Working hand-in-hand
Post by 2022 student Jocelyn Wood -
In this second part of the course, we focused on gathering samples from all our different established sites. By doing this we will be able to compare the different plot treatments with the different characteristics of the soil. Dr. Aguerre could not join us due to COVID-19, but we continued with his data collection design. For his, we collected forage samples from four subplots in each section. We can also compare the abundance and diversity of the forage samples with the different plot treatments. This data will be crucial for understanding how grazing and fire affect the soil and grass with a landscape.
For the soil data, we used a long drill bit to pull soil up out of the ground into a bucket. In each plot, there were seven collections, and they were all mixed into a bag. Smaller baggies were divided to be sent to the Montana State University lab to test for DNA in the soil. This will give us a look into the soil microbial activity. This can be used to measure the health and productivity of the soil. More microbes mean more grass, and more grass means more land for cows to graze on. The diversity of plants also helps with the overall diversity of the ecosystem. Landon Krogstead from the Montana Department of Natural Resources came out to talk to us about the importance of rangeland management. He was a great help in showing the agricultural side of management and helping us ID some of the plants we keep seeing in the field. Meriel Beck from the Montana Weed Control Association focused on sharing the types of noxious and harmful plants. Many of them were invasive species that provide either no benefit to grazing animals or can harm them if they consume them. Cheatgrass and Houndstongue are one of the most common species we found while collecting vegetation data. The Cheatgrass awns can get stuck in the gums of cattle and cause infection and the Houndstongue is toxic to all grazing animals. The key to these species' noxiousness is their ability to spread. The Cheatgrass awns are anemophilous and the Houndstongue’s seed pods stick to every fiber. With these modes of reproduction, you can find high density and high distribution. The best way to get rid of these types of plants is to spray for them and make sure you can reliably identify them, so you are not killing the wrong thing. The biggest thing for Meriel is the education of landowners on what plants they have and the best way to get rid of them.
Another key point of rangeland management is soil health. Soil health is important because it will determine what kinds of plants your land will grow. Then you can determine the types of plants you want and the kind of soils they prefer to grow in. Ph, water content, and mineral availability are some of the soil characteristics we can measure. Jed Eberly from Montana State University showed us some of the tools we can use to collect and look at soil. One was the type we used to collect soil samples from and another one was using a soil core extractor. This was useful to see the different horizons and how deep the roots of different grasses will grow. Fire can commonly create hydrophobic and poor soils so with the microbial activity data, we can help landowners understand how different processes affect their soil.
In this section the biggest take away would be the importance of understanding the dynamic relationships across fields of study. Working with this data we can correlate and suggests reasons as to why we see what we are seeing.
