2018-01-03_PERMIT FILE - C1981010A (12)

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I'� These woody plants are generally most abundant from the foothills to the ponde- rosa -pine belt of the mountains. They grow in sunny, moist, or relatively dry situations, the largest specimens usually being associated with willows, alders, aspen, and dogwood along the streams in open valleys or in sparsely timbered, warm and sunny canyons. They also grow about springs, seeps, and other moist places, but pure and brushy stands are largely limited to moist or well -drained, warm slopes or sandy flats. They usually occur on deep, rather fertile, sandy soils, but frequently do well on rocky talus slopes and about rim rocks. Although poisonous under some conditions, chokecherries are often grazed moder- ately and in combination with other forage without ill effect. Fortunately they are not of high palatability, the leaves, twigs, and green bark having a bitter flavor, which is not entirely agreeable to livestock. On the open range they rate as poor to fair forage for both cattle and sheep; and, although losses some- times occur, they usually are attributable to abnormal use of chokecherries, as a result of overgrazing or other causes. Most fatalities due to eating these • plants occur in areas where livestock are concentrated, such as about water, in corrals and pastures, and along driveways or near bedgrounds. SSymphoricarpos oreophilus (Mountain snowberry) Symphoricarpos, a member of the honeysuckle family (Caprifoliaceae), is a small genus of chiefly North American shrubs, widely distributed in the United States and southern Canada, and also extending into Mexico. Under a conservative nomen- clature, there are about 12 species of the genus, ten of which occur in the west- ern range country; the other two are largely eastern in their distribution. One species is confined to Mexico, and one additional species grows in China. These shrubs are frequently known on the range by the indistinctive name buckbrush; other common names include Indian current, St. Peterswort, waxberry, and wolf - berry. With one exception, all the United States species have white or slightly pink berries. The white -fruited species are most commonly called snowberries, and the single red -fruited species (S. orbiculatus) is dubbed coralberry. Many • of the American species are closely related and so similar that it is difficult. 2-91