Funtimes at the Tall Grass National Preserve

When my mom was here to visit in June she helped me have an awesome yard sale, but we also found some time to visit the Tall Grass Prairie which is only 20 minutes from my house by I had never been there. There is actually still a working ranch on the preserve called the Z-Bar Ranch. First we toured the historic limestone ranch house built in 1881. Next we hopped on a bus and set off for a guided tour of the preserve

Then we found out that it would be a 2 hour tour! We were a little worried:

We thought it might never end!

But it turned out to be pretty fun. And we learned some interesting stuff. For Instance did you know that there is no such thing as buffalo in America? What we have are American Bison....not Buffalo...they are only in Africa. Here are some wildflowers I photographed. This is the Monach Milk weed. Monach butterflies come from all around to find these and then lay their eggs on them. Then when their babies are born they already have a food source. This plant would be poisenous to most animals so it a good place to lay your eggs and the butterflies flourish off of its necture. Ahhh...dont you love symbiotic relationships

A prickly pair in bloom

Some of the natural wild life we encountered:

Some other scenic shots on the prairie:

I made this picture the background on my computer it looks good on a full screen view.

The side of the old limestone barn....I wish I had gotten a picture of the front of it...its neat....mom was ready to move in and live in the old barn.

It was a fun way to spend the afternoon and even better it was Free! I would like to go back this fall and take the tour again and see how much the scenery changes from spring to fall.