xeric

For Sean Hogan, owner of Portland’s Cistus Nursery, known for introducing xeric and Mediterranean-climate plants from around the world to the Northwest, said you need to become a weather detective to zone surf.

Stands of rare xeric tallgrass prairie, one of the oldest varieties on earth, swayed in the hot wind.

It flows through wooded areas like parts of Redden State Forest in Delaware and habitats that include ancient, inland forests where there are rare sand ridges called xeric dunes.

While the monitoring and treatment will keep visitors out of the Central Operable Unit, Surovchak said, the public shouldn’t be denied the 5,000 acres of xeric tallgrass prairie that surround it on all sides.

The specimen examined from four miles north of Jaumave was trapped in a xeric area in which the vegetation consisted of mesquite, high palmlike yuccas, and "lechugilla."