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In the early 1980s, Ronald Stuckey and Douglas Salamon of The Ohio State University looked at many herbarium specimens and the botanical literature to determine the distributional history of narrowleaved cattail, T. angustifolia. They found that earliest floras of northeastern states did not list the plant, but by 1820s the plant was present or rare (Stuckey and Salamon 1987). Before 1880, narrowleaved cattail had been collected only in a few coastal wetlands along the north Atlantic seaboard, Lousiana, and California. By the late 1800s, the plant had migrated westward to the Great Lakes region along waterways, railroads, road ditches, and other areas where wetlands were disturbed or created. Narrowleaved cattail continued expanding its range into areas west of the Great Lakes in the U.S. and Canada during the early and mid 20th century. First records of it in Wisconsin date back to the 1920s (Fassett 1930). In the 1930s, plants in Iowa spread rapidly into silted wetlands where higher mineral deposits raised soil salinities (Hayden 1939).

In North Dakota, no narrowleaved cattail was noted during extensive surveys of wetland vegetation by federal waterfowl biologist Franklin Metcalf just prior to World War I (Metcalf 1931). He found few cattail-dominated wetlands in North Dakota during that period. The few stands of common cattail were in boggy areas around freshwater lakes. This suggests that prairie fires and grazing by large ungulates, two major ecological forces during pre-settlement times, could have been responsible for the restricted distribution of common cattail.

During the last fifty years, narrowleaved cattail seems to have spread rapidly across much of the Great Plains. It was first collected in North Dakota at the Long Lake National Wildlife Refuge in 1942 by U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service biologist Neil Hotchkiss. Another Service employee, waterfowl biologist Merrill Hammond, found it at the Lower Souris National Wildlife Refuge in McHenry County the following year (Stevens 1963). In the early 1960s, Service biologist Robert Stewart and I noted that most North Dakota wetlands dominated by narrowleaved cattail were in the southeastern corner of the state. We were surprised to discover clones of narrowleaved cattail growing along with alkali bulrush (Scirpus maritimus) in some brackish and subsaline wetlands in Stutsman County. By the 1970s we saw it in many wetlands in central North Dakota. About this same time, Robert Jessen, a waterfowl biologist with the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources, also expressed concern about the rapid increase in narrowleaved cattail in western Minnesota wetlands formerly dominated by bulrushes (Robert Jessen, pers. commun.). Ditches and swales created by construction of modern highways in the United States likely helped narrowleaved cattail spread into the Great Plains region (Stuckey and Salamon 1987). The plant now inhabits all states east of the 105th meridian, but was not recorded in eastern Montana as late as 1977 (Great Plains Flora Association 1977).

Even more noticeable in the prairie pothole region has been the great increase in wetlands dominated by the robust plant most botanists consider a hybrid between common cattail and narrowleaved cattail. This plant is named T. x glauca, and Stuckey and Salamon (1987) believe its distributional history parallels that of narrowleaved cattail. Hybrid cattail, a huge, nearly 3 m-tall plant, has many botanical and habitat characteristics intermediate between its parents (McDonald 1955; Stewart and Kantrud 1972; Grace and Harrison 1986). It was described in Europe during the late 1800s, but not well recognized in North America until the 1950s. I believe this plant started to spread rapidly throughout most of the prairie pothole region of North Dakota during the 1950s and is now the most abundant large hydrophyte in the state.

Wetlands of the North Dakota portion of the prairie pothole region seem ideally suited for hybrid cattail. Most of these wetlands are of intermediate salinity and are often disturbed by tillage and siltation, especially around the shallow edges. In addition, many of these wetlands lay idle and are no longer grazed. This seems to allow cattails to replace native bulrushes. Many semipermanent wetlands in western Minnesota and the eastern Dakotas that were pastured a few decades ago and dominated by semi-open stands of hardstem bulrush (Scirpus acutus) are now idle and dominated by dense stands of cattails. The emergent vegetation in many other wetlands was often harvested for livestock forage and bedding. Many of these wetlands also are now idle and dominated by cattails.

