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Results <br /> Cover: After 15 years growth, the average Total Live Vegetative Cover for the four <br /> transects was 23% (see Table 1). A monoculture of 23% Total Vegetative Cover is <br /> woefully inadequate reclamation for a former mountain hay meadow. A reasonable <br /> Vegetative Cover at the site should be three times greater—closer to 70 or 75%. <br /> Numerous examples of cover percentages for reclaimed land are available for <br /> comparison. For example, the Black Eagle Mill up Chicago Creek (just 12 miles from <br /> Empire and in the same ecosystem was reclaimed and revegetated in the 1990s. After <br /> 3 years growth, the total Live Vegetative Cover of the vegetation was 72%. <br /> Diversity: 42 of the 45 Live Cover hits were Crested Wheatgrass. The site is <br /> essentially a monoculture of Crested wheatgrass, a species that should not have <br /> been planted at the site. Crested wheatgrass is a desert species developed for <br /> revegetating south-facing road cuts in Utah in the 1960s. It's an undesirable species for <br /> this ecosystem. It does about as much good as a weed and it will never do well in a <br /> mountain meadow at 8,500 feet elevation. <br /> Only five other species were observed during the "Pedestrian Survey" throughout the <br /> site. They were: <br /> • Canada bluegrass —one plant observed (one hit in TR1) <br /> • Kochia scoparia — noxious weed —multiple observations (one hit in T112) <br /> • Streambank wheatgrass —one plant observed (one hit in TR3) <br /> • Sheep fescue —one plant observed <br /> • Mountain brome —one plant observed <br /> The number of species expected at such a site after all these years should be <br /> somewhere around 30 to 50. <br /> Calculating diversity percentages by species for this site would be nonsensical because <br /> of the paucity of species. <br /> Diversity at the site is essentially zero. <br /> Quality Assurance: We are confident that, should the City wish to verify our cover <br /> values, they would arrive at similar values. <br /> 4 <br />