GENERAL32961

• Permit No: M1999002
• IBM Index Class Name: General Documents
• Doc Date: 8/18/1998
• Doc Name: COMMERCIAL MINE PLAN SUBMITTED TO BLM SECTION 7
• Media Type: D
• Archive: No

• Area Draft Resource Management Plan and Environmental Impact Statement (BLM
1994).
The BLM Sodium Leases FEA contains the most site-specific information on the
wildlife of the Piceance Site (BLM 1982). The FEA identifies mule deer and raptors
as animals that would be sensitive to habitat alteration or human presence
associated with sodium development. Information on wildlife use of habitats along
the proposed project pipeline corridor has been taken from the environmental
assessments for two natural gas pipelines that the project pipeline corridor will
largely parallel (Barrett 1994, CIG 1995).
7.7.1 Mule Deer
Mule deer use a variety of habitats in the Piceance Creek and Parachute Creek
drainages on a seasonal basis. During the summer they occupy higher-elevation
ranges supporting mountain shrub, aspen, and Douglas fir habitats. During the
winter, they concentrate in pinyon-juniper and sagebrush ranges below 7,400 feet,
where snow depths and temperatures are more moderate.
Mule deer use the Piceance Site exclusively during the winter. They begin
migrating into the area in September and increase in density through January as
snow accumulation at higher elevation forces increasing numbers down to late-
. winter ranges. Winter use is associated with pinyon-juniper woodlands and
chained pinyon-juniper vegetation, where cover and preferred forage are most
readily available. Browse preference tests indicate that deer select antelope
bitterbrush in the fall and early winter and then shift to sagebrush and pinyon-
juniper browse as snow depths make bitterbrush less available (Denison 1989). In
February, the deer begin migrating out of the higher elevations, making increasingly
heavy use of hay meadows and sagebrush bottoms as they go. Peak use of the
bottomland types is evident during the first half of April when large congregations
of deer forage along the length of Piceance Creek. Deer remain abundant at the
Piceance Site through April but are essentially absent from the area by late May. Use
of winter ranges varies from year to year depending on herd sizes and winter
weather conditions.
The Piceance Site is considered to be critical (severe) winter range for mule deer
(BLM 1982, BLM 1994). Severe winter range is defined by the Colorado Division of
Wildlife as "...that part of the overall range where 90 percent of the individuals are
located when the annual snowpack is at its maximum and/or temperatures are at a
minimum in the two worst winters out of ten" (CDOW 1998a). Such wintering
areas are essential to herd sustenance during winters with unusually heavy and
prolonged snow conditions when adjacent winter range resources are unavailable
or inaccessible. Critical (severe) winter range for mule deer on the Piceance Site is
shown in Figure 7-19.
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American Soda, L.L.P. '~_37
Commeraal Mme Plan
August 16, 1996