INDEXFall 2004

1 Annual Meeting

1 Road Decommissioning

2 President’s Message -

Earthquakes2 Westside Notes - Subsoiling

3 Eastside Notes - Surveys

5 Summer Tour Review

9 Urbisol Corner - Wetlands

O R E G O N S O C I E T Y O F S O I L S C I E N T I S T S

V O L . X V I I N O . 4

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SHARPSHOOTERSHARPSHOOTER

Road Decommissioning It isn’t always about blocking traffic,hydrological connections or gettingtrees or grass to grow.

By Dale A. Stewart and Kevin McCabe, Coos Bay District,Bureau of Land Management, North Bend, Oregon

When the Coos Bay District of the Bureau of Land Managementstarted to decommission roads in 1994 there were several disci-plines using various methods to accomplish what they envi-sioned to be a proper road closure program. Because the workwas designed by a host of disciplines from engineers to fishbiologists the goals and implementation were drastically differ-ent. Some individuals closed roads with no intent of ever usingthem again, where others simply installed a gate to allow accessfor administrative purposes.

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(Continued on page 6.)

O.S.S.S. 2005 Annual Meeting February 17 - 18, 2005 at

(Details will be in the next issue of the Sharpshooter. The following information comes from: http://www.innatottercrest.com, and is reprintedhere to build interest in the O.S.S.S. Winter meeting in February.)

The Inn at Otter Crest sits on the cliff ’s edge of the spectacular Oregon Coast and is only a short scenic drive fromdowntown Portland and Salem. It’s a place where the gorgeous Central Oregon coast-line meets towering dense forests, and miles of sandy beach; the vistas create a magicmerger of spectacular natural beauty. Welcome to the Inn at Otter Crest at Otter Rock.

They offer unmatched panoramic views of the Oregon coastline, condominiumstyle accommodations, full service meeting facilities, ocean view dining, whalewatching, and an endless array of nearby recreation and scenic attractions.

Escape to the tranquil and dramatic Central Oregon coast, to the awesomebeauty of the great Pacific Ocean, to the Inn at Otter Crest.

Otter Crest offers a wide variety of outdoor activities including charter fishing, hik-ing, biking, swimming, tennis, golf, whale watching, beach combing, wine tasting,and of course, shopping in Newport and Lincoln City. They also suggest taking a

short trip and visit the famous Blue Heron French Cheese Company in Tillamook.There are many local events and festivals that take place all year round on the Oregon Coast and in the

Willamette Valley. To find out everything there is to do in and around Otter Rock please refer to the Lincoln CityVisitor & Convention Bureau, the Oregon Coast Guide,or the Newport Chamber of Commerce.

Otter Crest provides fun for the whole family - including a wonderful waterview children’s playground and anoutdoor pool, and miles of sandy beach and forest trails for a full day of adventure and enjoyment!

Next, Brian Atwater,studying sediments in aWillapa Bay marsh made

another astounding discovery. Under the soil sur-face was a “gray clay” containing marine fossils. Butunderneath that was a peat layer with drownedspruce stumps! He proposed a large earthquakehad caused this 10 foot subsidence! Additional simi-lar evidences soon came to light. Subduction zoneearthquakes were not a mere possibility, but pastevents were actually recorded in sediments anddeposits both onshore and offshore. (See Goldfin-ger, Nelson, Johnson; “Holocene earthquakerecords from the Cascade Subduction Zone and thenorthern San Andreas Fault based on precise datingof offshore turbidites” Annual Reviews of Earth andPlanetary Sciences, v31, p. 555-77

Accompanying these catastrophic earthquakeswere tsunamis. In the idyllic inlets and fiords of Van-

couver Island, evidences of two catastrophictsunamis were discovered by researchers Benson,Grimm, and Clague. Their research paper, a nice bitof detective work, showed the tsunamis record intidal marsh sediments.

Three meter deep trenches transecting tidalmarshes showed two discrete “sand sheets.” Appar-ently mantling a paleo land surface, one depositwas at about 60 cm depth, the other at about the10 cm depth. Both these deposits fine landwardand simultaneously fine away from tidal channels.The sheets get thinner toward land and rise in ele-vation as they approach the forests ringing theinlets.

