Palouse Prairie

The Palouse ( ) is a distinct geographic region of the northwestern United States, encompassing parts of north central Idaho, southeastern Washington, and, by some definitions, parts of northeast Oregon. It is a major agricultural area, primarily producing wheat and legumes. Situated about north of the Oregon Trail, the region experienced rapid growth in the late 19th century.

The Palouse is home to two land-grant universities: the University of Idaho in Moscow and Washington State University in Pullman. Just eight miles (13 km) apart, both schools opened in the early 1890s.

Geography and history

The origin of the name "Palouse" is unclear. One theory is that the name of the Palus tribe (spelled in early accounts variously as Palus, Palloatpallah, Pelusha, etc.) was converted by French-Canadian fur traders to the more familiar French word , meaning "land with short and thick grass" or "lawn." Over time, the spelling changed to Palouse. Another theory is that the region's name came from the French word and was later applied to its indigenous inhabitants.

Traditionally, the Palouse region was defined as the fertile hills and prairies north of the Snake River, which separated it from Walla Walla County, and north of the Clearwater River, which separated it from the Camas Prairie, extending north along the Washington and Idaho border, south of Spokane, centered on the Palouse River. This region underwent a settlement and wheat-growing boom during the 1880s, part of a larger process of growing wheat in southeast Washington, originally pioneered in Walla Walla County south of the Snake River.

While this definition of the Palouse remains common today, the term is sometimes used to refer to the entire wheat-growing region, including Walla Walla County, the Camas Prairie of Idaho, the Big Bend region of the central Columbia River Plateau, and other smaller agricultural districts such as Asotin County, Washington, and Umatilla County, Oregon. This larger definition is used by organizations such as the World Wide Fund for Nature, who define the Palouse Grasslands ecoregion broadly.

The community of Palouse, Washington, is located in Whitman County, about 7 miles (11 km) west of Potlatch, Idaho.

Nevertheless, the traditional definition of the Palouse region is distinct from the older Walla Walla region south of the Snake River, where dryland farming of wheat was first proved viable in the region in the 1860s. During the 1870s, the Walla Walla region was rapidly converted to farmland, while the initial experiments in growing wheat began in the Palouse region, which previously had been the domain of cattle and sheep ranching. When those trials proved more than successful, a minor land rush quickly filled the Palouse region with farmers during the 1880s. The simultaneous proliferation of railroads only increased the rapid settlement of the Palouse. By 1890 nearly all the Palouse lands had been taken up and converted to wheat farming.

Unlike the Walla Walla Country, which was solidly anchored on the city of Walla Walla, the Palouse region saw the rise of at least four centers, all within several miles of each other: Colfax (the oldest), Palouse, Pullman, and on the Idaho side, Moscow. These four centers, along with at least ten lesser ones, resulted in a diffuse pattern of rural centers, relative to the centralized Walla Walla county.

Cities along the borders of the Palouse, and by some definitions included within it, include Lewiston, Idaho, serving the Camas Prairie farmlands; Ritzville, serving the eastern edge of the Big Bend Country; and Spokane, the region's major urban hub. So dominant was Spokane's position that it became known as the capital of the Inland Empire, including all the wheat-producing regions, the local mining districts, and lumber-producing forests. Spokane also served as the region's main railroad and transportation hub.

By 1910, although local terms like Palouse, Walla Walla Country, Big Bend, Umatilla Country, and Camas Prairie continued to be common, many people of the region began to regard themselves as living in the Inland Empire, the Wheat Belt, the Columbia Basin, or simply Eastern Washington, Oregon, or North Idaho.

Farming

Early farming was extremely labor-intensive and relied heavily on human and horse-power. An organized harvesting/threshing team in the 1920s required 120 men and 320 mules and horses.Williams, K.R. 1991. Hills of gold: a history of wheat production technologies in the Palouse region of Washington and Idaho. Ph.D. dissertation, Washington State University, Pullman. Teams moved from farm to farm as the crops ripened. By this point, the combine had been invented and was in use, but few farmers had enough horses to pull such a machine, which required a crew of 40 horses and six men to operate on level ground. Because of this, use of combines on the Palouse lagged behind use in other farming communities in the United States.

It was only when the Idaho Harvester Company in Moscow began to manufacture a smaller machine that combine harvesting became feasible. By 1930, 90% of all Palouse wheat was harvested using combines.

The next step in mechanization was development of the tractor. As with the combines, the first steam engine and gasoline-powered tractors were too heavy and awkward for use on the steep Palouse hills. The smaller, general use tractors introduced in the 1920s were only marginally used. As a result, by 1930, only 20% of Palouse farmers used tractors. Today, the Palouse region is the most important lentil-growing region in the USA.

