Culture
The culture of the plains includes a strong tradition of land stewardship, as economies and families are closely tied to the land. During the 1800s, the federal government gave much of the Great Plains grasslands to homesteaders and the railroads (who eventually sold much of it to individuals) to encourage westward expansion. Those landowners plowed and planted the prairie and ran cattle on it. Today, most of the shortgrass prairie remains in private ownership. Landowners in the shortgrass region have a long tradition of careful and effective land management, a necessity in a dry region where so little vegetation grows. Careful stewardship includes maintaining healthy ecosystems upon which livestock, wildlife, and humans depend. Landowners live close to the land, and recognize that abusing it reduces its productivity. Land that is less productive is less profitable. Land often remains with the original homesteading family, and is passed down from one generation to the next. And because abused land affects not only the current owners but also future generations, most landowners nurture it to leave a lasting legacy of healthy land.

Ecology
The shortgrass BCR contains flat to gently rolling topography, broken by occasional canyons and bluffs. Perhaps the most prominent feature on the prairie is Pawnee Buttes, on the Pawnee National Grasslands. These two chalk pillars, visible for many miles, jut up above the prairie in the northern portion of the BCR and provide nesting habitat for Prairie Falcons, Golden Eagles, and other birds. In some of the central and southern portions of the BCR, the only topographic relief is provided by shallow depressions in the prairie, called playas.

The shortgrass prairie owes its dry climate to the Rocky Mountains. The Rockies wring moisture out of Pacific storm fronts traveling east across the continent, leaving precious little to fall on the prairie. What scant precipitation falls in this rain shadow-less than 20 inches per year, in some areas-arrives mainly in the spring and summer. The total precipitation varies greatly between years at a given location and varies significantly more than in the mixed-grass or tallgrass systems. Extended droughts are not uncommon. Mean monthly temperatures range from 10°F in winter to nearly 100°F in summer, although daily temperatures can be more extreme. In the southern portion of the BCR, the annual total potential evaporation can be greater than 250 cm (100 inches). Severe weather (blizzards, hailstorms, and tornados) occurs in most years.

The semi-arid climate of the shortgrass prairie is expressed by ankle-high vegetation, primarily blue grama and buffalo grass. Where moisture and soil conditions are suitable, forbs, succulents, and low woody vegetation may also be present. The taller species, such as prickly-pear cactus and yucca, provide precious cover used by some bird species to shade their nests from the scorching prairie sun.

In addition to climate, grazing shapes the shortgrass prairie. Before widespread settlement by European-Americans, grazing regimes consisted of herds of native grazers (bison, pronghorn, and elk) wandering widely across the prairie, spreading the impact of their grazing and trampling unevenly over the landscape. Prairie dogs contributed, too, and were probably the primary source of grazing pressure. Their colonies expanded, contracted, and moved in response to vegetation changes. Bison may have sought out prairie dog towns for grazing, because repeated clipping by prairie dogs elevates the nutrient content of grasses. The end result of all this movement by grazers was a prairie mosaic, with some areas grazed intensively and others not at all.

Grassland birds were adapted to this shifting landscape mosaic, with vegetation patches available in a variety of conditions, from ungrazed to grazed-to-the-ground. On a landscape level, each bird species had access to a variety of habitat conditions, and could settle in the area that met its nesting and foraging needs. The extremes of grassland bird habitat needs are exemplified by Mountain Plovers, which prefer to nest in very short grasses, such as heavily-grazed sites, and Upland Sandpipers, which prefer to nest in tall grasses, found only on moist, ungrazed sites.

Another major habitat type in this BCR is lowland riparian. In the shortgrass prairie, riparian habitats occur along stream and river courses and around some reservoirs. Riparian vegetation is dominated by plains cottonwood, with willow shrubs and introduced species such as Russian-olive and Chinese elm. Trees were uncommon features of the shortgrass prairie before European settlement. The development of woody vegetation along waterways has been facilitated by alteration of natural river flow regimes through irrigation drawdown and reservoir construction for flood control. Animal species of eastern deciduous forests, including birds, have capitalized on the relatively recent development of these wooded corridors, and many of the species now found in riparian zones of the shortgrass region are actually natives of eastern forests. Examples include the fox squirrel, Blue Jay, and Brown Thrasher. Their impact on indigenous shortgrass species is largely unknown.

Closely affiliated with riparian zones are islands, beaches, and sandbars. These habitat features are created through the processes of erosion and deposition, and are reliant on periodic flooding. Controlled rivers do not effectively create these habitats. Sparsely-vegetated shores and islands supply habitat for species such as Piping and Snowy Plovers. However, this habitat is perpetually imperiled, as most reservoirs in the region are privately owned and managed, and considerations other than wildlife habitat (mainly agricultural) take precedence. Drawdown of the water levels for irrigation and concentrated use by livestock pose serious threats to shore- and bank-nesting bird species. In addition, many reservoirs are managed for public recreation, opening the door to habitat destruction and disturbance by humans, their pets, and machinery. Finally, vegetation encroachment threatens to render the habitat unsuitable, as most of the birds that favor this habitat require an open substrate for nesting and foraging.

Other habitats represented in the shortgrass region are wetlands (including marshes, wet meadows, lakes, and ponds), sandsage prairie (found where sandy soils occur), and playa lakes. Playas are shallow depressions in the prairie that are usually dry, but fill with water from thunderstorms and other sources. Playas average about 6.3 ha (15.5 ac), with most less than 12 ha (30 ac). They provide a great attraction for birds in a region otherwise devoid of standing water. Water-filled playas provide nesting and feeding habitat for waterfowl and shorebirds, and vital migratory and wintering habitat for waterfowl. Playas with wet soils but little standing water may produce vegetation with seeds important for some passerines. During migration, playas are especially important to shorebirds, which congregate on the extensive mudflats created when water evaporates from the shallow basins. More than 99% of all playas are privately-owned. Many have been lost due to conversion to cropland. Others are under threat from siltation (from surrounding croplands), pesticide runoff, overgrazing, oil field water dumping, and altered hydrologic cycles (a result of increasing the storage capacity for irrigation purposes, and the presence of additional water from irrigation runoff).

Because of the dry climate and low human population density, the shortgrass prairie has been altered less than either the mixed-grass or tallgrass prairies. Less than half of the original shortgrass prairie has been converted to other land cover types. By comparison, cropland and other land cover types now cover an estimated 64% of the original mixed-grass prairie and 98% of the original tallgrass prairie. However, the loss of nearly half of the shortgrass prairie is significant, and as the available habitat declines so do the plants and animals that are adapted to it. Prominent among the animals that are declining are some prairie birds.