Close looks at the sand layers themselves alsoindicate history of deposition. Ominously, the sandlayers are composed of “couplets,” a coarser sandoverlain by a finer sand, then another couplet ofcoarser sand to

P R E S I D E N T ’ SM E S S AG E

Mark KellerOSSS President

2

By Dan Cressy

New Road and TrailSubsoiling Technique

I would like to share with OSSSmembers a technique for tillingroads to ameliorate compactionthat I find impressive. It was devel-oped by the Roseburg Bureau ofLand Management’s road mainte-nance crew and Dennis Hutchi-son, the senior soil scientist there.Two pieces of equipment areused. One is a tractor-mountedself drafting winged subsoiler. Ithas a wing-shaped shoe attachedto each of its three shanks. The

tractor in this case is a D-6 cat.The other consists of two subsoil-ing shanks with winged shoesattached to a bucket of a trackedexcavator. Clint Brown, the main-tenance crew’s equipment mainte-nance person did an excellent jobdesigning and building the exca-vator subsoiler. The bucket had tobe reinforced with welded-onsteel plates to handle the extrastress. Subsoiling is a method oftilling in which the winged-

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(Continued on page 8.)

(Continued on page 4.)

WESTSIDEN O T E S

One of the themes for the OSSS annual meeting in February isearthquakes and tsunamis. The first part of this article was gleanedfrom Living with Earthquakes in the Pacific Northwest, A SurvivorsGuide, by Robert Yeats. Dr. Yeats will be participating in the OSSSannual meeting.

Twenty years ago Oregon and the Pacific Northwest were thought to beearthquake quiescent. But in the mid 1980’s evidence started accumulatingthat showed a past of catastrophic earthquakes.

Geologist John Adams compared highway benchmark re-levelings by theNational Geodesic Survey. The benchmark elevations were changing! Theearth’s surface is moving. Bowing under the strain of subducting continentalplates, the earth’s surface is tilting the Coast Range toward the Willamette Val-ley and Puget Sound.

January 24 - 28. 2005 National Society of Consulting Soil Scientists Annual NSCSS Meeting; Islandsof Hawaii and Kauai. Information at:http://www.nscss.org/05.html

February 17-18, 2005OSSS Winter Meeting at Otter Crest on the Oregon Coast.

June 17-18, 2005Western Society of Soil Science Meeting;Ashland, Oregon

D A T E S T OR E M E M B E R

3

By Ed Horn

Soil Product DevelopmentThis east side happening is in reference to the Crater Lake Soil Sur-vey contracted by the National Park Service (NPS) and completedby the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) in 2003.Much of the material about soil product development in this arti-cle came from a talk that Pete Biggam (soil program lead for theNational Park Service) gave at the “Advanced Technology and SoilMapping” course in Phoenix, AZ March 2004.

In March of 2004 Jerry Weinheimer, project lead, and TomClark, project mapping soil scientist for the Crater Lake Soil Surveytook a trip to Southern Oregon State College in Ashland, Oregon.They were to present their soil mapping experiences and expertiseto members of the National Park Service and Southern OregonState College. For their presentation, Tom and Jerry illustrated themajor soil types of the park and answered questions from theaudience on the technical aspects of completing the Crater LakeSoil Survey.

Pete Biggam, soil scientist and soil program lead for theNational Park Service in Denver, Colorado was also at this meet-ing. Pete has been using the completed soil survey of Crater LakeNational Park as a way to generate interest and show new soilproduct developments to other Park Service employees. One ofPete’s duties as he tells it is to bring together Soil Survey contractmappers with Park Service employees. He wants to ensure thatsoil product development is meeting the needs of individual parks.Park service employees from Lassen National Volcanic Park, Califor-nia were present to get ideas for mapping their park.

What soil products have we been producing?

• Past – Hard copy soil survey report and soil atlas sheets.• Present – Hard copy soil survey report (hard copy and digi-

tal), Soil Atlas Sheets (hard copy and digital), Soil geospatial data-base with soil attribute database that can be used in a Geographi-cal Information System.

• Future – Similar products but with more flexibility to produceany/all of the actual components developed within the soil surveyprocess, as well as soil visualization products, and products tomeet various customer needs in an ever-changing world.

