Describe a conservation worker as a "wildlife biologist" and numbers of creatures -- from deer to endangered species -- come immediately to mind. But for Department of Natural Resources wildlife biologist Dan Kennedy, one of his main species of interest isn't even an animal. It's a plant.

A private-lands biologist with the DNR's Landowner Incentive Program (LIP), Kennedy is intrigued with the Eastern prairie fringed orchid, a federally threatened plant that thrives in what has become a rare Michigan ecosystem -- the lakeplain prairie.

Lakeplain prairies are wet coastal meadows found along the Great Lakes. Lakeplain prairies vary in wetness from year to year and often are thought of as a transition zone between uplands and marshes. These unique habitats have been degraded since settlement, often having been converted into croplands or pastures. According to state ecologists, 99 percent of Michigan's lakeplain prairies have disappeared during the last two centuries and the habitat continues to change because of fluctuating water levels, succession of woody vegetation and invasive plants.

But working with the Michigan Nature Association, a nonprofit land conservancy that's been around since 1952 and owns 8,500 acres in 165 sanctuaries across the state, Kennedy is helping restore a 100-plus-acre site adjacent to Wildfowl Bay in the Saginaw Bay area that is prime prairie fringed orchid (or PFO, as the insiders call it) habitat.

So far, prescribed burning and removal of invasive plants and shrubs have been used to preserve the tract and an intensive monitoring program is underway to make sure the management techniques are working.

"We originally were concerned fire might have a negative impact to PFO, but the lakeplain prairie is a fire-dependent ecosystem," Kennedy said. "Most experts believe the plant has adapted over time to deal with fire."

So far, Kennedy's instincts seem correct; surveys of burned and unburned lakeplain prairies show similar numbers of PFOs.

"It's just one sample, so far -- we're going to do a prescribed burn again in spring of 2010 -- but there's no statistical difference in the numbers of PFOs in the burned and unburned areas," he said.

"One of our goals in partnership with the Michigan Nature Association is to recreate natural ecological processes. One that has been hindered over the last couple of centuries has been fire. The general thought is, if you restore the natural ecological processes, most of the plants and animals in those habitats will benefit."

Kennedy teams up with the Michigan Nature Association to develop a management plan, and the LIP program, provides a grant to do the work. Kennedy follows up by monitoring the management activities.

But wildlife comes into play in prairie fringed orchid management in a very important way: the plants are pollinated by the hawk moth, which has an unusual adaptation that allows it to pollinate the plant. The hawk moth has an unusual tongue that allows it to penetrate deep into the orchid's nectar-rich flowers. Hawk moths are active at night, when the orchid increases its fragrance generation, attracting the insects to the flowers.

And, as Kennedy notes, lakeplain prairie restoration provides benefits to waterfowl, songbirds, reptiles and amphibians.

"The site I'm working on in Saginaw Bay is one of the nicest lakeplain prairies left in the state," Kennedy said. "The DNR just got a grant from the Great Lakes Fish and Wildlife Restoration Act to do additional lakeplain prairie restoration in the Saginaw Bay area."

Lakeplain prairies are open grassland/wetlands, Kennedy explained.

"The driving force is Great Lakes water levels, so the lakeplain prairies move over time with the water," he said. "They can be found intermixed with oak openings in places -- kind of like an oak savanna."

Although rising water levels may flood out the habitat from time to time, the plant has adapted. Jeremy Emmi, executive director of the MNA, said the prairie fringe orchids, which grow from tubers, come back when water levels recede.

"They can remain dormant for a decade when the water level changes," said Emmi.

A federally threatened plant, the Eastern prairie fringed orchid was added to the U.S. List of Endangered and Threatened Species in 1989. A recovery plan for the species, which was adopted a decade later, calls for habitat protection and habitat management.

One of about 200 native North American orchids, the prairie fringed orchid is a perennial that grows to 40 inches in height with an upright leafy stem and an inflorescence (flower cluster) composed of five to 40 white flowers. Each flower has a fringed lip that is less than an inch long and a tube-like nectar spur that is less than two inches long.

Flowers appear in late June or early July and last only for a week to 10 days, often at a height just above the surrounding grasses. Found in seven states (and Canada), prairie fringed orchids are more common in Michigan than any of the other states.

"I think it's the most striking plant I've ever come across," Kennedy said. "The individual flower is very fine and delicate and intricate -- a beautiful flower."