By Jessica Celis April 2020 In this time of combating an insidious, novel threat like the coronavirus, it is nice to get outside and combat a more typical ecological threat: weeds. Last week, staff from IAE’s Ecological Education Program (EE) joined Habitat Restoration Program (HR) folks up at Horse Rock Ridge, a 378-acre mid-elevation meadow […]
Cooped up from COVID? Our staff has your outdoor activities!
For 20 years, IAE’s Ecological Education Program (EE) has been engaging youth outside with hands-on, participatory outdoor learning. We’re here to support you in getting outdoors for safe and fun exploration! Our staff have rounded up art- and science-based backyard activities you can enjoy yourself or with your children, immersing them in the natural world […]
Adults in custody at California City Correctional Facility help support desert tortoise habitat
By Tyler Knapp April 2020 Days before the CA statewide shelter in place order, Institute for Applied Ecology (IAE) was fortunate to kick off a new project to support the Mojave desert tortoise – please read on to learn more. What do the Mojave desert tortoise (Gopherus agassizii) and the greater sage-grouse (Centrocercus urophasianus) have in common? […]
Nursery supports the restoration cause
Peter Moore April 2020 Getting plants in the ground and seeing them thrive – this is a rewarding part of being a restoration ecologist at the Institute for Applied Ecology (IAE). Each year, IAE plants thousands of native plants at restoration sites throughout Oregon and New Mexico. For example, see the December blog How does […]
Daylight savings time threatens biological cycles
Researchers studying biological rhythms have discovered a disturbing trend. Setting clocks ahead for daylight savings time annually is causing a steady creep in important biological events, such as when plants bloom and animals emerge from hibernation. The effect of a single hour of daylight savings appears to cause no measurable change, but the cumulative sway […]
Oregon’s mysterious tidal forests
A sneak preview of Laura Brophy’s upcoming pub talk, Pelican Pub, Pacific City, Oregon, 6-8 pm on March 12, 2020 By Laura Brophy February 2020 Oregon’s estuaries today are full of beauty: salt marshes with intricate, winding channels and mud flats with wheeling flocks of shorebirds and clam beds for the adventurous forager. But did […]
Celebrating Nearly a Decade of Native Seed Production in the Willamette Valley
By Alexis Larsen February 2020 Historically, the Willamette Valley of Oregon was lush with fields of purple camas (Camassia quamash ssp. quamash) and rosy seablush (Plectritis congesta) in the spring, and goldenrod highlighted by the last rays of sun in the fall. Today this prairie habitat is among the most endangered ecosystems in North America, with over […]
Two hours from nowhere: monitoring remote sagebrush ecosystems in Eastern Oregon
By Lisa Schomaker and Kaitlyn Harless February 2020 Eighty miles from cell service and ten miles off the highway, on a bumpy track just north of the Nevada state line, botanical monitoring technician Kaitlyn Harless saw her first herd of pronghorn (Antilocapra americana) in the wild. Not long after, a wild horse (Equus ferus) galloped over […]
The Willamette Valley Oak and Prairie Cooperative
January 2020 IAE is proud to serve on the Steering Committee of the Willamette Valley Oak and Prairie Cooperative, and to have played a role in drafting the Strategic Action Plan as part of a contractor team with JK Environments. Please read on, and click the images below to learn more! What is the Willamette […]
The Violet Restoration Hydra
By Rolando Beorchia January 2020 Restoration work at IAE is often like a multi-headed hydra (we’re talking the cute cousin to anemones type of hydra, not the scary monster that Hercules killed). Each project has multiple “arms,” including property owners, staff, funders and sometimes researchers, who all have to come together to make the magic […]
Oh, the places seed goes…
By Laynie Saidnawey and Maria Mullins February 2020 By the time seed arrives at the IAE Southwest Office Seed Studio in Santa Fe, New Mexico, to be processed and cleaned, some collections have traveled close to 300 miles from their source populations. However, this move is temporary; the seed will eventually make its way back […]
2019: A Better Year for Fender’s Blue Butterfly
By Carolyn Menke January 2020 Since 2016, IAE has coordinated annual surveys for the endangered Fender’s blue butterfly (Icaricia icarioides fenderi) across its range in Oregon’s Willamette Valley. The total number of Fender’s blue butterflies fluctuates on an annual basis, driven by variation in individual populations, which sometimes double or halve between years. We are […]
How does IAE get all of those plants in the ground?
By Andy Neill December 2019 Fall is planting season, which means IAE’s restoration ecologists are in the midst of their busiest time of the year. Most of the restoration work that takes place the rest of the year is in preparation for planting and seeding each fall. This year, nearly 116,000 plants were planted and […]
Much more than a Handful of Seed – Highlights from a Season with the National Park Service Crew in the Desert Southwest
By Melanie Gisler, Lindsay Jaeger, and Meredith Prentice December 2019 IAE has been collecting seeds from native plants since we opened our doors in 1999. Our first seed collections were from rare plants for use in recovery efforts. In 2005, we initiated a seed crew dedicated to collecting species to increase for use in restoration, […]
Rebuilding Habitat and Empowering Hope
By Stacy Moore November 2019 Carefully putting ten sagebrush seedlings into a plastic bag, inmate Jessie Downing places his bundle of plants into a box with 110 other plugs to be picked up by the Winnemucca Bureau of Land Management (BLM) field office in Nevada for planting on land scorched by wildfire. “The Sagebrush in […]