The month of July has been a very full month! My partner, Erin, and I have been splitting our time between collecting data for an on-going vegetation production study and SOS collections, both of which are time sensitive projects.
Our SOS collections have been focused primarily on key pollinator and sage grouse forbs, as well as a couple grasses and antelope bitterbrush. Even though we started with 16 vouchers of specimens that we had the potential to collect seed from, the reality will be that the final number of seed collections we make this season will be much smaller. I’ve learned this month how unpredictable and time-consuming the process of locating and monitoring a potential collection can be. I don’t mean these adjectives in a particularly negative sense, but I’ve had my eyes opened to some of the basic hurdles a seed collection program such as SOS must face. As we’ve monitored species, trying to predict the dates of prime seed readiness, many of the seed populations have gotten swept away or chomped to dust by wind and insects. Managing our time for two projects also meant that some of our seed was ready for us before we had the time to snatch it up.
In light of this, we are proud and excited to have completed our first few collections this month with the help of the Montana Conservation Corps crew that came to assist us from the Wind River Reservation. We were fortunate enough to have their help for two days collecting seed just outside of the Red Canyon Wildlife Management Area. We are hoping August will bring several more successful collections!
When we are not busy collecting SOS seed, our other task has been to gather data about the annual vegetative production of rangeland across the field office and make comparisons between grazed and ungrazed rangeland. Each study site we visit has an exclosure that has been preventing cattle from grazing these small sections of land for many years now, which allows the grass and other plants to proliferate (hypothetically) as the rest of the land would if cattle were not present. Our job is to collect data about the cover by species and production by species weight for plots placed inside and outside the exclosure. Part of this process is clipping small circular plots, dividing and bagging species separately and then weighing them. Today we finished our tenth and final study location and are excited to see what new projects August will bring!