Salt Cedar

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Salt Cedar Russian Olive

• Intensifying challenges for management of arid
  land riparian ecosystems in the 21st century

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Fish and Wildlife ServiceMission
To conserve, with others, fish, wildlife and
plant resources For the continuing benefit of the
American people.
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Management Challenges
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Pluses Minuses

• Provides habitat in degraded systems
• Supports populations of endangered and trust bird
  species
• Survives/thrives in saline soils

• Displaces native flora
• Exacerbates water losses
• Monotypic stands decrease plant animal diversity

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Refuge management concerns

• SC clogs desert water holes
• Both species encroach into wetland and moist soil
  management units
• Expensive to control - 380-700/acre
• Increases probability of wildfire

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Questions

• What is a tolerable level of invasion?
• Most effect means of control chemical vs.
  mechanical
• Biologically and cost effective restoration
  techniques
• Under what conditions does control and
  restoration become biologically and economically
  infeasible?
• Expected conditions in extended drought
• Where, and under what conditions, should we
  manage for native communities?

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Were looking for the right path