Image:Palouse fields from Kamiak Butte 00-08-23.jpg, Palouse fields from Kamiak Butte, early summer
Image:Palouse fields, Washington from Kamiak Butte.jpg, Palouse fields from Kamiak Butte, fall

Geology

The peculiar and picturesque loess hills which characterize the Palouse Prairie are underlain by wind-blown sediments of the Palouse Loess that covers the surface of over on the Columbia Plateau in southeastern Washington, western Idaho, and northeastern Oregon. The Palouse Loess forms a fine-grained mantle of variable thickness that lies upon either the Miocene Columbia River Basalt Group, non-glacial Pliocene sediments of the Ringold Formation, or Pleistocene glacial outburst flood sediments that are known informally as the ''Hanford formation.'' At its thickest, the Palouse Loess is up to thick. It consists of multiple layers of loess separated by multiple well-defined calcrete paleosols and erosional unconformities. The degree of development of individual layers of calcrete together with thermoluminescence and optically stimulated luminescence dating of the loess indicate that each calcrete layer represents a period of thousands to tens of thousands of years of nondeposition, weathering, and soil development that occurred between episodic periods of loess deposition. A consistent sequence of normal-reverse-normal polarity signatures demonstrates that the older layers of loess accumulated between 2 and 1 million years ago. Detailed optically stimulated luminescence dating has shown that the uppermost layer of Palouse Loess accumulated between 15,000 years ago and modern times and the layer of loess underlying it accumulated episodically between about 77,000 and 16,000 years ago. Regional trends in the distribution, thickness, texture, and overall composition of the Palouse Loess indicate that it largely consists of the wind-blown sediments eroded from fine-grained deposits of the Hanford formation that were periodically deposited by repeated Missoula Floods within the Eureka Flats area.Busacca, A.J., 1989
''Long Quaternary record in eastern Washington, U.S.A., interpreted from multiple buried paleosols in loess.''
Geoderma. 45:105-122.Busacca, AJ, and EV McDonald (1994
''Regional sedimentation of late Quaternary loess on the Columbia plateau: sediment source areas and loess distribution patterns.''
Washington Division of Geology and Earth Resources Bulletin. 80:181-190.Gaylord, DR, AJ Busacca, and MR Sweeney (2003
''The Palouse loess and the Channeled Scabland: A paired Ice-Age geologic system.''
In Quaternary Geology of the United States, INQUA 2003 Field Guide Volume. DJ Easterbrook, ed., pp. 123-134. Reno, Nevada: Desert Research Institute.

Although superficially resembling sand or other types of dunes, the loess hills of the Palouse are of far different origin. Internally, they lack any evidence of cross-bedding or erosion of interbedded layers of loess and calcrete that characterize dunes formed by moving currents. Instead, these hills consist of alternating layers of loess and calcrete that are more or less concordant with the modern surface of these hills. This layering demonstrates that the Palouse hills loess accumulated from the airfall of wind-silt from suspension. In addition, the ubiquitous homogenization of the loess by innumerable plant roots and insect burrows as it accumulated further supports the conclusion drawn from numerous thermoluminescence and optically stimulated luminescence dates that individual layers of loess accumulated over an extended period of time in terms of thousands of years. Finally, the calcrete horizons are paleosols that represent the periodic cessation of loess accumulation for periods of thousands of years during which they formed within the surface of a loess layer.Lewis, PF (1960) ''Linear Topography in the Southwestern Palouse, Washington-Oregon.'' Annals of the Association of American Geographers. 50(2):98-111.

Environment

Once an extensive prairie composed of mid-length perennial grasses such as bluebunch wheatgrass (''Agropyron spicatum'') and Idaho fescue (''Festuca idahoensis''), today virtually all of the Palouse Prairie has been plowed or overrun by non-native species such as cheatgrass. The native prairie is one of the most endangered ecosystems in the United States (Noss et al. 1995), as only a little over one percent of the original prairie still exists. The only large preserved patches of this ecosystem left are found in Hells Canyon National Recreation Area and in the southern portion of Lake Roosevelt National Recreation Area.

Riparian areas offer breeding habitat for a greater diversity of birds than any other habitat in the U.S. (Ratti and Scott 1991). Loss of trees and shrubs along stream corridors means fewer birds and eventually fewer species. The majority of riparian areas have been lost across the bioregion.

Lately, conversion of agricultural lands to suburban homesites on large plots invites a new suite of biodiversity onto the Palouse Prairie. University of Idaho wildlife professor J. Ratti documented changes in bird community composition over a 10-year period as he converted a wheat field into a suburban wildlife refuge. As of 1991, his yard attracted 86 species of birds, an increase from 18 (Ratti and Scott 1991).

Ecological transformation

As population grew, towns and cities appeared changing the complexion of the area. By 1910, there were 22,000 people scattered in 30 communities across the Palouse Prairie.

Intensification of agriculture has affected both water quantity and quality. Agriculture has changed the hydrology, increasing peak runoff flows and shortening the length of runoff. The result is more intense erosion and loss of perennial prairie streams. As early as the 1930s soil scientists were noting significant downcutting of regional rivers (Victor 1935) and expansion of channel width. Higher faster runoff caused streams to downcut quickly, effectively lowering the water table in immediately adjacent meadows. On the South Palouse River, this process was so efficient that by 1900 farming was possible where it had been too wet previously (Victor 1935). Replacement of perennial grasses with annual crops resulted in more overland flow and less infiltration, which translates at a watershed level to higher peak flows that subside more quickly than in the past. Once perennial prairie streams are now often dry by mid-summer. This has undoubtedly influenced the amphibious and aquatic species.

