Before and after photographs, or
repeat photography, are useful tools for measuring success of any prescription applied as an intervention in landscape restoration. In the case of the area around the rustic cabin the first prescription applied was fencing. The 240 acres encompassing the cabin and the river bottom were
fenced to exclude grazers and create a seed reservoir for existing grasses to reseed the surrounding landscape, both on and off the estate. Later topsoil restoration barriers were added to benches above the west side of the riverbed where only clay hard pan subsoil was present as a result of poor range management practices. After 2 seasons plants are not only growing on the subsoil but the areas surrounding the hard pan have more plants. While there are some native grasses, woody shrubs also are also present. This is in contrast to early descriptions of the San Simon Valley describing a "luxuriant growth of grasses, affording excellent pasturage for all kinds of stock." It is clear that a variety of factors combined to significantly alter the landscape and recovering the original grasslands presents a number of problems. Since the
soil types above the riverbed are sandy/gravelly loam, decaying biomass is essential to building healthy new topsoil and the first step is any plant that creates biomass and prevents further erosion, grasses or shrubs. The conversion of soil minerals into useful Biomass provides a home to soil microbes and nematodes which will benefit the next plants (ideally only grasses) in a succession of species that leads back to a productive landscape. It should be noted that this plant growth is especially encouraging since the area has received less than 6" of rain this year (
PRISM climate model average rainfall for the estate is 12.17").
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Initial view with topsoil restoration barriers installed at the Rustic Cabin. This is after fencing. Note
the large area without subsoil or plant life. |
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Two seasons later and the return of plant life. Especially noteworthy are plants growing in the hard pan subsoil
creating biomass for new topsoil. |
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| topsoil restoration barrier |
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| The same topsoil restoration barrier after 2 seasons. |
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Some online references:
1.
http://www.fs.fed.us/rm/pubs/rmrs_p003/rmrs_p003_306_311.pdf
2.
http://www.nrcs.usda.gov/Internet/FSE_MANUSCRIPTS/arizona/sansimonareaAZ1924/sansimonareaAZ1924.pdf
3.
http://www.malpaiborderlandsgroup.org/?section=conservation-action
4.
https://sites.google.com/site/sansimonassessment/actions-participants
5. Slides from a landscape restoration talk presented at the the 2015 Chiricahua Peloncillo Heritage Days -
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B9IXOUCL-_hoSTRQd3N0bWU1dGc/view?usp=sharing
