Semester

Spring

Date of Graduation

2023

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Type

MS

College

Davis College of Agriculture, Natural Resources and Design

Department

Forest Resource Management

Committee Chair

Kirsten Stephan

Committee Member

Jamie Schuler

Committee Member

Melissa Thomas-Van Gundy

Abstract

Running buffalo clover (RBC) is a rare perennial plant that grows throughout the American Midwest and the Appalachian Mountains. It requires disturbed forests to establish and proliferate. It has been suggested that, in the past, these conditions were created by buffalo; now logging operations maintain RBC populations. However, forest managers have been looking for ways to create suitable habitat for RBC that do not involve harvesting practices. This could help create new populations in areas that cannot be logged. Once established, competing vegetation might influence RBC abundance and flowering. This study seeks to quantify this influence by measuring the vegetation in and around naturally occurring RBC patches. This study took place within five managed sites in the Cheat Wildlife Management Area within the Monongahela National Forest, WV. In these sites we completed an inventory of RBC patches, counting rosette numbers and flowers in each patch, and we collected data on neighboring trees. A year later, we returned to these patches and in the center 1 m2 counted RBC rosettes and estimated RBC cover and RBC maximum height. We also measured the cover of various vegetation types, and the height of the tallest vegetation. We found that RBC patch size was positively related to tree canopy cover, and RBC flowering was negatively correlated with the presence of nearby trees. We also found that RBC rosette density, cover, and height were positively correlated with forb cover, and negatively correlated with shrub/vine cover. In a separate experiment, we established new RBC occurrences by transplanting five individuals into 1-m2 experimental subplots with varying levels of prior ground disturbance. Treatments (n=15) comprised mowing vegetation, raking away litter, raking and mowing together, and undisturbed control. RBC survival rates in treated subplots one year after planting were increased by the disturbance treatments (83%) when compared to the control (57%). The number of rosettes that arose from each surviving transplant was also greater in the three disturbance treatments combined (P = 0.009) than the control, but there was no difference in the cover per surviving transplant (P = 0.23). Consequently, the total number of rosettes and their cover was greater after mowing and mowing+raking when compared with control. Raking alone resulted in values intermediate between the treatments involving raking and the control; values were not significantly different from the two raking treatments, but showed a statistical trend (P ≤ 0.1) of having a greater number of rosettes (but not cover). The results of this study will help managers identify suitable canopy and herb-layer conditions for RBC to thrive, as well as create habitat for RBC without the use of logging disturbances.

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