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Posted on Mon, Nov. 17, 2008

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Tumbleweed didn't always roll through Kansas

BY BECCY TANNER

The Wichita Eagle

This is one in a series of vignettes celebrating Kansas history. The series' name comes from the state motto, Ad astra per aspera: "To the stars through difficulties."

"See them tumbling down,

Pledging their love to the ground,

Lonely but free I'll be found

Drifting along with the tumbling tumbleweeds."

--chorus to "Tumbling Tumbleweeds," written by Bob Nolan, co-founder of the Sons of the Pioneers, 1934

Hardly a Western movie or television show is made without a scene involving one of the most iconic symbols of the Old West: the tumbleweed.

Until 135 years ago, the tumbleweed had yet to grow on American soil.

Native to Russia, thistle seeds were accidentally introduced with flax seed that was planted in Scotland, S.D., during the fall and winter of 1873 and 1874.

With just enough snow and rain, the seeds germinated. By fall, Russian thistles tumbled and scattered their seeds with the wind.

Within two decades, tumbleweeds were thriving in 16 western states, including Kansas.

"They always talk about the tumbling tumbleweed but that is the primary way the seed gets dispersed," said Dallas Peterson, weed specialist and associate professor of agronomy at Kansas State University in Manhattan.

Each plant can produce up to 200,000 seeds. The plants range

in size from a few inches high to 4 or 5 feet tall and can be as wide.

The hardy weeds are among some of the first to germinate and establish themselves as plants by early spring and are drought tolerant.

On Nov. 24, 1915, Kansas newspapers reported that tumbleweeds were causing problems:

"Russian thistle, bull nettles and other tumbleweeds, rolling in the November winds, piled up against fences and in railroad cuts. Trains carried crews to remove the thistle for fear the engines would set fire to them. They were a menace in prairie fires. Frequently houses burned when they piled against the wall and caught fire from the chimney."

During the years of the massive dust storms in the 1930s, the tumbleweeds were among the plants in western Kansas that thrived. So much so, some farmers stored tons of them as emergency feed during the winter of 1934.

Today, the plants still flourish in Kansas.

Tumbleweeds have been used in home decorating, as Christmas trees and in landscaping. The Southwest Prairie Tumbleweed farm near Garden City sells tumbleweeds on its Web site for $15 to $25, plus shipping.

Most Kansans, though, can find tumbleweeds on any given day, perhaps when carefully dodging them while driving on windswept roads.

Reach Beccy Tanner at 316-268-6336 or btanner@wichitaeagle.com.