Yes, that small, white envelope, hand-labeled “Sunflower seeds, 1969,” went unplanted that summer. I suppose there were other things on the young married couple’s agenda.

Study region and experimental setup. Twenty-one pairs of grassland (green) and sunflower (yellow) fields were selected across the study region in Southwest France. Study landscapes (500 m radius ...

STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Millions of acres of grassland used to spread across the high plains in this country. There's still some left, but also seas of corn and wheat growing instead.

Southern grassland ecosystems, and nearly all the plants and animals they supported, are gone. There is hope of bringing some of them back to life.