, looks at the actual species present today. Focusing more on plants than animals (though animals are well covered as well), Noss looks at plants and animals that are present in disjunct populations, animals like the Florida Scrub Jay and plants like yucca, that while they are present in the south today, are really western species of grassland areas, with most of their relations existing much further west. Given that these species occur naturally in the south, they are part of a clear pattern showing not only the great age of grasslands in the south but the fact that they once covered huge swaths of the southeastern United States.
Even more telling are the high rates of endemism in many grassland patches remaining today; the fact that many grassland areas in the south have species found there and nowhere else in the world. One area of grasslands, the Ketona Glades of Bibb County, Alabama, a patchwork of grassy areas ranging from tiny spots to areas as large as 12 acres, has five species and three varieties of plant found there and nowhere else in the world. If these were man created, perhaps long abandoned pastures that never quite converted to forest again, why would they have unique species? Clearly areas such as this are naturally occurring, of great age, and were once much more extensive in size.
This was a fascinating book, the highly readable text well supported by easy to understand charts and diagrams, helpful maps, and beautiful photos of some of the unique grassland plants and animals of the south. Noss covered the subject very well, discussing the many types of grassland in the south, ranging from the coastal prairies of Florida to the grassy balds of the southern Appalachians to the cedar glades of Tennessee and Alabama to the virtually extinct canebrakes that were once an important part of the southeast’s ecology and Native American culture. He shows the many reasons such grasslands could arise and how they would remain treeless. Lots of ecological terms are thrown around – biotic homogenization, historic range of variability, no-analog communities, foundation species – but they are well explained and integral to his coverage of the subject. Noss also includes plans to save and even restore these grasslands and why this would be of benefit to everyone.
Noss spent a lot of time covering the subject of fire in maintaining grasslands, in particular to the grasslands of the Longleaf Pine forests (yes, these forests are grasslands; he explains the seeming contradiction there quite skillfully). Not limiting himself to refuting decades of conventional wisdom that said that fires were bad and had to be suppressed, the author really gets into the subject, discussing not only why fires are a healthy part of the ecology of the south as a whole and grassland in particular but when fire should be used, when it should be man-created and when natural processes should instead be relied upon, and on the ecological consequences of such things as not allowing fires to burn from time to time and even on the effect fire brakes have on the local ecology.
Further, circling back to a point I brought up near the beginning of this review, Noss spends a good bit of time (time well spent) on the idea that grasslands were human created by the use of fire, that the south was once an area very much landscaped by Native Americans for their use, an idea made popular by such recent works as _1491: New Revelations of the Americans before Columbus_ by Charles Mann, published in 2005. Looking at archaeological, climatological, botanical, and geological data, he refuted this notion to me decisively.
This was a really good book. I learned a lot, loved to read about the rare plants and animals of the grasslands of the south, and am now filled with a great desire to visit these wonderful places. Whether interested in the overall human history of the south, the south’s plants (I am a bit of a wildflower enthusiast), or are more interested in animals (his discussions of bison were quite interesting and he is the only person I have ever read so far that is PRO-coyote as far as the south goes; he explains why), this book should be a real treat.
If you thought this, you wouldn’t be alone. So little known are southern grasslands and so thoroughly reduced in area they are (one depressing chart shows the various types of grasslands in different regions of the south and what percentage has been converted to other uses; in some cases it is nearly 100%), even some experts debated in the past whether the south ever had any real natural grasslands of any extent. Citing traveler’s tales, looking at current land usage and plant distributions, and most of all clinging to outdated notions of what causes a grassland to exist – chiefly rainfall, or the relative lack thereof, not a problem in the American south – many over the decades concluded that if grassy areas ever existed in the south, they were the product of man’s intervention, not natural processes.
Not so! Author Reed F. Noss clearly, concisely, and definitely shows that the south had extensive grasslands (and in some areas still does). Riding skillfully the fine line between scientific study with real data and first hand observations while producing a readable book for the educated layperson, Noss discussed the many types of grasslands that exist in the south, how they arose, what keeps them grassland, and how he knows that they have been here well before even the arrival of Native Americans.
So elegant and understandable are his many reasons for the long, long (long) existence of grasslands – naturally – in the American south one wonders how others missed or ever disputed this. Tackling not only the traveler’s accounts of pre-European settlement (and early Colonial) wild lands in the south, he brings to the reader evidence of fossil pollen preserved in various locales, demonstrating the types of plants found in the region, the fossil record of Ice Age mammals (many horses and other grassland animals were once common here until nearly historic times), and most interestingly to me, looks at the actual species present today. Focusing more on plants than animals (though animals are well covered as well), Noss looks at plants and animals that are present in disjunct populations, animals like the Florida Scrub Jay and plants like yucca, that while they are present in the south today, are really western species of grassland areas, with most of their relations existing much further west. Given that these species occur naturally in the south, they are part of a clear pattern showing not only the great age of grasslands in the south but the fact that they once covered huge swaths of the southeastern United States.
