What is in a name? Well apparently the name you give a plant, sensitive, endangered, threatened, means quite a bit! In light of a pressing evaluation of BLM sensitive species listings by the USFWS, we’ve been rushing to enter data and use Access to analyze information about a BLM sensitive plant that previous interns have been collecting data on for years. Later in the week, after a monotonous period of data entry, lightened up by an exchange of funny faces with my fellow cubicle-sharing intern, we finally got a chance to see the plant we’ve worked so hard on.
Eriogonum diatomaceum is its name. It’s a type of buckwheat (polygonaceae) that grows only on diatomaceous soils in Nevada. Diatomaceous soils are neat. They are soils created by the evaporation of water from the ancient lake lahontan and the settled layers of diatoms (microscopic algae) whose only known habitat is in Churchill Narrows, a large parcel of BLM land containing interesting rock outcrops, randomly placed train tracks, a bizarre company called “Hodges” that gets paid to use vehicles and other equipment until they break down to test their durability, paleontological sites, and of course our favorite little plant.
We filled in the blanks on the datasheets from previous interns and got to know this little plant as a random hodges tank drove back and forth in the distance on an adjacent dirt road, leaving the occasional cloud of dust in its wake. The site was gorgeous, wide-open expanses of sagebrush and greasewood with the rolling hills and mountains in the background. We also saw a couple of nifty non-botanical artifacts at the sites including fossilized bones from a large mammal and a chert flaking site created by Native Americans. So now we know what the plant looks at and got a glimpse of its habitat. It will be interesting to see if its listing changes due to the research of past and current intern teams.