Plant species of concern and plant associations of Powder River county, Montana /

Abstract

County Distribution: It has only been found in two places on the Ashland District of the Custer National Forest (Heidel and Marriott 1996), and these represent the known Powder River and Rosebud records. In the course of this survey there was very little suitable habitat in the areas that were visited, so it was not found and no additional data was collected on this species and its distribution. Ecology and management considerations: This plant seems restricted to mesic microhabitats within pine woodlands, which could make it vulnerable to changes in woodland structure and composition by grazing and logging. These settings are also vulnerable to invasion of exotic species like Kentucky bluegrass (Poa pratensis). There were fire scars among the Ponderosa pine at one of the Ashland District sites where it occurred, indicating that the species survives ground fires. Status note: Since this species is restricted to woodlands and has not been found on BLM lands in Montana, it could be dropped from BLM "Watch" status. Ceanothus herbaceous, New Jersey tea (G5, SH) County Distribution: The single collection of this species in Montana was from a "grassy, pine-covered hill" in Powder River County. There are few pine stands on BLM lands in the county, and of the few that were surveyed, none appeared to have suitable microhabitat. It is not known whether this species is restricted to pineland habitat in Montana, and we also looked for it nearby grassland habitat on BLM lands. We did not locate it, and were unable to collect any additional data on this species in the county. Ecology and management considerations: We have no information on the ecology of this plant. It has reportedly diminished elsewhere on the Great Plains (Ode, pers. comm.) Some species of Ceanothus are highly palatable to wildlife and livestock.

Linking the National Vegetation Classification System to NRCS ecological sites in southeastern Montana

“…Only two Montana works have approached the challenge of classifying seral and disturbed vegetation types to produce an existing vegetation type classification, which is the goal of the NVCS (Hansen et al 1995 for all of Montana's wetland and riparian vegetation and a NatureServe work in progress for Glacier-Waterton Lakes International Peace Parks). Many relatively recent reports (authored after most of the above-cited references were published) describe new plant communities/associations (see Cooper 2003, Heidel et al 2001.…”

“…We also compiled a database of plots of sites in good ecological condition. Plots collected by previous studies in LRU 58A and adjacent areas include those by Hansen and Hoffman (1987), Heidel et al (2001), andVanderhorst et al (1998). Data entered included quantitative cover estimates and abiotic site variables necessary to determine ecosite.…”

Surveys of significant plant resources in southeast and south-central Montana on the Billings and Miles City field offices of the Bureau of Land Management /

“…Botanical surveys in Carter County (Vanderhorst et al 1998), surveys for globally significant plants in parts of Big Horn and Rosebud Counties (Barton and Crispin 2003), surveys in Hanging Women Basin in Big Horn County (Carlson and Cooper 2003), surveys for Astragalus barrii and Physaria didymocarpa var. lanata in parts of Big Horn and Rosebud Counties (Taylor and Caners 2002), plant Species of Concern in Powder River County (Heidel et al 2002), botanical survey of the Tongue River area (Heidel 1997), surveys for Quercus macrocarpa (Heidel 1993) and vascular plant surveys in the Pryor Mountain Desert (Lesica and Achuff 1992a).…”