2007 Monitoring Natural WBP Regeneration on Whitehawk Mountain
Project: Monitor Natural Whitebark Pine Regeneration-Whitehawk Mountain
Agency/Forest or Park/District: Lowman RD, Boise National Forest, USFS, Idaho
Project coordinator: Pete Wier
Contact: Pete Wier, Lowman Ranger Station, 7359 Hwy 21, Lowman, ID. 83637 208-259-3361 pwier@fs.fed.us
Cooperators None
Source of funding /amount
FHP: $1000
Supplemental funding: $130 from RTRT
Dates of restoration efforts
Restoration efforts took place over the summer months between the years of 2004-2009
Objectives
Estimate the timing and amount of WBP regeneration that may be expected after different vegetative treatments associated with WBP restoration projects.
Acres/ha treated 70 acres
Methods
There are four levels of vegetative manipulation including a control group that will be sampled and monitored and are associated with the ongoing Whitehawk WBP Restoration Project and the 2006 Red Mountain Wildfire.
The initial implementation if the Whitehawk WBP Restoration Project project began in 2004 and offers two different vegetation treatments. The initial phase if this project involved the removal of subalpine fir and losgepole pine less than 10’’ DBH and girdling subalpine fi and lodgepole pine greater than 10’’ DBH. A portion of these acres received a second treatment, removing large diameter subalpine fir and lodgepole pine using commercial yarding equipment.
The 2006 Red Mountain fire offers opportunities to monitor WBP regeneration within naturally disturbed WBP ecosystems. Five fixed diameter plots, 1/50th acre in size, would sample each of the four areas of interest. Only WBP seedlings less than 4 ½ feet in height will be measured. Plots centers will be identified by rebar and colored flagging. GPS points will be taken at plot centers.
Planting? If so, source of seedlings? Resistance? No
Outcome
On October 2007, the project was nearly complete. 24 permanent plots were established with rebar plot centers. 75% of the plots have GPS coordinates; 25% of the plots still need coordinates. Whitebark pine regeneration data was collected at each plot; data input to appropriate spreadsheets has not been completed.
This project established baseline whitebark pine regeneration information that will be used to monitor long term changes in regeneration trends associated with different vegetative treatments.
Monitoring since completion of the project
Dates 2009 and 2012 Post monitoring of the 24 plots
Plans for future monitoring? Yes
Will outcome meet goals?
The monitoring is intended to generate trends in long term regeneration. These results will assist in meeting project goals.
Future actions/follow up?
Continued monitoring
Miscellaneous comments
During implementation, I realized that several additional factors may affect the seed caching behavior of the clark’s nutcracker and ultimately affect the amount of whitebark regeneration. In an effort to address this concern, additional information was collected on cone producing trees. Measurements from the plot center to the nearest 2 cone producing whitebark pine trees included azimuth and distance.