A new partnership with the Special K Ranch will have an impact all across the West.

Every year, hundreds of thousands of acres of native vegetation in the western United States are lost to wildfire. Other activities such as mining and recreational activities also take their toll.

The Bureau of Land Management works to revegetate areas susceptible to erosion and the spread of noxious weeds and to improve wildlife habitat. For many years, land managers used non-native species for revegetation purposes. These species were more readily available than native species and had high success rates due to their established growth and the methods land managers used to transplant them. More recently, however, land managers are shifting to the use of native vegetation as they work to sustain healthy, natural ecosystems.

However, finding sufficient supplies of native species is still difficult. Many times, they are not available commercially or in the quantities land managers need. To alleviate this shortage, in 2002, Congress charged BLM with developing ways to provide native plant materials sufficient to meet the needs of the public lands and with encouraging private industry to do the same. The result is BLM’s national Native Plant Material Program.  

The BLM in other states is developing contracts with commercial growers to provide shrubs, the priority need for rehabilitation projects. Most of these contracts are for seed. But because seed collection is at the mercy of weather fluctuations and growing conditions, it is difficult to predict what type and quantity of seeds growers will collect. These uncertainties prompted BLM-Montana to team up with the Special K Ranch in Columbus, Mont.

The Special K Ranch is a residential facility that provides family-oriented homes for developmentally disabled adults. A working ranch, it allows the residents to learn and achieve vocational skills in horticulture, gardening, general farm maintenance and care of livestock. In 1997, the ranch started a tree and shrub nursery. Now Special K also produces wholesale bedding plants and hothouse tomatoes, selling them throughout Montana. The ranch has 40,000 square feet of greenhouses, which until last year were mostly empty by the end of June.

Initially, BLM occupied one greenhouse and began planting seeds in June 2007. With seed from Colorado, Montana, Idaho, North Dakota, and Arizona, it ultimately planted 14 species of trees, shrubs, and grasses. BLM now has about 14,000 seedlings of 13 different species, which it will use for a variety of projects throughout the West. These projects include using black sagebrush seedlings to restore Gunnison sage grouse habitat in Colorado; growing four species of grasses for the Lewis and Clark Botanical Garden in Boise, Idaho; and using green ash to restore hardwood draws and buffalo berry to rehabilitate wildlife habitat in Montana. Other seedlings will go to the Great Basin to help revegetate burned areas.

The agreement with Special K is a benefit for everyone. It allows BLM to generate a stable supply of restoration and rehabilitation plant materials while maintaining flexibility in the number of seedlings it grows and the species it uses. The project also gives BLM the opportunity to try different horticultural methods to get the seeds to germinate and become viable seedlings. In addition, the project will keep the Special K Ranch greenhouses occupied after the bedding plant season and present the residents with a new variety of work.

Before winter, the residents moved the seedlings outdoors to a deer and rabbit-proof compound, which they had built, and then covered the seedlings with mulch. Next spring the residents will move the seedlings to their project sites, and BLM will begin a new round of seedling production.

In the future, BLM hopes to expand the seedling production project. It also has plans to start seed production beds for forbs that are not commercially available but which will further enhance restoration efforts.