All the open areas and many of the wooded areas of the Preserve were disturbed by farming or grazing in the past.  However, some areas of the Preserve were surveyed before they were plowed.  In his 1910 thesis, Heddle carried out transect surveys of the upland and lowland plants in and around the University Bay area, including the sedge meadow area that is today the playing fields, parking lots (formerly called Lot 60), and the Class of 1918 Marsh.  This sedge meadow area was soon drained and converted to crop fields.   For a partial list of the 270 plants found by Heddle in these transects of the University Bay area in 1910, before the area was plowed, see

• Heddle’s 1910 list of wetland and wet prairie plants
  
• Heddle’s 1910 list of prairie plants

Eagle Heights Woods is one of the most diverse woodland areas of the Preserve.  Much of the area has been forested since before the 1930s.  Josh Sulman has created an inventory of the plants in Eagle Heights Woods and the adjacent (across Lake Mendota Drive) Wally Bauman Woods and North Shore Woods.

• Native Vascular Plant Inventory of Eagle Heights Woods, Wally Bauman Woods and Tent Colony Woods