missouri's mini deserts

8/11/2019 Missouri's Mini Deserts

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The Eastern collaredlizard is glad Missourihas glades. Look insideto learn about otheranimals and plantsthat live there.

Missouris Mini Deserts

AmazingGlades

AmazingGlades Missouris

Mini Deserts By Joan McKee


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have tiny hairs on their stems. Tese hairs slowthe evaporation of water from the surface of the plant. Other plants, such as prairie dock, have longroots that wind through cracks in the rock, seeking water deep down in the ground. Lichens and

mosses trap water in spongy mats.Some glade plants avoid the dry summerheat altogether. In the fall, seeds of the Missouribladderpod plant grows into clusters of leaves,close to the ground. When the warm spring rainscome in April and May, yellow owers bloom fromthe 8-inch tall plant. When the weather gets hotin June, the Missouri bladderpod drops its seedsand dies. Te seeds wait until the cooler weatherin the fall before they begin to grow. Seeds of someglade plants can remain dormant for many years.

Tey wait until the right amount of soil and waterare available, then they sprout and grow into anew plant.

Specially adapted animals also live in this harshenvironment. For example, the small-footed myotis

bat sleepsunder rocksor under treebark duringthe day. Tetrees at theedge of gladesand rockson the glademake perfect

bedrooms. Te bats y around the open areas ofthe glade at night looking for insects to eat.

Another animal that avoids the heat of theday is the tarantula. You will rarely see Missourislargest spider because it hunts for insects at nightand is very shy. By day it hides in rocky crevices orabandoned burrows dug by rodents or reptiles.

Cold-blooded lizards love living in glades, where they can warm themselves on rocks andhide among the crevices. If you are lucky, youmight spot the colorful eastern collared lizard.Missouris largest lizard, it can grow to be morethan a foot long.

Collared lizards hunt for insects, spiders, smallsnakes and other lizards. Tese fast runners oftenrun on hind legs with the forward part of their

Missouri bladderpod

Prairie dock

Tarantula

Small-footed myotis bat

Hoary puccoon J I M R A T H E R T

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bodies upright. Maybe the collared lizard runs on its hindlegs to catch a mealor to avoid becoming a roadrunnerslunch. Greater roadrunners love to eat lizards, snakes,insects, rodents and berries. Tey can y, but they usuallyuse their strong legs to chase their prey. Roadrunners can

often be seen running on glades near Branson and along theshore at able Rock Lake in south Missouri.Insects make up a large part of the glade community,

serving as food for many different kinds of animals. oavoid their predators, glade insects have adapted cunningdisguises. Te lichen grasshopper, for example, is virtuallyinvisible, even when it is sunning itself out in the open.It can be light gray, pink or green with dark splotches,depending on the color of the rock or lichen it is resting on.Tis slow-moving insect is easy to catchif you can see it!

Camouage also helps the striped scorpion. Tese

venomous insects are the same color as the rocks and logsthey live under. Missouris only scorpion can be found inglades in the southern part of the state. Te scorpion comesout at night to hunt for insects and spiders to eat. It uses thesharp stinger at the end ofits tail to inject venom intoits prey. While deadly toinsects, the venom usuallyisnt dangerous to humans,but the sting is painful.

Glades provide a specialhabitat where manydifferent types of specieslive. Each year, some ofMissouris mini desertsdisappear. When they do, these desert species also are lost.

A major enemy of glades is the cedar tree. Glade plantsand animals depend on sun. Cedar trees can grow in rockysoil and will eventually take over a glade, turning it into athicket that nothing can walk through. In the past, natural wildres swept through glades and kept the trees fromtaking over. oday we control wildres for safety reasons.But to maintain a healthy glade, owners and managers needto occasionally burn the area when they can do so safelyand cut down cedar trees. Without management, glades willeventually disappear.

Overgrazing by cattle is another way glades can bedestroyed. Because the soil is thin and water is scarce, plants arent always tough enough to grow back if they areeaten each year during the growing season. Also, heavytrampling can injure the plants to the point where they

Greater roadrunner

Painted bunting

Black widow

Striped scorpion

Red milksnake

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cant recover. If the plants die, the roots will no longer beable to hold the soil. Eventually rain and wind may carry thesoil away and when the soil and plants are gone, the animalsleave. Te same thing can happen when people use glades formountain biking, driving A Vs and horseback riding. Teseactivities can cause the soil to erode quickly.