Pete feels that for future products we need to consider makingavailable all of the components used in generating soil maps.

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E ASTSIDEN O T E S

(Continued on page 4.)

LOOK AT THE JUNECOPY OF SCIENCEIf you have not done so, check out the June11 “Science,” vol. 304, No. 5677. There is agood soil profile on the cover and severalsoil articles. One article deals with thechange of ecological sites as the Arctic per-mafrost melts. Will the changed vegetationcommunities cause a net loss of soil car-bon or an increase in soil sequestered car-bon? The jury is still out. Another article isa good description of the interactionsbetween the soil microbiology and the veg-etative communities.

4

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Things such as:! Observations from soil map-

pers such as soil/wildlife, orsoil/plant community interrelations.This is information that leaves withthe soil mapper, and does not getincorporated into the final soil sur-vey product.

! Soil forming factors as sepa-rate geospatial themes – separateout climate temperature moistureregimes, geologic parent materialtypes, vegetation types, landforms,and soil age classes.

! Soil – Landscape – Vegetationmodel with 3d illustrations, eleva-tions, aspects, pictures and soil dia-grams.

! Soil catena concept diagramson how soils change over a land-scape. Greater use of illustrationsand soil profile diagrams correlatedto landscape diagrams.

! Locations and attributes of allsoil observations;

• Transects/Traverses• Soil analyses• Soil – crop yield correlation• Soil – range correlation• Soil – woodland forest correla-

tion

The Crater Lake survey was oneof the first Oregon soil surveys toextensively use Geographical Infor-

mation System (GIS)and GeographicalPositioning System(GPS) technologyto complete thesoil survey. Thesoils productdevelopedfrom theCrater LakeSoil Surveyincludes acompact disc con-taining Adobe Acrobatelectronic versions of the 1)Soil survey manuscript, 2) Generalsoils map, 3) General vegetationmap, and 4) Detailed soil maps.The soil survey manuscript includesdetailed soil map unit descriptions,general soil map unit descriptions,and soil property and interpretationtables. The general soil map wasproduced from the detailed soilmapping and includes links fromthe general soil legend to the gen-eral soil descriptions in the manu-script. A color general vegetationmap was also generated from thedetailed soil mapping. A topo-graphic quadrangle index, whenclicked on, will display the detailedsoil mapping and symbols withinthe index area. The soil map lineswere displayed over 1994 digital

black andwhite

orthophotog-raphy. Other

product deliver-ables, according

to Tom Clark, werecopies of soil note

descriptions and digi-tal pictures linked to

latitude/longitude loca-tions, geospatial poly-

gon data for use in a GISenvironment, along with

the related National SoilInformation System soil

attribute data. The “Soil DataViewer” is an application beingdeveloped by the NRCS to make iteasier to generate soil interpretationmaps from the geospatial data. Theversion of the Soil Data Viewer thatwill work with ArcGIS should beavailable some time this summer.

Tom Clark said that there wastalk of trying to incorporate soil dia-grams and interpretation from theCrater Lake Soil Survey into theexisting network of interpretationsfor Crater Lake. Stay tuned, this willbe a future soil product develop-ment!

(Eastside Notes from page 3.)

finer sand sequence. The upper sheet, correlated tothe 1964 Alaska earthquake tsunamis, had three cou-plets. This corresponded to the 3 tsunamis wavesrecorded at the Tofino tide gauge. There the gaugerecorded 3 waves 1 to 3m high over a 3 hour period.

Further evidences of the tsunami origin of deposi-tion: The sand layers have marine diatoms. Leaf basesof marsh plants were entombed in the sand sheet. Thetwo discrete sand sheets relate to two earthquakeevents. Cesium dating show dates of about 1700 ADfor the lower sand sheet. Though adulterated by the

atmospheric nuclear testing of the 1950’s and 1960’s,the upper sand sheet was correlated to year of 1964.Their paper: “Tsunami deposits beneath Tidal Marsheson Northwestern Vancouver Island, British Columbia,”is published in Quaternary Research 48, 192-204(1997)

There are important implications of this work forpublic safety. But for a soil mapper, compared to mostpedogenic processes which progress slowly, this is adramatic, graphic soil development!

