CHEATGRASS: MANAGEMENT
IMPLICATIONS IN THE 90'S
Thomas C. Roberts, Jr.
down its spread and mitigating the huge rehabilitation or
fire suppression costs.
As I previously stated, we can also find literature that
notes the "beneficial" side of cheatgrass. Most recently,
James Deflon's (1986) article in Rangelands, "The Case
for Cheatgrass," has generated a great deal of discussion.
Murray and others (1975) thoroughly documented the
growth and nutritional value of cheatgrass to cattle in
southern Idaho.
However, I will center my discussion on the country
that I know best, the Salt Lake District of the BLM. The
District encompasses the public lands of Box Elder, Rich,
and Tooele Counties in the northern third of Utah. It
includes over 3 million acres of public land. Some Salt
Lake District facts germane to my subject include the
following: (1) acreage ofland growing cheatgrass: 900,000
acres including Box Elder and Tooele Counties; (2) acreage of cheatgrass or dominated land burned: in the last 11
years over 235,000 acres including Box Elder and Tooele
Counties; (3) average acreage burned per year (over the
11 year period): 21,384 acres; (4) average annual suppression cost (from the period 1981-1988): $152,867; (5) approximate average acreage rehabilitated yearly: 7,900
acres.
Our main concerns include the following points:
ABSTRACT
A review of the literature coupled with a Bureau of Land
Management (BLM) District's experience, shows that many
of the concerns and problems of the 80's are the same as
they were in the 60's. People are possibly more aware of
them in the 80's because, while we have become a more
urban society, we are possibly more aware of wildland
management problems in a multiple-use and fiscal sense
than we were then. This paper addresses the multiple-use
management concerns in the Salt Lake District, BLM.
These concerns with cheatgrass are range forage problems,
wildlife forage problems, recurrent fire problems, and complications caused by the shrub die-off. The needs of the
present and future in cheatgrass management are discussed.
INTRODUCTION
First, I want to recognize the presence and the experience and knowledge of those gathered here. Hopefully,
we will all be able to go home with new ideas on
cheatgrass management. The title ofmy paper,
"Cheatgrass: Management Implications in the 90's,"
is one that allows a great deal ofliterary license, that is
as it should be given the scope of the subject. In reviewing my files, I have found a number of publications, including those that can support nearly any viewpoint on
this vast and growing subject, but as many of us readily
acknowledge, cheatgrass and its problems are not new.
In 1965, the Oregon-Washington State Office of the
Bureau of Land Management (BLM), U.S. Department
of the Interior, sponsored a 3-day workshop on cheatgrass
and medusahead in Vale, OR. Possibly, some of the
people that were there are here today. I am sure that
they could provide us with some interesting perspectives.
In 1965, the participants included such range notables as
A. C. Hull, Forrest Sneva, J. 0. IGemmendson, and Ray
Evans. Their subject matter included rehabilitation of
cheatgrass ranges, seeding methods, and the autecology
of cheatgrass. Possibly, we have just spent 20 years on
the same subjects and learned little more, but that is not
my contention. While it is true that there is a large background of knowledge on cheatgrass, it is my contention
that there is a great need for newer or better methods of
rehabilitation of cheatgrass ranges, including slowing
DEPENDABILITY AS A FORAGE
Many ranchers depend on cheatgrass as their primary
forage species in the spring. The lack of dependability of
cheatgrass as a forage species is one of the arguments
that we use when telling concerned permittees that managing cheatgrass is not one of our management goals.
On some allotments in Box Elder County, I have stood in
cheatgrass stands that were tall enough to cut for hay.
I am sure that the permitted cattle could not graze fast
enough to keep up with the growth. I have also expressed
some concern to the sheep or cattlemen that in a drought
year their grazing fee could go for naught because the
storms had not come and the cheatgrass was hardly an
inch high. I realize that we are far from the first to notice
the undependability of cheatgrass as a forage. Fifty years
ago Stewart and Young (1939) reported that forage production for perennial grasses varied much less than
cheatgrass. Their findings showed that perennial grasses
produced twice as much herbage as cheatgrass in a moist
year and 12 times as much herbage in a drought year. I
do not know if we could document such great differences,
but fluctuations in productivity have long been a concern
and a matter of discussion. The discussions even addressed the idea oflicensing use in some allotments on
an annual basis, as is done on ephemeral rangelands, to
make more use of cheatgrass when it is available.
