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STATE OF COLORADO DIVISION OF RECLAMATION, MINING AND SAFETY Department of Natural Resources 1313 Sherman St., Room 215 Denver, Colorado 80203 Phone: (303) 866-3567 FAX: (303) 832-8106 TO: Kent Gorham FROM: Sandy Brown DATE: October 16, 007 COLORADO DIVISION O F RECLAMATION MINING - St- SAFETY Bill Ritter, lr. Governor Harris D. Sherman Executive Director RE: Golden Eagle Phase III Bond Release Ronald W. Cottony Division Director There aze two primary vegetation communities that were disturbed at the Golden Eagle ~I'ine eSOUfCe trustee pastureland in the valley bottoms and rangeland on the uplands. An alluvial valley floor reference area was approved to measure revegetation success in the pasturelands and a rangeland reference azea was established for the rangeland (grasslands). The revegetation standard for both communities requires that herbaceous cover and production in the reclaimed azeas shall be at least 90% of the cover as determined from the reference azea with 90% statistical confidence. Species diversity for the rangeland will be deemed adequate when the reclaimed lands consist of a minimum of two cool season grasses, two warm season grasses and one forb. These species shall each comprise five percent and no more than sixty percent relative cover and shall be perennial non-noxious species. There is no species diversity standard for the pastureland. The RN-4 findings dated 6/18/2004 state that shrub density will be deemed adequate when sampling determines that shrubs comprise at least 5% of the total species composition. The shrub density standard was not addressed in the revegetation sampling. Was there a revision to the permit eliminating the shrub density standard? The last seeding at the Golden Eagle Mine was in 1996 and thus the required ten-year liability period was achieved in 2006. Basin Resources, Inc. (BRI) hired a consultant to measure revegetation success during the summers of 2005 and 2006, the last two years of the liability period. A summary of the data is shown in the table below. Cover Production lbs/acre 2005 Irri ated Pasture Reclaimed Area 39.9 1822 2005 Irrigated Past. AVF Reference Area 36.5 2018 90% of Production Standard 1816 2005 Reclaimed Ran eland 32.5 1373 2005 Rangeland Reference Area 19.7 356 2006 Irrigated Pasture Reclaimed Area 20.9 2479.3 2006 Irri ated Past. AVF Reference Area 19.5 1662.5 2006 Reclaimed Ran eland 14.5 1090.7 2006 Ran eland Reference Area 12.8 154.9 Office of Office of Mined Land Reclamation Denver Grand Junction Durango Active and Inactive Mines