Treesearch

Water conservation in nursery systems is an ever-increasing focus, yet there is relatively little guidance for growers producing seedlings intended for restoration regarding how practices such as subirrigation influence plant growth in the nursery and after outplanting. Our study investigated red-flowering currant (Ribes sanguineum Pursh) seedling development and early field performance using different fertilizer treatments under a subirrigation regime. Plants were fertilized with 1) incorporated organic fertilizer, 2) incorporated controlled-release fertilizer, 3) top-dressed controlled-re...

Ungulate carrion supports an unusual canine-corvid-eagle winter scavenging guild in northern Arizona. To evaluate the effect of location and habitat on carcass use and longevity, between December 1996 and April 2008 we recorded 870 observations of Bald Eagles (Haliaeetus leucocephalus), Common Ravens (Corvus corax) and coyotes (Canis latrans) scavenging 123 ungulate carcasses: 103 elk (Cervus canadensis), 12 mule deer (Odocoileus hemionus), seven pronghorn antelope (Antilocapra americana), and one domestic cow (Bos taurus). Our temporal metric for measuring carcass longevity and scavenger...

Increasing the evolutionary potential of restored populations has become a viable objective of restoration activities. Choosing plant materials genetically adapted to the restoration environment is critical for success, and phenotypic plasticity may also contribute to establishment and persistence in disturbed environments. To select seed sources for restoration informed by plasticity, we must answer the question: Do some source environments produce more plastic genotypes than others? Using a dataset of maternal families from 130 western US source populations of the perennial bunchgrass...

Recent developments in remote sensing (RS) technology have made several sources of auxiliary data available to support forest inventories. Thus, a pertinent question is how different sources of RS data should be combined with field data to make inventories cost-efficient. Hierarchical model-based estimation has been proposed as a promising way of combining: (i) wall-to-wall optical data that are only weakly correlated with forest structure; (ii) a discontinuous sample of active RS data that are more strongly correlated with structure; and (iii) a sparse sample of field data. Model predictio...

Recent extensive forest mortality and subsequent salvage logging may threaten the water supply from headwater catchments in western North America. Land managers confronting current insect outbreaks and projected increases in forest disturbance require information about the potential water quality consequences of these changes. This study is a hillslope-scale evaluation of soil N and C leaching in lodgepole pine forests that have experienced 80% overstory tree mortality. I measured extractable inorganic and ion resin exchangeable-N forms, in situ net mineralization and nitrification, and...

Wildfire is a natural phenomenon that began with the development of terrestrial vegetation in a lightning-filled atmosphere of the Carboniferous Period (307-359 million years before the present). Sediment deposits from that era contain evidence of charcoal from post-fire ash slurry flows. As human populations developed in the Pleistocene and Holocene epochs, mankind transformed fire into one of its oldest tools. Human and naturally ignited fires from lightning altered and steered the trajectories of ecosystem development in most parts of the world. Humans are now the primary source of...

The Interagency Native Plant Materials Development Program outlined in the 2002 United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) and United States Department of Interior (USDI) Report to Congress encouraged use of native plant materials for rangeland rehabilitation and restoration where feasible. The Great Basin Native Plant Project is a cooperative project lead by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) Plant Conservation Program and the United States Forest Service (USFS), Rocky Mountain Research Station that was initiated to provide information that will be useful to managers when making...

Sagebrush false dandelion is distributed from south-central British Columbia to northern California, northern Nevada and Utah, largely east of the Cascade and Sierra Nevada mountains, and eastward across western and central Montana and northwestern Wyoming (CPNWH 2017; SEINet 2017; USGS 2017).PDF UPDATED: FEBRUARY 2024.

Royal penstemon occurs from the eastern slopes of the Cascade and Sierra Nevada Mountains eastward across central and southeastern Washington, eastern Oregon, and southwestern Idaho, and south through eastern California and Nevada to higher elevations in mountain ranges on the northern edge of the Mojave Desert (USDA NRCS 2017). A few populations are found in Utah.PDF UPDATED: APRIL 2024.

Gooseberryleaf globemallow is native to North America and occurs primarily in the Intermountain region in the western states of Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Nevada, Utah, Arizona, and New Mexico (La Duke 2016). It is also reported in northern California but may reach its maximum abundance in Utah (Kearney 1935). Plants are winter hardy, especially in regions with at least periodic snow cover. They are most abundant on open or disturbed sites receiving 8 to 12 inches (200-300 mm) of annual precipitation (Wasser 1982; Stevens et al. 1985).PDF UPDATED: MAY 2024.