West Eugene Wetlands habitat monitoring at Long Tom, Oxbow West, Speedway, and Vinci

This document summarizes habitat monitoring in the West Eugene Wetlands on land managed by the Bureau of Land Management Eugene District under a long term (10 year) land management implementation schedule, developed in 2005.

In 2014, we monitored Long Tom, Oxbow West, Speedway, and Vinci to assess whether they were within the habitat targets for Threatened and Endangered species, as determined by the Western Oregon and Southwestern Oregon Prairie Species Recovery Plan.

• While in the past plant community composition was dominated by introduced species at Long Tom, we noted a shift towards native species dominance in 2014.
• Oxbow West and Speedway experienced an increase in native species cover since previous years, but remained dominated by introduced species in 2014.
• The plant community at Vinci 1 had equal native/introduced species abundance, which differed from monitoring in 2013 where introduced species were more abundant. Vinci 2 has had greater cover of native species over the three years of monitoring, with increases in total native cover from 2013 to 2014.
• Both Vinci 1 and Vinci 2 experienced increases in native species post-fire, with the majority of percent change occurring in native forbs. Fire at Vinci also tended to increase introduced graminoids; percent change in introduced graminoid cover at Vinci 2 was 41% between 2013 and 2014.
• Cover of invasive species and litter exceeded the thresholds for management (maximum 50% cover for invasive species and 20% cover for litter) in habitat for Lupinus oreganus, Erigeron decumbens, and Lomatium bradshawii at all sites.
• Thresholds for woody vegetation exceeded at Long Tom with 35% woody cover in the area monitored.