Relict Rural Plantings in Eastern Nebraska

Abstract

In landscapes of the Great Plains that originally were prairie, old trees often serve as the legacy left by pioneers who sought to fashion gardens in that windswept region. Trees and other woody plants enrich the image of events that occurred there, especially the efforts of the early settlers who sought to transform the prairie's harsh reality. Trees, as central elements in the pioneer's image of the garden, are symbols of how the pioneers interacted with their prairie environment and how they felt about it as a place to live. The Great Plains has absorbed several distinctive waves of planting. In the rural landscape of three eastern Nebraska counties selected for study, a mosaic of planted gardens, groves, hedges, and shelterbelts still remains. Much can be learned from such plantings regarding cultural response to the environment, for they reveal learning and adaptation as well as failure and abandonment. Today, these pre-existing plantings are vanishing due to land consolidation, landscape change, mechanization, and natural mortality.