(President’s Message from page 2.)

“The Crater Lakesurvey was one of

the first Oregonsoil surveys to

extensively use []GIS and [] GPS tech-

nology to complete

the soil survey.”!

5

OSSS Summer Tour to Steens Mountain a Great Success

by Steve Campbell

OSSS President Mark Keller put together a great tour of the Steens Mountain area. Westarted at the BLM Page Springs Campground onthe Donner and Blitzen River. Terri Geisler, BLMgeologist, gave us an excellent overview of the geol-ogy of the region. At the first three stops, we lookedat soils and vegetation that had been mapped anddescribed during the course of the Harney Countysoil survey project.

We had a great lunchat the Steens MountainPackers Lake Creek BaseCamp, then headed for

the high country. Westopped for a view of thespectacular Kiger Gorge

then proceeded to the top of Steens Mountain for great views of theAlvord Desert and Wildhorse Lake.

Thanks Mark for arranging such an excellent tour.

Ed Horn, OSSS Eastside Director,with Kiger Gorge in the back-ground

Terri Geisler, BLM geologistexplaining the geology ofSteens Mountain and theAlvord Desert

Mark Keller, OSSS president, fill-ing in soil pit on tour stop

6

Technical expertise regarding sediment control, decompactionmethods, and hydrologic function was expected from the Soil,Water and Air working group. Training sessions and workshops inErosion Control and Compaction were being offered at this timeand the Soil Scientist generally was attending them to acquire themost current thoughts and methods regarding this type of work.In 1996 the Coos Bay District was overwhelmed with storm dam-age to the road system, restoration projects and staff reductions inthe engineering department. In addition, legal challengesand consultation with other agencies drew theFisheries Biologists away from road pro-jects. Thus the planning, designand implementation cameto rest solely onthe SWA group.

WatershedAnalysis (WA) rec-ommendations gener-ally proved to be thebest planning tool (shop-ping list) to get at poten-tial roads that could bedecommissioned in somemanner. The Soil and Watergroup would walk the road anddevelop a specific method bywhich the decommissioning wouldbe accomplished. These methods then could be put forth to anInterdisciplinary Team to ensure other uses of the road were notplanned in the near or long term future. If so, the method ofdecommissioning would change or the road dropped from the listof potential candidates. Getting input from others was instrumen-tal in the successful and efficient use of available dollars.

Initially our efforts concentrated on closures on short spurroads that were no longer needed or could be easily opened formanagement actions. Bringing together an ID Team was not alwayssuccessful. For example, some long sections of road recommendedfor closure were maintained for a specific contract at considerableexpense. Had the project implementer consulted the WA recom-mendations it would not have been done. The best plans of miceand men go awry often in our organization.

Requiring timber sales to concentrate decommissioning effortswithin the scope of contracts was successful early on. New roadsnecessary for harvest and transport of logs were planned for fulldecommissioning to return the land to productive forestland uponcompletion of the sale. Renovated roads necessary for managementactions in the future were closed and storm proofed in a mannerthat reduced the maintenance required and could easily be re-opened for fire suppression or service contract work. This was gen-erally required by other agencies in consultation with our Fish orWildlife Biologists. Road closure and storm proofing projects

funded through Jobs in the Woods or Secure Rural Schools andCommunity Self-Determination Act of 2000 (RAC) funding con-centrated efforts on roads that were generally scattered across asub-watershed(s), were heavy sediment producers, or could be tiedto fish access barriers.

Prior to 1996, the methods of closure were very high on costeffectiveness. The work was considered complete after only one

barrier was built or a culvert was removed at the junction of amain road. After several years it was apparent that some

individuals were successful in gaining access to roadsclosed in this manner and that more complex designs

were required. Some changes were: Road prisms werenot always removed from the landscape, and drainage

features were changed from ditchlines to waterbars orwaterdips. Individuals seemed to respect the closure

concept if a series of waterbars were evident fromthe berm or pile of rocks closing the road. They

could see considerable effort was expended onthe road and would honor that closure.

