Site Inventory, Sand Creek Massacre Site
Roath R, Ridenour R, Wesley B, Holmes Z, Forest, Rangeland, and Watershed Stewardship Department - Colorado State University. 2007. Site Inventory, Sand Creek Massacre Site. Fort Collins, Colorado
The current objective is to identify what the Range of Natural Variability is for the potential rangeland communities on the area so that the National Park Service NPS can begin the planning process for management of the Sand Creek Massacre National Monument. An earlier project, by this project leader, focused on the inventory of the vegetation on Sand Creek Massacre National Monument. This inventory included an assessment of the seral status of the rangeland vegetation. At that point in time, the vast majority of the land managed by the NPS was in lower seral status as reflection of past activities on the land foot print. It is critical conceptual juncture to realize that some the past actions on the land have changed the land and its communities for very long periods of time. Perhaps these changes will be evident for by either altered ecological process and/or the plant communities for up to five hundred years. Examples of this are those areas that have experienced large scale soil disturbances or movement in farming activities or construction of ditches, landing strips, et cetera. It then falls to the project leader to make: 1) "educated" guesses as to what the land and its communities might have been at the time of the Sand Creek Massacre event; 2) what that means relative to what communities are present now; and 3) what type of management actions might produce an array of communities over the long term that might be similar to what would have been in naturally functioning prairie landscape.
- Type
- Published Report
- Authors
- Roath, Roy; Ridenour, Rachel; Wesley, Bob; Holmes, Zachary; Forest, Rangeland, and Watershed Stewardship Department - Colorado State University
- Date of Issue
- 2007
- Units
- SAND
- Keywords
- altered ecological processes, Disturbance, Ecology, historic reference condition, Landscape, Management, Management Actions, natural range of variability, Plant Communities, potential rangeland communities, Prairie, range of natural variability, Vegetation