Restoration
View article.
This study identified contrasting climate niches for ten Great Basin understorey forbs, including differences in both mean values and climate variability. These estimates can guide species selection for restoration by identifying species with a high tolerance for climate variability and large climatic niches. They can also help conservationists to understand which species may be least tolerant of climate variability, and potentially most vulnerable to climate change
View research brief.
Key findings of this research were:
- Burned low-elevation sagebrush sites can be seeded with mixes of native grasses, forbs and shrubs using rangeland drills adapted for seeding large and small seeds in separate rows.
- Seeding technique, timing of seed application, and seeding rate are important considerations when seeding Wyoming big sagebrush.
- The best techniques for establishing Wyoming big sagebrush are seeding at high rates via a drill in late fall.
- Success of seeding treatments on semiarid sites is ultimately dependent on weather conditions and competitive pressure from invasive weeds, and it may be best to delay treatments until conditions are predicted to be favorable, depending on the feasibility of weed control at the site.
Access guide.
This guide describes the process the Klamath-Lake Forest Partnership (KLFHP) has used to plan and implement cross-boundary restoration projects to achieve improved forest health conditions on large landscapes scales. It is intended as a model other individuals and communities can modify to meet the needs of their local circumstances.
View synthesis.
This synthesis presents existing information and identifies critical knowledge gaps in our understanding of seed-based aspen regeneration, in particular as it relates to flowering and seed production, as well as germination, first year growth, and survival of aspen seedlings. This information is discussed further in the context of aspen ecology and its application in both passive and active management approaches to aspen seedling regeneration and restoration.
The Exploration Tool is designed for resource managers to use when planning land treatments. The tool provides useful summaries of environmental characteristics of planned treatment areas and facilitates adaptive management practices by comparing those characteristics to other similar treatments within a specified distance or area of interest.
Access map.
The LANDFIRE Web–Hosted Applications Map WHAM! is an online, interactive map that calls up many of the applications, their locations, and the partners we work with. It’s easy as point–and–click! Hover over a “point,” click on it, and learn how LANDFIRE products helped land managers meet their planning objectives. Use the checkboxes at the bottom right of the map to view projects by categories.
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In this study, we use freely available, satellite remote sensing to explore changes in vegetation productivity(normalized difference vegetation index) of three distinct, low-tech, riparian and wet meadow restoration projects. Case studies are presented that range in geographic location (Colorado, Oregon, and Nevada), restoration practice (Zeedyk structures,beaver dam analogs, and grazing management), and time since implementation. Restoration practices resulted in increased vegetation productivity of up to 25% and increased annual persistence of productive vegetation. Improvements in productivity with time since restoration suggest that elevated resilience may further enhance wildlife habitat and increase forage production.Long-term, documented outcomes of conservation are rare; we hope our findings empower practitioners to further monitor and explore the use of low-tech methods for restoration of ecohydrologic processes at meaningful spatial scales.
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This study presents a method and case study to evaluate the effectiveness of restoration of riparian vegetation using a web-based cloud-computing and visualization tool (ClimateEngine.org) to access and process remote sensing and climate data. In each study area, the post-restoration NDVI-precipitation relationship was statistically distinct from the pre-restoration relationship, suggesting a change in the fundamental relationship between precipitation and NDVI resulting from stream restoration. We infer that the in-stream structures, which raised the water table in the adjacent riparian areas, provided additional water to the streamside vegetation that was not available before restoration and reduced the dependence of riparian vegetation on precipitation. This approach provides a cost-effective, quantitative method for assessing the effects of stream restoration projects on riparian vegetation.
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This study used seed‐coating techniques to attach powder ground from Bhut Jolokia (C. chinense) peppers to native plant seeds and evaluated the efficacy of these seed coatings for deterring rodent seed predation and enhancing native plant recruitment using laboratory and field experiments. Laboratory feeding trials demonstrated that native deer mice (Peromyscus maniculatus) consumed far fewer pepper‐coated seeds compared with untreated control seeds. Field seed‐addition experiments consistently demonstrated that rodent seed predation reduced native plant recruitment over the four year study. Coating techniques used in the first three years were not persistent enough to reduce rodent seed predation effects on plant recruitment. However, a more persistent coating applied in conjunction with late‐winter sowing negated rodent seed predation effects on recruitment in year four. Our results demonstrate that coating seeds with natural plant defense compounds may provide an effective, economical way to improve the efficacy of plant restoration by deterring seed predation by ubiquitous rodent granivores.
View report.
This report contains descriptions of USGS sage-grouse and sagebrush ecosystem research projects that are ongoing or were active during 2018 and is organized into five thematic areas: Fire, Invasive Species, Restoration, Sagebrush, Sage-Grouse, and Other Sagebrush-Associated Species; and Climate and Weather.