I have not done any work on prairies myself, hopefully someday. But, while looking up info on butterflies and moths I came across this amazing website (below) about a couple who bought a bunch of farm land in Wisconsin and has spent 10+ years "unfarming" it. They are trying to restore it to its pre-farming state of prairie, savannah, woodlands, etc. They documented the whole process (including some burning and mowing) and go out and photograph and inventory all the wildlife. It is really amazing. I have no affiliation with them, but I have posted about it several times now on various sites, because it is just so impressive. I think I took a special interest because that is the part of Wisconsin my family is from. My grandparents (and great-grandparents) were dairy farmers until the 90s and family still lives on some of the farmland. So the landscape at that website seems very familiar and beautiful to me. If I had way more money (and energy) I would love to do something like on a grand scale someday.
http://www.prairiehaven.com/
(beware if Googling, prairiehaven
.org is a nudist colony!)
Also it is definitely doable on a much smaller scale. I took wildflower class years ago at the local college. The teacher lived in a nearby town and took us on a tour of her "yard". She had a regular somewhat large suburban corner lot. Her backyard was a complete bona-fide prairie with a proper ratio of grasses and flowers, and she burned it almost every year. The fire department would come to supervise the burn. She also had a passive solar house and did a green roof...it was impressive.