Even more telling are the high rates of endemism in many grassland patches remaining today; the fact that many grassland areas in the south have species found there and nowhere else in the world. One area of grasslands, the Ketona Glades of Bibb County, Alabama, a patchwork of grassy areas ranging from tiny spots to areas as large as 12 acres, has five species and three varieties of plant found there and nowhere else in the world. If these were man created, perhaps long abandoned pastures that never quite converted to forest again, why would they have unique species? Clearly areas such as this are naturally occurring, of great age, and were once much more extensive in size.
This was a fascinating book, the highly readable text well supported by easy to understand charts and diagrams, helpful maps, and beautiful photos of some of the unique grassland plants and animals of the south. Noss covered the subject very well, discussing the many types of grassland in the south, ranging from the coastal prairies of Florida to the grassy balds of the southern Appalachians to the cedar glades of Tennessee and Alabama to the virtually extinct canebrakes that were once an important part of the southeast’s ecology and Native American culture. He shows the many reasons such grasslands could arise and how they would remain treeless. Lots of ecological terms are thrown around – biotic homogenization, historic range of variability, no-analog communities, foundation species – but they are well explained and integral to his coverage of the subject. Noss also includes plans to save and even restore these grasslands and why this would be of benefit to everyone.
Noss spent a lot of time covering the subject of fire in maintaining grasslands, in particular to the grasslands of the Longleaf Pine forests (yes, these forests are grasslands; he explains the seeming contradiction there quite skillfully). Not limiting himself to refuting decades of conventional wisdom that said that fires were bad and had to be suppressed, the author really gets into the subject, discussing not only why fires are a healthy part of the ecology of the south as a whole and grassland in particular but when fire should be used, when it should be man-created and when natural processes should instead be relied upon, and on the ecological consequences of such things as not allowing fires to burn from time to time and even on the effect fire brakes have on the local ecology.
Further, circling back to a point I brought up near the beginning of this review, Noss spends a good bit of time (time well spent) on the idea that grasslands were human created by the use of fire, that the south was once an area very much landscaped by Native Americans for their use, an idea made popular by such recent works as _1491: New Revelations of the Americans before Columbus_ by Charles Mann, published in 2005. Looking at archaeological, climatological, botanical, and geological data, he refuted this notion to me decisively.
This was a really good book. I learned a lot, loved to read about the rare plants and animals of the grasslands of the south, and am now filled with a great desire to visit these wonderful places. Whether interested in the overall human history of the south, the south’s plants (I am a bit of a wildflower enthusiast), or are more interested in animals (his discussions of bison were quite interesting and he is the only person I have ever read so far that is PRO-coyote as far as the south goes; he explains why), this book should be a real treat.
February 2, 2021
An excellent overview into the less famous grasslands of the southeastern United States.
December 27, 2018
Reed Noss's book Forgotten Grasslands of the South is a much needed treatise on a long overlooked subject. That said, his book left me asking more questions than it answered. I found his focus on Florida too limited... comparatively little discussion was given to the piedmont, Appalachian, and central basin regions. I think Noss's focus on edaphic factors is too limited. He summarily dismisses anthropogenic factors like Native American burning without hardly referencing the historical accounts of such practices. The question of fire as natural or anthropogenic need not be either/or! That said, Noss's book is a good introduction to the topic at large and what he does discuss he is pretty comprehensive about. 4 stars.
September 3, 2025
Forgotten Grasslands of the South is a thoughtful, informative look at an often-overlooked ecosystem. As a wildlife biologist transitioning from working in wetlands to grasslands, I found it an insightful and foundational read. The opening and final chapters struck a perfect balance between reverence and scientific insight, with vivid descriptions and strong conservation messaging. Other chapters were more academic and textbook-like, which made them a little less engaging, but still valuable. Overall, the book deepened my understanding of these complex and beautiful landscapes and helped me better appreciate their ecological importance.
November 20, 2019
Reed's book is an excellent look at the plight of our native grasslands of the Southeast. We have lost the majority of these lands and only now are we starting to pay attention. As someone who works in conjunction with the Southeastern Grasslands Initiative, I found this book much needed and an excellent overview of the history, natural history, and conservation efforts to save this forgotten landscape.
January 20, 2020
An excellent, passionate, well researched, and easily readable book on one of the South's most fascinating, and most endangered, ecosystems. Highly recommended for folks interested in botany, ecology, and natural history in the southern US.
May 17, 2023
Everyone who loves the scientific study of nature in the South will love this book.
May 13, 2013
A perfect fit with all my recent study of longleaf pine habitat - the grasslands are the amazingly diverse community carpeting the pineywoods. And, yay, new destinations to explore: hopeful restoration projects in TN, AR, SC, Fl. Final bonus is a foreward by EO Wilson - I'd walk a million miles to read a few words from EO.
Currently reading
February 23, 2013Reed is a fellow ex-pat Buckeye. He is a tireless and insightful interpreter of the dynamic landscapes, especially of the south. A very useful and thought-provoking book for both details and the big picture. Suitable as a specialty textbook for Ecological Restoration principles.
Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews