Commissioned by the Oklahoma State Senate Historical
Preservation Fund, Inc. Dedicated on October 2, 2001 The
tallgrass prairie was one of North America's major ecosystems
originally spanning portions of 14 states and covering over 142
million acres. It was a complex landscape, harboring a rich
diversity of plants and animals, that was shaped by nature.
Today, less than 10% of the original tallgrass prairie remains.
Most of it has been converted to farmland. Large, unbroken
tracts of tallgrass prairie only exist now in the Flint Hills of
Oklahoma and Kansas. In 1989, the Nature Conservancy purchased
the 29,000 acre Barnard Ranch as the cornerstone of the
Tallgrass Prairie Preserve. The Preserve now consists of 38,600
acres of land owned or leased by The Nature Conservancy. The
Conservancy's goal is to recreate a functioning tallgrass
prairie ecosystem using controlled burns and bison. In 1993, 300
bison were reintroduced and will eventually grow to a herd of
3,200 animals freely roaming on 32,000 acres of pre