Across the Midwest, the preservation and restoration of prairie lands are all the rage. In Kansas, the Tallgrass Prairie National Preserve, one of the newest national parks, is gearing up for thousands of hiking tourists this summer, and a push is on to create another tall-grass prairie national park in Iowa. In Illinois, prairie boosters convinced the state to widen a highway by paving over prime farmland rather than virgin prairie, and the state has started planting prairie grasses along freeways. Growing numbers of suburb dwellers are even creating mini-prairies in their backyards.