Definitions have been a reoccurringproblem. The term “decommission” is an

example. Within our own District, Engineers using theTransportation Management Plan mean a different action

when proposing to decommission a road than do the FisheriesBiologists working on a Consultation with NOAA Fisheries. Hydro-logic recovery is only a requisite for the Fisheries Biologists.Wildlife Biologists are willing to accept decommissioning if itmeans no traffic on the road in lieu of hydrologic recovery. So, get-ting all the interested parties to agree to terms and to understandeach others intents or meanings has been a hurtle for the last tenyears.

In an effort to determine if early actions on decommissionefforts (Pre-1996) had set up an unacceptable condition on someroads, the District Soil Scientist and a District Engineer reviewedthe first several years of projects. The expectation was that thoseold roads would show signs of gullying on steep portions, ditch-lines would be overwhelmed with bank slough, and culverts wouldbe plugged diverting drainage down the roads. What was foundinstead was quite the opposite.

Because early efforts were confined to short spurs with littlegrade or to longer ridge-top roads, little to no degradation of thegravel surface, ditches or culverts had occurred in the resulting sixto eight years since treatment. Removing the traffic seemed to bethe key action allowing the accumulation of needles, twigs orleaves on the road surface. In areas where no canopy existed, suchas adjacent to a young plantation, the road surfacing weathered toa resistant armor layer with larger sized gravel being predominateover smaller pieces. When this surface armor became sufficientlydeveloped the weathering stopped.

The slope of the road appeared to have some relationship to

(Road Decommissioning from page 1.)

(Continued on next page.)

“As the planners,

designers

and implementers of ro

ad

decommissioning projects

we

will also have to be the

educators of th

e critics

.”

!

7

the amount of erosion. Most research hassince shown a slope-squared-times-lengthequation is a good fit for determining theamount of sediment that could be erodedfrom a road surface. Since our early effortsdid not establish water diversion structureson the roads but merely removed the trafficwe decided to test our accomplishmentsthrough a review process. For our reviewprocess we measured the length of the roadprior to where the erosion became evident.That information allowed us to determine apercent slope to length relationship to usefor spacing between waterbars or dips.

Most of the decommissioning work thatour District has undertaken in the past is inthe 60 to 70 inches of precipitation per yearzone. As we move to new areas that receive120 to 140 inches per year we are moreaggressive with the depth of the cut ofdrainage structures and choose to shortenthe spacing between these structures. Get-ting others to accept a no-cookie-cutterapproach to this type of work is a challengein and of itself. Most people can accept astandard, such as 75 feet between structureswhen the slope is 12%, but have a hard timeremembering only when the rainfall equals60 inches/yr. We Soil Scientists have beentold we can’t make up our minds or that weare always changing our recommendationswhen in all practical aspects we are readingthe response of the road to the climate andrecommending what we hope will be a longterm solution to an age old problem.

To keep abreast of our assumptions weare field-checking some of each road treat-ments we accomplish (waterbars or dips,sub-soiling, and planting) to validate ourinitial read of the situation and see ifchanges need to be made. The amount ofroad that was still in very good shape wasimpressive even though no other workbeyond blocking the road to traffic wasundertaken. Call it blind luck or skillfulimplementation, but once the disturbancefrom the traffic was taken away, the surfacecondition on both the graveled and dirtroads settled down and erosion was not aproblem. Getting waterbars to flow water

out the end, or connect to the ditchlineseemed to be a hard thing to do for someoperations. The equipment operator was notable to clear the outlet of somestructures due to the brushand vegetation just off theroad surface using hismachine and no attempt wasmade to shovel the outlet clearlater. Construction of a dri-vable water dip is best done aspart of the initial building ofthe sub-grade. Coming in lateron with a grader, front-endloader or small cat with a six-way blade all have there shortcomings, but the best resultwas obtained by the cat.