The great increase in cattails has effects on many wildlife species in the prairie pothole region. Dabbling and diving ducks and their broods prefer wetlands with openings in the marsh canopy (see review by Kantrud 1986). Ducks seem to avoid wetlands with monotypes of deep-marsh emergent hydrophytes like hybrid cattail. Most studies of waterfowl I reviewed indicate that reductions in height and density of tall emergent plants generally increase use by breeding ducks. Whether these reductions are caused by fire, flooding, mowing, cultivation, insect damage, or grazing by muskrats or domestic livestock seems to make little difference. The increased use of semi-open prairie wetlands by ducks is probably from a combination of factors. These wetlands seem to have enough emergent cover to allow pairs to isolate themselves from conspecifics. These wetlands also usually contain open-water areas dominated by submerged aquatic plants that provide easily accessible supplies of insects, molluscs, and crustaceans that are known foods of adult female ducks and their young. Use of wetlands by duck broods seems to increase with increased numbers of vegetative types at the edges of open water areas (Kantrud 1986). My review strongly suggested that most waterfowl worldwide favor feeding in shallow water areas where sunlight is not intercepted by tall emergent plants. Coots, grebes, terns, and rails also probably benefit from the presence of openings in the marsh canopy.

Some animals, however, have benefitted from the invasion of cattails into prairie wetlands. The thermal and escape cover provided by cattail-choked wetlands certainly seems to enhance the survival of wintering populations of white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus) and ring-necked pheasants (Phasianus colchicus) in intensively cultivated areas where upland cover is scarce. Large numbers of migrant blackbirds (Icteridae) roost in cattail-choked wetlands, but we know little about use of these wetlands by other migrant birds.

Scientific management of prairie wetlands is in its infancy, and research needs are great. These needs have been complicated by changes that accrued to prairie wetlands because of fire suppression, differential grazing regimes, cultivation, mowing, changes in hydrology, siltation, pesticides, and other factors. We know little about the physical and biological environments preferred by most species of breeding waterfowl during different stages in their life cycle. This information should be obtained from habitats in high states of natural preservation. Long-term experiments of burning and grazing different wetland types, in which seasonality, frequency, and intensity of treatments can be varied and combined, are needed. Monitoring should follow to ascertain if the treatments cause changes to the physical and chemical environments of wetlands. Improved management practices are needed for prairie wetlands where water levels can be controlled.

Completion of this suggested research should give conservation agencies the predictive capabilities needed to effectively manage prairie wetlands on public and private lands.

Fassett, N.C. 1930.  Preliminary reports on the flora of Wisconsin.  VI.  
     Panadanales. Wis.  Acad. Sci. 25:183-184.

Grace, J. B., and J. S. Harrison.  1986.  The biology of Canadian weeds. 
     73. Typha latifolia L.,Typha angustifolia L. and Typha x 
     glauca Godr.  Can. J. Plant Sci. 66:361-379.

Great Plains Flora Association. 1977.  Atlas of the flora of the Great 
     Plains.  Iowa State University Press, Ames.  600 pp.

Hayden, A. 1939.  Notes on Typha angustifolia L. in Iowa.  Iowa State 
     Coll. J. Sci. 13:341-351.

Kantrud, H. A. 1986.  Effects of vegetation manipulation on breeding 
     waterfowl in prairie wetlands--a literature review.  U.S. Fish 
     Wildl. Serv., Tech. Rep. 3.

McDonald, M. E. 1955.  Cause and effects of a die-off of emergent vegetation.
     J. Wildl. 	Manage. 19:24-35.

Metcalf, F.P. 1931.  Wild duck foods of North Dakota lakes.  U.S. Dept. Agric. 
     Tech. Bull. 221.

Stevens, O.A. 1963.  Handbook of North Dakota plants.  North Dakota Institute 
     for Regional Studies, Fargo.  324 pp.

Stewart, R. E., and H. A. Kantrud. 1972.  Vegetation of prairie potholes, North 
     Dakota, in relation to quality of water and other environmental 
     factors.  U. S. Geological Survey 	Prof.  Pap. 585-D.

Stuckey, R.L, and D.P. Salamon. 1987.  Typha angustifola in North America:  
     A foreigner masquerading as a native.  Ohio J. Sci., April Program 
     Abstr. 87:2