Annotated Checklist of Vascular Flora Dinosaur National Monument
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National Park Service U.S. Department of the Interior Natural Resource Program Center Annotated Checklist of Vascular Flora Dinosaur National Monument Natural Resource Technical Report NPS/NCPN/NRTR—2009/225 ON THE COVER Paria evening-primrose (Oenothera caespitosa var. navajoensis). Photograph by Walter Fertig. Annotated Checklist of Vascular Flora Dinosaur National Monument Natural Resource Technical Report NPS/NCPN/NRTR—2009/225 Author Walter Fertig Moenave Botanical Consulting 1117 W. Grand Canyon Dr. Kanab, UT 84741 Editing and Design Alice Wondrak Biel Northern Colorado Plateau Network P.O. Box 848 Moab, UT 84532 July 2009 U.S. Department of the Interior National Park Service Natural Resource Program Center Fort Collins, Colorado The National Park Service, Natural Resource Program Center publishes a range of reports that address natural resource topics of interest and applicability to a broad audience in the National Park Service and others in natural resource management, including scientists, con- servation and environmental constituencies, and the public. The Natural Resource Technical Report Series is used to disseminate results of scientifi c stud- ies in the physical, biological, and social sciences for both the advancement of science and the achievement of the National Park Service mission. The series provides contributors with a forum for displaying comprehensive data that are often deleted from journals because of page limitations. All manuscripts in the series receive the appropriate level of peer review to ensure that the in- formation is scientifi cally credible, technically accurate, appropriately written for the intended audience, and designed and published in a professional manner. This report received informal peer review by subject-matter experts who were not directly involved in the collection, analy- sis, or reporting of the data. Views, statements, fi ndings, conclusions, recommendations, and data in this report are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily refl ect views and policies of the National Park Service, U.S. Department of the Interior. Mention of trade names or commercial products does not constitute endorsement or recommendation for use by the National Park Service. This report is available from the Northern Colorado Plateau Network website, http://www.nature.nps.gov/im/units/NCPN, as well as at the Natural Resource Publications Management web site, http://www.nature.nps.gov/publications/NRPM. Please cite this publication as: Fertig, W. 2009. Annotated checklist of vascular fl ora: Dinosaur National Monument. Natural Resource Technical Report NPS/NCPN/NRTR—2009/225. National Park Service, Fort Col- lins, Colorado. NPS 122/100142, July 2009 ii Annotated Checklist of Vascular Flora: Dinosaur National Monument Contents Figures ...........................................................................................................................................v Tables .............................................................................................................................................v Abstract .......................................................................................................................................vii Acknowledgements .....................................................................................................................ix 1 Introduction ..............................................................................................................................1 1.1 Background and justifi cation .......................................................................................................1 1.2 Objectives ......................................................................................................................................1 1.3 Study area .....................................................................................................................................1 1.3.1 History and setting ........................................................................................................................ 1 1.3.2 Geology ......................................................................................................................................... 2 1.3.3 Vegetation ..................................................................................................................................... 4 1.3.4 Previous botanical studies ............................................................................................................ 5 2 Methods ...................................................................................................................................11 3 Results ......................................................................................................................................13 3.1 Summary of the fl ora of Dinosaur National Monument .........................................................13 3.2 Life form and biogeographic diversity ......................................................................................15 3.3 Plants of special concern ............................................................................................................15 3.4 Non-native species and noxious weeds .....................................................................................15 4 Discussion ................................................................................................................................21 5 Literature Cited .......................................................................................................................23 Appendices ..................................................................................................................................27 Appendix A. Confi rmed, historical, and reported vascular plant taxa of Dinosaur National Monument, organized by family and scientifi c name with taxonomic and biogeographic notes. ..................................................................................................................................................29 Appendix B. Potential (unconfi rmed) taxa of Dinosaur National Monument. .............................95 Appendix C. Rejected (falsely reported or questionable) taxa of Dinosaur National Monument. ......................................................................................................................................119 Appendix D. Confi rmed, historical, and reported taxa of Dinosaur National Monument, organized by life form with ecological notes. ...............................................................................137 Contents iii Figures Figure 1.3.1. Location of Dinosaur National Monument, Uintah County, Utah, and Moffat County, Colorado. ................................................................................................................................................ 3 Figure 1.3.4. Increase in the number of plant taxa confi rmed as present in Dinosaur National Monument by decade, 1910–2007. .......................................................................................................................... 9 Tables Table 1.3.4. Chronology of plant-collecting efforts in Dinosaur National Monument. ................................... 7 Table 3.1-1. Statistical summary of the fl ora of Dinosaur National Monument. ............................................ 13 Table 3.1-2. Statistical summary of the fl ora of Dinosaur National Monument, by state. .............................14 Table 3.3. Plant species of conservation concern from Dinosaur National Monument. ................................ 16 Table 3.4. Noxious weed species of Dinosaur National Monument. ............................................................... 20 Contents v Abstract In 2005–2006, the National Park Service’s Northern Colorado Plateau Network received funding to develop a revised checklist of the vascular plant fl ora of Dinosaur National Monument. This entailed a thorough review of existing literature, re-examination of specimens from the Dinosaur National Monument herbarium and other state and national museum collections, and additional fi eld work to corroborate unverifi ed species reports or locate new species. Based on this study, 756 vascular plant taxa have been confi rmed or reliably reported as occuring in the monument (705 are known from validated herbarium specimens and 51 from unvouchered literature reports). Another 123 species formerly considered part of the monument fl ora have now been shown to be falsely reported. The Utah portion of Dinosaur National Monument contains 484 species (13.5% of the state fl ora), and the Colorado segment contains 592 species (18.8% of the entire Colorado fl ora). Only one plant species from Dinosaur National Monument is listed as threatened or endangered under the U.S. Endangered Species Act: Ute ladies’-tresses (Spiranthes diluvialis), but at least 79 other species are either former candidates for listing, identifi ed as sensitive by the U.S. Forest Service or Bureau of Land Management, or tracked as species of concern by state natural heritage programs. Introduced plants make up 10.3% of the monument fl ora (78 species), of which 22 species are considered noxious weeds by the states of Utah and Colorado. Further surveys in Dinosaur National Monument are likely to fi nd additional new species (359 are known from similar habitats outside the monument boundary), especially among late- season fl owering, weedy, or wetland taxa. Contents vii Acknowledgements I would