Sources of Seed
For Land Managers
Pull it out of inventory
(warehouses)
 Collect it
 Grow it
 Buy it (from collectors or growers)
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 Bids
 Contracts
Working with Seed Industry
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Tell them what you want, in what quantities
Give as much lead time as possible
They will supply it (for a price)
Proposed “Provisional Seed zones” for
the Great Basin
 Snake River (12)
– Upper
– Lower
 Northern Basin (80)
– Low (<4500 ft.)
– High (>4500 ft.)
 Central Basin (13)
– Salt flats
– Sage
– Sage-juniper
– Sage-woodland
FUNDING GERMPLASM DEVELOPMENT
AND PRODUCTION
(I.E., SEED ON THE GROUND)
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Contracts
Supply and Demand Market
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1,000lb
10,000lb
100,000lb
For a healthy Great Basin seed market (availability
and reasonable prices), plant 1,000,000 acres of
seeder-ready projects per year (funding to come from
re-directed fire budgets when no fires).
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What is Native Germplasm
Development?
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Detailed description of population on
wildland site
Removal of a population sample
(accession) from wildland site for
testing and/or increase
• How can geographic source and
germplasm identity and purity be
defined and maintained?
• Use AOSCA germplasm development
categories
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For 1,000,000 acres of seeder-ready projects
per year?
GBNPSIP Plant Germplasm Provenance
and Distribution Qualification Committee
(PDQ)

Great Basin (Gene) Pools: How
Many, How Big, and Who’s Paying?
 Philosophy:
Local is better (?)
 Practicality: How local is local?
 Politics: All (political) grass roots are local, but
grass (political) heads are up in the air swaying with
the wind
 BOTTOM LINE: Funding (political) may tell us how
local is local
To Plant A Million acres/year?
Native Plant Materials
Evaluation of Availability and Cost
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The species can be wild collected economically
The species can be wild collected to some extent
but may need field production also
The species has to be field produced; stock seed for
initial production fields can be wildland collected
The species has to be field produced; stock seed for
initial production fields has to be small plot
increased
The species cannot logistically (economically) be
wild collected, field produced and/or established by
seeding. Forget it. (Transplants for critical areas?)
DOLLARS: FUNDING GERMPLASM
DEVELOPMENT AND INCREASE
(I.E., SEED ON THE GROUND)


Contracts
Supply and Demand Market


1,000lb
10,000lb
100,000lb
For a healthy Great Basin seed market (availability
and reasonable prices), plant 1,000,000 acres of
seeder-ready projects per year (funding to come from
re-directed fire budgets when no fires).

WHAT DO WE WANT ECOSYSTEMS TO DO?
Ecosystem services---filtering water, controlling
erosion, sequestering carbon, building soil,
supporting animal life
 Ecosystems with insufficient or inappropriate plant
cover are short on services
 Plant indigenousness, role (niche), productivity
 Whatever plant material is decided on,

Maintain its genetic identity and genetic purity
 From PLANT GERMPLASM DEVELOPER to
SEED PRODUCER to
LAND MANAGER

STRIKING A BALANCE FOR PLANT
MATERIALS IN THE GREAT BASIN
Natives?
 Exotics ?
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1,000lb
10,000lb
100,000lb
DOLLARS
 Climate and Soil
 Invasive Species complications
 Public Land Use: photography, seed collection, outdoor recreation
(camping, hunting, hiking, winter sports, ATVs, eco tourism), grazing
(wildlife, feral, domestic, T&E), timber, parks, monuments, wind and solar
farms, oil and gas extraction, military/tanks
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