Written by Edwin Sparks, Malheur National Wildlife Refuge Habitat Ecologist/Photo by High Desert Partnership
After an initial setback due to the furlough, Refuge staff and partners were able to participate in our Weed Prioritization Workshop February 12-13. The workshop was held at the High Desert Partnership office and put on by Region 1’s Inventory and Monitoring (I&M) team. Jess Wenick, who became one of the regional I&M biologists after leaving Malheur as the habitat ecologist, came back to lead the workshop. In attendance from the Refuge were biology staff, maintenance, and our deputy project leader. Also in attendance were weed experts from Oregon Department of Agriculture, Harney County Cooperative Weed Management Area, U.S. Forest Service, Bureau of Land Management, local landowners, and owners of Ecosystems Management, Inc. (a private chemical sprayer who works on the Refuge).
The first day of the meeting we tasked the experts in the room to go over Malheur Refuge’s extensive weed list so we could discern 1) how far away from the Refuge the weed was known to exist and 2) how invasive it would be if it made to the Refuge. This information was plugged into a computational model that created a score based on whether or not we could prevent, eradicate, or suppress the weed. The model then ranked out where our highest priorities should lie with our treatments. I won’t give the entire list here but our top five priorities (for the weeds on Refuge only) came out as follows: Salt cedar, Perennial pepperweed, Russian olive, and then Mediterranean sage, Medusahead rye, and Russian knapweed tied for fourth on the list.
On the second day of the meeting, the expert panel departed and it was down to just Refuge staff and members of Ecosystems Management, Inc. Day one focused on what to prioritize and day two focused on where. We broke down the Refuge to the management units (there are twelve) and then broke that down to habitat type. We then looked at each habitat and graded the current condition, resistance to weeds, and proximity to other activities on the Refuge. This was all plugged into the model to produce scores that tell us what the model expects to be our highest priority areas. The top five areas the model said deserve our highest attention were as follows: P-Ranch wetland, Krumbo meadow, P-Ranch meadow, Double O wetland, and BV meadow.
At this time the model results are only in draft form. I look forward to receiving the full package from the I&M team once completed. The idea here is that we can take this information and ensure that we are allocating our resources in the most intelligent way possible. One thing to keep in mind though is even armed with this information, we are allowed to use our best judgement. For example, the highest priority weed is currently only found in an area that ranked 20th in the area model. Since that weed has a high chance for eradication, we will be working diligently to eradicate that particular species regardless of how low the area ranked. Overall the workshop was a huge success, it was great to catch up with Jess, and I look forward to putting this new information on the ground this spring.
