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VII. HISTORIC RECORD VEGETATION COMMUNITY <br />GENERAL DESCRII'I'ION <br />The historic record vegetation community is comprised of an old field or pasture type <br />vegetation community. Several expressions of this type of community are present <br />within the West Elk Mine permit area, notably east of the study area, and on primary <br />terraces above the drainage of Sylvester Gulch. These range or hayfield communities <br />are well defined, though intermixing occurs at the edges with the adjacent vegetation <br />communities (predominantly oakbrush and aspen). Old field/pasture vegetation <br />communities are comprised of one vegetative stratum, a low herbaceous layer (<0.5 <br />meters) dominated by graminoids. Figure 2 provides an illustration of the character of <br />the historic record vegetation community. As expected, native and introduced pasture <br />and range grasses dominate the vegetation cover and herbaceous production of the <br />historic record vegetation community. Organic litter from the gtaminoids provides <br />additional significant cover on the ground surface. <br />QUANTITATIVE SAMPLING RESULTS <br />The general composition of the historic record vegetation community was that of a <br />single story grassland. The single low herbaceous stratum was composed of herbaceous <br />graminoids and forbs. The dominant graminoid species was Bromus inermis (smooth <br />brome), with two subdominant grass species; Poa pratensis (Kentucky bluegrass) and <br />Agropyron r'ntermedium (intermediate wheatgrass). <br />Two lifeforms were encountered during the sampling of the historic record vegetation <br />community; graminoids and forbs. Six individual plant species were identified during <br />sampling. Four species were graminoids, and two were forbs. Of the species <br />encountered, five were perennial and one was annual. All species encountered were <br />identified as cool season. Two species were native in origin and four were introduced. <br />None of the species encountered were statutory designated undesirable weed species, <br />although Conrowlus arvensis (field bindweed) is generally considered an undesirable <br />weed. The plant species encountered and their characteristics are presented in Table 4. <br />Vegetation Cover <br />Tonal vegetation cover of the historic record vegetation community was 38.27 percent. <br />Graminoids represented 35.47 percent mean cover (93.58% relative cover), forbs <br />accounted for 2.80 percent mean cover (6.425'o relative cover), and woody plants were <br />not represented in the cover sampling. A summary of the cover sampling data is <br />presented in Table 5. <br />-13- <br />