Location: Piceance basin near Meeker, Colorado.
The Piceance Creek Basin, located in northwestern Colorado, serves as winter range for one of North American’s largest migratory mule deer (Odocoileus hemionus) populations. This structural basin encompasses nearly 1600 square miles and is bordered from the north by the White River, from the south by the Roan Plateau, from the east by the Grand Hogback and from the west by the Cathedral Bluffs. Food available for winter browse lacks significant nutrition, which emphasizes the value of robust plant diversity and access to this food source. However, in many Pinyon-Juniper (PJ) woodlands, such as that in the Piceance Basin, understory plant diversity is at risk due to both natural expansion of PJ as well as habitat fragmentation due to energy extraction.
While dense PJ offers excellent cover against harsh winter weather, it does not always adequately meet other habitat needs such as food and water. Managing PJ and maintaining a healthy winter range habitat is critical to sustaining a healthy Piceance mule deer population. To mitigate this increasing habitat pressure, wildlife managers must understand the role the Piceance Basin plays as winter range and how habitat quality can be improved. Increasing forage in the remaining undeveloped mule deer habitat in the Piceance Basin is of great interest to area stakeholders.
The goal of this study is to examine the effectiveness of mechanical treatments in improving the establishment of mule deer forage in the Piceance Basin. Within that framework the study targets these questions:
- Is seeding a diverse mix of native species necessary?
- Does mechanical thinning improve shrub establishment versus untreated stands?
- Which shrub species will be most successful?
Each plot will be divided and randomly assigned one of four different treatments:
- control (40 acres)
- anchor chain (38 acres)
- hydro-ax (36 acres)
- roller chopper (36 acres)
The anchor chain will be dragged between two crawler tractors in such a manner that mature PJ will be uprooted leaving young trees and shrubs in place. A hydro-ax tractor has a front-end mounted high powered blade designed to selectively mow PJ to a height of 5 inches. Roller chopping drums with welded blades crush and mulch vegetation as they’re towed behind a bulldozer.
Plots will be seeded by hand using broadcast spreaders prior to treatment implementation, which will allow heavy machinery to cover over the exposed seed. The diverse native seed mix is comprised of 11 shrub species, 13 forb species and 9 grass species. To test the effectiveness of seeding, half of each study plot will be seeded and half will be left as an unseeded control. Seeding and mechanical treatments are scheduled to begin in October 2011. Vegetation monitoring is currently planned through the first two growing seasons.
