Plant Succession on Abandoned Fields in the Central Wisconsin Sand Plain Area

Abstract

Juilieau County, Wiscolisiln, is in the part of the central salnd plaini area which is the bed of Glacial Lake Wisconsin. Here the residual soil of the underlying Canmbrian sandlstone has beenl reworked by water to forlm extensive areas of the Plainfield sandy soil series. Ill the southeastern part of the coulnty there are large areas of the Boolie series of sandy soils which are residual from the Cambrian sandstone but have not been reworked. These soils were much cultivated in Juneau County after settlement, which began in the eighteen-fifties, but their low fertility alnd their aridity have caused their abandonnment in this century. As part of a stuldy of the prairie flora in the celitral sani-d plain of Wisconsin, the suecessioll of plants ori some of these abandolied fields was observed in Juneau Coulity. Funds making possible the field work for this study were supplied by the Alumni Research Foulndatioll of the Ulliversity of Wiscolisill. The studies on the abandoned fields were beguln during the sunmmer of 1936 byArthur Oehrncke alnd the writer alnd continued in 1937 anld 1938 by the writer. Grateful acknowledgment is made to Professor N. C. Fassett of the University of Wisconsin for constant help and suggestions durilig the progress of this study. I am in-debted to my wife, Olive S. Thomson, for assistanee in the field and ill the preparation of this paper. The generous hospitality of Mr. and Mrs. F. N. Hamnerstrom, Jr., made available their home as a center of operations while the field work was in progress. Information upon the dates of abandonment was supplied mainly by Mr. Leo Laski of Necedah and Mr. Knute Olsen of the Olseni store at Mather. Little ilnformation upoln the date of last cultivatioln could be obtailled from people living near abandoned fields. Their reluetanee may in part be ascribed to the habit of some people in celntral Wisconsin of farming county land. When defilnitely dated fields were located which were on ground that was not too low and wet for the study of prairie plalnts, they were examinied during the three suecessive years. A total of thirteen separate fields were observed during this period. The detailed data are llot presented in this paper owing to the exigence of space but may be obtained by consulting the writer's thesis submitted to the University of Wisconsin under the title of Dynamics of some prairie plants in central Wisconsiln. The observations of changes within aln individual field were checked against fields of varying