![]() Luckily, over 25 years of work at the site has led to the compilation of an amazing mini-herbarium of pressed plants and identifying characteristics that we can bring down with us when we do our plant surveys. The vegetation at the site seems hard to categorize and we’ve had trouble finding just one or two field guides to use when we do the plant surveys. Meanwhile, the rain seems to have slowed from earlier in the winter but the plants are still growing! We’re headed down to the site again in March to have another rodent-trapping-plant-field-extravaganza.Ībove, Rumex, Erodium, and Guterrezia all green up. You can read about her adventures at the prairie dog blog. Loren studies prairie dog populations, genetic divergence and pathogens in the southwest. Pictured below, is my volunteer of the month, Loren Sackett, from University of Colorado at Boulder. I really don’t want the shed to seem like a larder for our resident rattlesnake. ![]() We even found a nesting pair in our trap shed this past month! They were pretty cute, but since our trap shed has recently been inundated with other living things–pack rats and most recently, at least one rattlesnake and a badger living underneath the shed, I chased them out. I was still a bit surprised, however, to catch several plain’s harvest mice ( Reithrodontomys montanus) in January! This is a species that I hadn’t seen in a few years, so it took me a moment to determine what I was seeing.Īnother of the generalist species that has been popping up this winter is the cactus mouse ( Peromyscus eremicus). ![]() These species seem to be more transient at the site, popping up when conditions are right for them. After some decent rains in 2011, diversity is slowly returning to the rodent community as we have been seeing more of the generalist species return. After the recent drought, we saw a decline in biodiversity at the site that rivaled anything seen throughout the course of the 35 years of study, including the dominance of the rodent community by a very small-sized species (Desert pocket mouse, Chaetodipus penicillatus) which surprised us all. One of the best things about working in the desert (especially when you’re doing long-term ecology!) is that things are always changing.
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