We in the Soil, Water andAir Group will continue tolook for roads that are causingresource degradation, but the selection poolis getting smaller all the time. Having a landownership pattern that is a checkerboard bydesign will always necessitate keeping someroads open for management reasons eventhough our needs are reduced over time asstands grow past the initial establishmentand thinning stages. On road systems thatwe will maintain on a lower intensity orreduced frequency it makes economic senseto build structures into the road surface thatwill reduce the need for grading or cleaningditchlines. There will be resistance to gettingthis work accepted by others that still wantthe old style roads to drive and can’t under-stand that the extra time involved in travel isa benefit to the landscape, not to them tryingto get to a project area quickly. As the plan-ners, designers and implementers of roaddecommissioning projects we will also haveto be the educators of the critics. This is achallenge that is greater than the road workitself and one that needs continued evalua-tion of as well.

Road decommissioning projectin the Coos Bay BLM district.

8

(Westside Notes from page 2.)

shaped shoes slightly lift the com-pacted soil, causing it to shatterwith little mixing of topsoil and sub-soil. A good subsoiling job can get80 percent of the compaction toshatter.

Both pieces of equipment startat the far end of the road to betilled. The tractor mounted subsoilerwith two passes (more for turnoutsand timber harvest landings) tillsthe roadbed in a quick efficientmanner (up to 0.5 miles in onehour). The excavator follows at aslower pace (about 300 feet perhour), subsoiling its own tracks andspots missed by the tractor-mounted subsoiler. Using thebucket, it then brings organic debris(slash on theforest floor andslash pilesfollowing timberharvest) on tothe tilledroadbed. It alsopicks up a littletopsoil and dufffrom off the roadto sprinkle ontothe roadbed asinoculant for soil organisms. Whereneeded the excavator removesditchlines and constructs waterbars.The beauty of this technique is thatall compacted surfaces can be tilled,the soil ecology is jumpstarted,good drainage and erosion controlis ensured, insurmountable barriersare created to deter the off-roadenthusiasts, and the covering andburning of slash piles is eliminated.

For consistently good results,having an experienced operatorwho well knows the desired resultssure helps. The Roseburg District isfortunate to have Darryl Jones fromits Mrytle Creek Maintenance shopin this role. Funds are dedicated tohim and the Roseburg District’s sub-soilers to do the tillage work, elimi-nating the uncertainty of results

that comes with con-tracting. Contractorsoften can not securethe proper equipmentto get acceptable shat-tering of the com-paction. Dennis and Iwould like to usebiosolids on tough-to-reclaim roadbeds toincrease the jumpstarteffect. A severely compactedroadbed in clayey subsoil or in par-alithic material would be candi-dates.

Subsoiling with the excavatorhas been tried a few times in theRoseburg District on compacted oldskid trails and on new harvester-for-

warder trailsinside timber har-vest units. Dam-age to the rootsof the residualtrees in commer-cially thinnedstands due tosubsoiling andthe resultantintroduction ofroot disease has

been a concern. Back in 1994 For-est Service forest pathologists Ellenand Don Goheen gave me theirthoughts on the subject in a letterto me. At that time there were fewstudies established to look at theeffects of such machinery on rootsystems and little data available. TheGoheens believed healthy, vigorousDouglas fir can tolerate moderatelevels of root wounding by subsoil-ing equipment based on the factthat these trees are relatively decayresistant and their root systems areusually not shallow. They, however,strongly recommended that subsoil-ing not occur within five feet of thetree boles. For stands composed oflarge percentages of shallow-rooted, decay prone species suchas western hemlock and true firs,

they suggested larger buffers andgreater care taken during subsoilingoperations. I need to do a literaturesearch to learn if there is more up-to-date information on the subject.

Excavator subsoiling of skid trailsand harvester-forwarder trails hasbeen a big improvement over thetractor subsoiling. The excavatorcan maneuver through the residualtrees much better avoiding damageto tree boles. The operator can bemore selective where and at whatdepth he subsoils, lessening dam-age to the larger roots. He can alsobring organic debris back over thetrails. The Roseburg District wouldlike to secure the use of a smallerexcavator for this work, especiallywhen Darryl begins subsoiling oldcompacted trails in denseunthinned mid-seral stands. Moni-toring will be needed to get a han-dle on the amount of root damage.

Dale Stewart, a soil scientist atthe BLM Coos Bay District, submit-ted observations about the chal-lenges of road decommissioning inthe wettest parts of western Ore-gon. (Read his and Kevin McCabe’sarticle on page 1of this Sharp-shooter.) We in the Roseburg Dis-trict can complain about our 35 to70 inches of mean annual precipita-tion. Dale and his coworkers mustdeal with mean annual precipita-tions twice that.

