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3.4 2005 Drvland Pasture Reference Area <br />The 2005 Dryland Pasture Reference Area is comprised of approximately 8 acres located well to the <br />south of the New Horizon permit area (Map 6). This site is located on Barx soils (Unit 14 on NRCS Soil <br />Survey). Per the NRCS Soil Survey, the expected range production for this site is 850 pounds per acre in <br />normal years. With irrigation, this soil has the potential to be characterized as prime farmland. This soil <br />type occupies approximately 11% of the New Horizon permit area, the majority of which is on the <br />Morgan tract (Map 2). <br />Ground cover in the 2005 Dryland Pasture Reference Area (Chart 1 and Table 1) consisted of 36.0% <br />live vegetation, 0.5% rock, 12.8% litter, and bare soil exposure of 50.7%. Perennial cover across the <br />unit averaged 29.6% with annual and biennial cover averaging 6.5%, and no noxious weed cover was <br />observed. Dominant taxa were Russian wildrye (Eiymus junceus), scarlet globemallow (Sphaera/cea <br />coccinea), and stickseed (Lappu/a redowski), with 15.9%, 11.2%, and 4.3% average cover, respectively. <br />Table 2 exhibits the summarized relative cover results. <br />Current annual herbaceous production across the area averaged 877.6 pounds per acre with <br />perennial vegetation comprising 790.8 pounds per acre. Perennial grasses and perennial forbs were the <br />dominant categories totaling 552.2 and 206.7 pounds per acre, respectively (Chart 3 and Table 3). <br />Woody plant density across the area yielded 202.3 stems per acre (Chart 4 and Table 4). Dominant <br />taxa were four -wing saltbush and big sagebrush, with 133.5 and 60.7 stems per acre, respectively. <br />