Crop production increased dramatically (200–400%) after the introduction of fertilizer following World War II.

Since 1900, 94% of the grasslands and 97% of the wetlands in the Palouse ecoregion have been converted to crop, hay, or pasture lands. Approximately 63% of the lands in forest cover in 1900 are still forested, 9% are grass, and 7% are regenerating forestlands or shrublands. The remaining 21% of previously forested lands have been converted to agriculture or urban areas.

The impacts of domestic grazers on the grasslands of the Palouse and Camas Prairies was transitory because much of the areas were rapidly converted to agriculture. However, the canyonlands of the Snake and Clearwater rivers and their tributaries with their much shallower soils, steep topography, and hotter, drier climate, were largely unsuitable for crop production and were consequently used for a much longer period by grazing domestic animals (Tisdale 1986). There, intense grazing and other disturbances have resulted in irreversible changes with the native grasses largely replaced by annual grasses of the genus Bromus and noxious weeds, particularly from the genus Centaurea. The highly competitive plants of both of these genera evolved under similar climatic regimes in Eurasia and were introduced to the U.S. in the late 19th century.

With the adoption of no-till farming practices in the Palouse region in the early 2000s, the negative environmental impact of agriculture has visibly decreased.

Fauna

The Palouse boasts a large amount of animal species. Some animals in the region include both mule and white-tailed deer, coyotes, bobcats, California quails, yellow-bellied marmots, and red-tailed hawks.

Fires

While there is some debate over how frequently the Palouse prairie burned historically, there is consensus that fires are generally less frequent today than in the past, primarily due to fire suppression, construction of roads (which serve as barriers to fire spread) and conversion of grass and forests to cropland (Morgan et al. 1996). Historians recount lightning-ignited fires burning in the pine fringes bordering the prairies in late autumn, but the extent to which forest fires spread into the prairie or the converse is not known. Some fire ecologists believe the Nez Perce burned the Palouse and Camas Prairies to encourage growth of Camas (Morgan, pers. comm.); but there is little historical record to solve the mystery. European-American settlers used fire to clear land for settlement and grazing until the 1930s. Since then, forest fires have become less common. One result has been increasing tree density on forested lands and encroachment of shrubs and trees into previously open areas. Consequently, when fires occur in the forest, they are more likely to result in mixed severity or stand replacing events.

See also

* Spokane-Coeur d'Alene-Paloos War (Palouse War)
* Palus people
* Appaloosa
* Battle of the Palouse - college football rivalry game
* Okanagan Desert
* Steptoe Butte

References

References

Chapter 10: Additional Figures - Biodiversity and Land-use History of the Palouse Bioregion: Pre-European to Present
- Sisk, T.D., editor. 1998. ''Perspectives on the land-use history of North America: a context for understanding our changing environment''. U.S. Geological Survey, Biological Resources Division, Biological Science Report USGS/BRD/BSR 1998-0003 (Revised September 1999)..
* Meinig, D.W. 1968. ''The Great Columbia Plains: A Historical Geography, 1805-1910.'' University of Seattle Press, Seattle (Revised 1995). .
* Morgan, P., S.C. Bunting, A.E. Black, T. Merrill, and S. Barrett. 1996. Fire regimes in the Interior Columbia River Basin: past and present. Final Report, RJVA-INT-94913. Intermountain Fire Sciences Laboratory, USDA Forest Service, Intermountain Research Station, Missoula, Mont.
* Noss, R.F., E.T. LaRoe III, and J.M. Scott. 1995. Endangered ecosystems of the United States: a preliminary assessment of loss and degradation. U.S. National Biological Service. Biological Report 28.
* Ratti, J.T., and J.M. Scott. 1991. Agricultural impacts on wildlife: problem review and restoration needs. The Environmental Professional 13:263-274.
* Tisdale, E.W. 1986. Canyon grasslands and associated shrublands of west-central Idaho and adjacent areas. Bulletin No. 40. Forestry, Wildlife and Range Experiment Station, University of Idaho, Moscow.
* Victor, E. 1935. Some effects of cultivation upon stream history and upon the topography of the Palouse region. Northwest Science 9(3):18-19.

External links

A Palouse Bibliography
Compiled by David M. Skinner
Palouse Prairie Foundation bibliographies.
The Columbia Gazetteer of North America. 2000.
The Appaloosa MuseumThe Luminous Landscape: The PalouseA photographic guide to the PalouseA Palouse Paradise
Documentary produced by '' Idaho Public Television''
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Eureka Flat: How glacial outburst floods started the dust engine of the Pacific Northwest
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Textbook - Key Concepts in Geomorphology.
The University of Vermont, Burlington, Vermont.

{{Washington

Temperate grasslands, savannas, and shrublands
Ecoregions of the United States
Grasslands of the United States
Natural history of Idaho
Natural history of Oregon
Natural history of Washington (state)
Geography of Idaho
Regions of Washington (state)
Regions of Oregon
Nearctic ecoregions