Paper presented at the symposium on Cheatgrass Invasion, Shrub DieOff and Other Aspects of Shrub Biology and Management, Las Vegas, NV,
April 5-7, 1989.
Thomas C. Roberts, Jr., is a Range Conservationist in the Pony Express
Resource Area, Salt Lake District Office, Bureau of Land Management,
Salt Lake City, UT 84119.
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This file was created by scanning the printed publication.
Errors identified by the software have been corrected;
however, some errors may remain.
setting the stage for the other potential causes of the
shrub die-off phenomenon? Because of the presence of
cheatgrass, are shadscale, fourwing saltbush, and winterfat in a situation where water and nutrients are usurped
by the cheatgrass, thus putting them in a precarious position ready for any other factor to push them over the
edge? I am sure that the presence of cheatgrass makes
the natural revegetation process more difficult.
ECONOMICS
Can we continue to fight rangeland and cheatgrass fires
and rehabilitate them? The costs of rehabilitating after a
cheatgrass fire, using an aggressive approach, can exceed
$100 per acre. This includes seed, planting, protection
fences, and contract administration. For example, the
contract costs for the drilling of a project in Skull Valley
was $26.00 per acre; the contractor supplied the equipment and operator. The seed cost was about $30.00 per
acre. Although Siberian wheatgrass does not cost $5.00
per pound, it costs much more than the $.25 per pound
that crested wheatgrass did many years ago. The protection fence for a rehabilitation project, although salvagable, can add $30 to $40 per acre to the project cost. No
longer are land managers or users willing to accept a
monoculture of crested wheatgrass, but diversity, even
a little diversity, has its cost, which greatly increases the
costs of the project. As you can see, rehabilitation after
a rangeland fire can be very costly.
Last year, our Area and District Manager were shocked
when they saw the cost estimates for a cheatgrass fire
rehabilitation project. The costs were higher than the
appraised value on some nearby land that was recently
sold. Are the costs of rehabilitating these lands going to
influence our fire suppression behavior or our rehabilitation efforts? Maybe it is not a question of are they, but
when are they going to modify our fire suppression behavior and rehabilitation efforts. Can we afford not to?
DESERTIFICATION
While I am not one to use buzz words, perhaps "desertification" fits in this situation. In some areas on our District, we could be left with two ecotypes, neither nativecheatgrass and juniper type. Fires, shrub die-off, and lack
of regeneration, and the encroaching juniper type make
the modern-day term of desertification fit. This is becoming a real problem, and cheatgrass domination could well
be a step leading to desertification.
IMPLICATIONS IN THE 90'S
I entitled my paper "Cheatgrass Implications in the
90's," and so should address some of those implications if
matters do not change:
A Shortened Fire Cycle-This has already become
a problem in some parts of the District: Skull Valley, for
example. The problem of a shortened fire cycle is one that
is well documented. In 1965, A. C. Hull felt safe in stating that a cheatgrass range is 10 to 500 times more likely
to burn, and requires five times more men and equipment
to control than fires on perennial grass ranges. He also
believed that the cheatgrass fire season is from 1 to 3
months longer than the fire season on native rangelands.
I do know that, although other factors may be involved,
the fire season starts much earlier in Tooele County
than it does in Rich County where there is not much
cheatgrass. Simply put, the more cheatgrass, the more
fire, more often.
However, on a District level, the fire-suppression program is subject to the vagaries of policy shifts. We have
been fortunate that the budget constraints for rehabilitation have been minimal. The fire cycle, imposed by a
large acreage of cheatgrass, would probably not dovetail
with the artificially imposed policy shifts. This would
lead to an increase in acreage in cheatgrass and the ensuing problems.
WILDLIFE IMPACTS
Antelope forage and lagomorph forage are lost with
concurrent losses to raptor habitat. This impact can be
very important when the raptors are bald or golden
eagles.
Last year, the Utah National Guard hosted a live artillery firing exercise on BLM lands in the Salt Lake District. Some short-falling illumination rounds caused a
9,000-acre fire. One of the concerns in the environmental
assessment was the amount of eagle (bald in the winter
and golden year round) hunting that takes place in the
area. The hunting takes place because of the rabbit population in the area. The loss of the desirable diversity in
shrub and forb components of the vegetation composition
has undoubtedly had a deleterious effect upon the rabbit
and eagle habitat. The area (if our rehabilitation efforts
are unsuccessful) is on its way to becoming a cheatgrass
desert with a lack of botanical and faunal diversity, and
this only addresses two of the affected animals and
plants.
