Location: Range Management Research
Project Number: 3050-21600-001-014-I
Project Type: Interagency Reimbursable Agreement
Start Date: Sep 15, 2020
End Date: Sep 15, 2025
Objective:
The mission of the BLM is to sustain the health, diversity, and productivity of the resources and land entrusted to it for the use and enjoyment of present and future generations through balanced management within the framework of the laws. To meet the goals of the BLM mission, the agency must have reliable sources of sound science concerning rangeland resources within its jurisdiction in support of the Bureau's overall vegetation management program, and rangeland health assessment, evaluations and various studies in Southwestern NM.
Approach:
Funding under this statement of work will support the following collaborative activities: 1) Continuation of long-term vegetation cover and production monitoring and soil data collection at 20 Restore New Mexico brush management experimental sites and additional 10-15 BLM monitoring sites used in evaluation of long-term trends in vegetation and establishment of additional monitoring sites (ca. 2-3) in underrepresented treatment/vegetation types; 2) data management, data integration with spatial data layers, statistical analysis, and development of reports/presentations for BLM staff and stakeholders, 3) sharing of quality-assured data with BLM technical staff, 4) draft modifications to ecological site descriptions (ESDs) based on results, 5) ecological state mapping (digitization of states based on ESDs) for planning in new treatment areas, 6) refinement of planning procedures based on scientific results (“collaborative adaptive landscape management”), and 7) co-development and refinement of protocols with BLM staff to scale up collaborative adaptive landscape management steps and workflows for application to other field offices, including direct engagement with the Socorro Field Office this year.
