Tridens Prairie

Duane's take

The official marker's the source here, and I'm just the one putting it into words for you as we roll through Lamar County. Now, pull over in your mind for a second, because what's out here is something most folks drive right past without knowing what they're looking at. Back in 1841, a man named Zacharia Westfall was granted 1280 acres of land in this area.

That was a time when much of the northeastern region of Texas was covered with natural prairies, stretching wide and wild in every direction. Over the years, most of them have been plowed or destroyed. Most of them.

But not all. See, 97 acres of Westfall's original grant survived. It's called Tridens Prairie, and it is an undisturbed remnant of the blackland prairie, sitting right here, preserved, while the world changed all around it.

Now think about that. The rest of Texas was getting turned over, planted, built upon. And this patch just kept on being exactly what it always was.

Tridens Prairie isn't some isolated curiosity, either. It's part of a natural grassland that extends from Texas through the midwestern United States and into southern Canada. One unbroken living thread running thousands of miles.

Its name is derived from a native, perennial bunch grass known as Long-spiked tridens, and that grass is still out there growing among more than 150 species of grasses and wildflowers that have been identified on the prairie. The dominant grasses have names that carry their own kind of music: Sporobolus silveanus, the Silveanus dropseed. Tridens strictus, that Long-spiked tridens itself.

Paspalum floridanum, Florida paspalum. And Tripsacum dactyloides, Eastern gama. This place was once part of a large hay-producing region, one of the few remaining native grasslands in the state.

The Texas Nature Conservancy and Texas Garden Clubs, Inc. are the ones preserving it now. Keeping the last of something real, something that was here long before Westfall got his grant, and is still here today. Ninety-seven acres.

That's all that's left of a world that used to stretch to the horizon. Sometimes the whole story of a place fits in a patch of grass you almost didn't stop to see.

What the marker says

In 1841, when Zacharia Westfall was granted 1280 acres of land in this area, much of the northeastern region of Texas was covered with natural prairies. Over the years most of them have been plowed or destroyed. Tridens Prairie, which covers 97 acres of Westfall's original grant, is an undisturbed remnant of the blackland prairie that now is under preservation management. Tridens Prairie is part of a natural grassland that extends from Texas through the midwestern United States and into southern Canada. Its name is derived from the native, perennial bunch grass known as Long-spiked tridens. Over 150 species of grasses and wildflowers have been identified in Tridens Prairie. Dominant grasses of the prairie include Sporobolus silveanus (Silveanus dropseed), Tridens strictus (Long-spiked tridens), Paspalum floridanum (Florida paspalum), and Tripsacum dactyloides (Eastern gama). One of the few remaining native grasslands in the state and once part of a large hay-producing region, Tridens Prairie is an important part of Texas' natural history. It is being preserved by the Texas Nature Conservancy and Texas Garden Clubs, Inc. (1985)