Increased Susceptibility To Drought-Drought is
a part oflife in the Intermountain West and native rangelands have evolved with it. Hopefully, the agricultural
and managing agencies have learned to live with it, but,
with cheatgrass in the picture, the model is complicated
by the lack of forage carryover from a "normal" percipitation year to a drought year. The agencies and agricultural community manage on a sustained yield basis, not
an ephemeral forage base. As previously stated, the presence of cheatgrass certainly complicates the managerial
model.
SHRUB DIE-OFF
While this is a subject all its own, and cheatgrass has
been around much longer than the recent die-off, I believe
that the shrub die-off and cheatgrass are interrelated.
Suffice to say, the shrub die-off is probably a result of any
number of causes. Is the presence of cheatgrass and its
opportunistic abilities in using water and nutrients
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Improved Technology Transfer-This session and the
rehabilitation workshop held by the Intermountain Research Station's Shrub Sciences Laboratory and Utah
BLM were excellent. Often, the knowledge is received by
a small percentage of those that need it. The atmosphere
is improving, but many more mid- and upper-level personnel need to get the message. Cheatgrass is not, or should
not be a range problem; it is a land management problem with concerns touching numerous disciplines.
Lack of Diversity-As previously discussed, when the
dominant aspect of a landscape is cheatgrass, the effect is
a lack of botanical and faunal diversity, and a much less
stable ecosystem. To anyone who picnics, camps, hunts,
grazes livestock, or appreciates a native rangeland, the
result is disheartening. There are more people seeking
uses of public land who are expecting to find biological
diversity, not a cheatgrass monoculture.
Money-Because of the shortened fire cycle, as discribed above, money to maintain the system (trying to
minimize the cheatgrass problem) becomes a deciding
factor or certainly a limiting factor. Since it is expensive
to fight the cheatgrass fires and rehabilitate the area,
money becomes very important, and in tight budgetary
times maybe not all that dependable.
Increased Funding And Visibility-While high
visibility would probably be ill-advised at the level of the
Halogeton Control Program of the early 60's, land managers and the public need to be aware of the changes due to
cheatgrass, and they will continue to take place without
active intervention. Part of the increased visibility would,
by design and necessity, be educational. People would
realize the need for active intervention.
In conclusion, I hope to see you at the next Cheatgrass
Symposium in 20 years when the subject will be "Our Successes in the Rehabilitation of the Western Rangelands."
Decreased Land Values-Although not a large factor
in the managerial equation, the productivity of a grazing
permit on cheatgrass acreage is probably worth less. At
any rate, the capital stock of the land owner is depreciated, whether the land owner is private or public.
REFERENCES
MANAGEMENT NEEDS
DeFlon, James G. 1986. The case for cheatgrass. Rangelands. 8: 14-17.
Hull, A. C. 1965. Cheatgrass-a persistent homesteader.
In: Proceedings, Symposium on management of
cheatgrass on rangelands; 1965 July 27-30; Vale, OR.
[Portland, OR]: U.S. Department of the Interior,
Bureau of Land Management: 20-26.
Murray, R. B.; Mayland, H. F.; Van Soest, P. J. 1978.
Growth and nutritional value to cattle of grasses on
cheatgrass range in southern Idaho. Res. Pap. INT-199.
Ogden, UT: U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest
Service, Intermountain Forest and Range Experiment
Station. 57 p.
Stewart, G.; Young, A. E. 1939. The hazard of basing
permanent grazing capacity on Bromus tectorum.
American Society of Agronomy Journal. 31: 1002-1015.
In closing I will address what I see as some needs of the
management agencies.
Less Expense-Less expensive methods and species
to rehabilitate rangeland fires with more effective methods and means are needed. We are starting to branch out
from the traditional crested wheatgrass areas and rangelands, and I expect that the seed prices will continue to
follow the economic laws of supply and demand. We need
the equipment and techniques to improve our success
rates with native grasses and native and exotic shrubs
and forbs, including, but not limited to, seed material that
is suited to the equipment available.
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