I got a little more work done on the St. Joseph county map. Here the prairie areas (as determined by the Michigan Natural Features Inventory) are shown in green. The lighter green areas are oak savanna.
The earliest land entries, i.e. those made at the Monroe land office prior to 1831, are shown in gray.
Q. Why are none of these early land entries in Mendon Township? After all, the good prairie land extends up into Mendon and Leonidas townships. A. It’s because that land was not for sale at that time. It was part of the Nottawasepe reservation at the time.
Fort Hogan (identified by the middle yellow-oarangish circle) was built right up against hte reservation.
And what’s the deal with the rightmost of the circled areas. It looks like the Schelhouses bought land, not on the prairie, but on the eastern edge of it. Their land purchases included land that was NOT prairie. Why they didn’t buy the parcels just to the west, which would have placed their purchases entirely on the prairie, I don’t know. Maybe sometime I’ll ride my bike there and take a look. I don’t think I’ve ever been quite in that location.
And below is a view from my July 15 bike ride. The grain bins in the distance (visible under the large tree) are just barely on the former Nottawasepe reservation. Fort Hogan was where the clump of big trees stands on the right edge of the photo.
[...] vegetation data from the Michigan Natural Features Inventory that I’ve also used elsewhere so I could see the extent of the prairie. M marks the place where I took my photo, and yes, it [...]