Before community landlls, people dumped trash and junkon their property. Often the dump was in a glade because theowner didnt see the land as valuable. Over time, cedar treesgrew up around the old tires, buckets and wringer washingmachines, blocking the sun from the glade.

oday, some people love glades to death. People like tobuild houses on glades because the hillside provides a great view unblocked by trees. Other people are destroying glades

by turning them into quarriesand mining the rock.

Because glades are beingdestroyed, many glade speciesare rare or endangered inMissouri. You can help thesehabitats by visiting glades andlearning how to identify them.o nd the glades listed onthe next two pages, go to www.mdc.mo.gov/atlas.

Geocarpon

Lichen grasshopper

Meads milkweed

Can you spotthe lichengrasshopper? It

sure looks like alichen to me!

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Missouris glades are found inrocky areas of Missouri, suchas the Ozarks. Tese little hotspots are full of unusual, rareand endangered species, butmost people never visit them.o see more than rocks, youmust sneak up on a glade.Perch upon a rock, sit still and

wait for lizards and snakes to venture out of rock creviceslooking for insects.

A multi-colored paintedbunting looking for insectsmight y overhead. Perhaps you will see an eastern towheehopping backwards, huntingfor spiders and insects. But you must come back at nightto see tarantulas and stripedscorpions do their hunting.

Here is a list of differenttypes of glades and where youcan see them.

Limestone gladesare sometimes found on steepslopes above large streams orriversusually facing south or west. Some of the easier places tosee this type of glade are RockyBarrens Conservation Area,the Springeld ConservationNature Center, or Wilsons CreekNational Battleeld in GreeneCounty in Springeld. In KansasCity, visit Burr Oak WoodsConservation Area.

Dolomite glades look like prairies with lots of exposedbedrock. Tey usually face south or west. Visit Victoria GladeConservation Area in Jefferson County near St. Louis, Ha Haonka State Park near the Lake of the Ozarks, or HenningConservation Area in Branson.

Where t o S ee Missouris

Glad e Hot Spots

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Chert glades are on ridges, slopes and valleys along streams near Joplin in southwestMissouri. Wildcat Glade Natural Area in WildcatPark is an excellent location to see a chert glade.

Igneous (IGneeuhs) glades are foundon slopes of knobs and mountains and alongshut-ins in southeastern Missouri. KetchersideMountain Conservation Area in Iron County andHughes Mountain Natural Area in WashingtonCounty are good examples of this type of glade.

Sandstone glades are found alongnarrow valleys or canyons on moderateto steep slopes. Tey usually face south or west. Lichen and moss grow on undisturbedbedrock. Next time you are traveling betweenColumbia and St. Louis on I-70, visit GrahamCave State Park and explore the sandstoneglades there.

Walk Lightly andTake Nothing but Photos When you visit your public glades, you willbe tempted to turn over rocks or pick owers. When you feel the urge to take a souvenir, takea photo instead. It will remind you what a greattime you hadand it will help you protect oneof Missouris remaining mini deserts.

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E00123 7/07www.missouriconservation.org

Nuttalls sedum is one of the plants that can survive on a dry, chert glade. The succulent leavesand stems store water after a rain. The plants waxy outer surface helps reduce water loss.

Equal opportunity to participate in and benet from programs of the Missouri Department ofConservation is available to all individuals without regard to their race, color, national origin, sex, ageor disability. Questions should be directed to the Department of Conservation, P.O. Box 180, JeffersonCity, MO 65102, (573) 751-4115 (voice) or 800-735-2966 (TTY), or to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife ServiceDivision of Federal Assistance, 4401 N. Fairfax Drive, Mail Stop: MBSP-4020, Arlington, VA 22203.

Copyright 2007 by the Conservation Commission of the State of MissouriReprinted from the August 2006 Missouri Conservationist magazine.

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