Many thanks go to Dale Stewartand Karin Baitis for responding tomy request for articles and informa-tion to include in the WestsideNotes.

Subsoiling and reaching for slash at theBear Buck commercial thin.

Bucket of excavator withattached shanks and wings.

9

U R B I S O LC O R N E R

Bats Dependent Upon (Vanishing) Wetlands Humans Dependent Upon Batsby John Good

On a recent visit to Colorado I picked up the book: Bats of the Rocky Mountain West. Surprised at the magnitudeof our wetland losses over the last two centuries, I thought other soil enthusiasts might be interested in the statistic.If we are not careful we can become another “Easter Island,” and consume our own homeland beyond recovery.

[From Rick A. Adams, Bats of the Rocky Mountain West, (University Press of Colorado, 2003)pp. 87-8.]

“Wetlands are also important for sustaining bat diversity. Unfortunately, these areas have been greatly reduced in the continental United States.More than 53 percent of total wetlands in the lower forty-eight states were forfeited between 1780 and 1990, with most losses occurring in the mid-western states for cropland conversion. Wetland areas include marshes, swamps, flood plains, peat bogs, and prairie potholes (formed from theretreat of the last glacier), all of which are important to ecosystem health because they filter out pollutants from surface water and act as reservoirsfor rainfall and runoff. In addition, wetlands help extend stream flow during droughts and aid in preventing devastating floods. They also providerefuge for more than 50 percent of fish species, one-third of bird species, and one-sixth of mammal species presently listed as federally threatened orendangered in the United States.”

The Urban Interface betweenSoils and Critters.

Loss of wetlands between1780 and 1990 throughoutthe lower forty-eight states

O R E G O N S O C I E T Y O F S O I L S C I E N T I ST SP. O . B o x 2 3 8 2 • C o r v a l l i s , O R 9 7 3 3 9

SHARPSHOOTER

SharpshooterThe Sharpshooter is the official newsletter distributed tothe members of the Oregon Society of Soil Scientists. Pub-lished quarterly by J.B. Good, Inc. and the Oregon Societyof Soil Scientists. Address changes or inquiries aboutmembership to:

OSSSBox 2382 Corvallis, OR 97339

AdvertisementsReach more than a hundred soil scienceprofessionals with an advertisement inthe Sharpshooter And the price is right —whole page $45, 1/2 page $25, 1/4 page$15, or 1/6 page $10. All you need to do isprovide a disk and hard copy to theSharpshooter editor by the deadline (firstof the month — January, March, June andNovember).All articles and advertisements submittedare subject to room available basis.

News itemsRemember all articles submitted to theSharpshooter can be sent on 3-1/2'' disk in most any DOS, MAC orASCII format, along with a hard copy. Indoing so, the Sharpshooter can get to youfaster.

Membership rates$25.00 Voting member13.00 Associate member30.00 Sustaining member

5.00 Student member250.00 Lifetime member

Executive

Board

President: Mark Kellerph: (541) 573-6446 ext, 118email: mkeller@or.blm.gov

or mpkeller@centurytel.comPast President: Tom Clark

ph: (541) 923-4358 ext. 118 • (541) 504-0520 (hm)email: 3cats@bendcable.com

Vice President: Kathy Verbleph: (503) 378-3805 ext. 295email: Kathy.Verble@state.or.us

Secretary: Kathy Clarkph: (541) 504-0520email: 3cats@bendcable.com

Treasurer: Ron Reuterph: (541) 322-3109email: ron.reuter@oregonstate.edu

Westside Director: Dan Cressyph: (541) 440-6737

email: Daniel_Cressy@or.blm.govEastside Director: Ed Horn

ph: (541) 416-2645email: ehorn@aaahawk.com

Editor: Steve Campbellph: (503) 414-3009, Fax: 503-414-3277

email: steve.campbell@or.usda.govPublications Administrator: Judy Good

ph: (541) 752-6260 email: goodj@peak.org

• • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •

Web site and email address:http://osss.peak.orgemail: osss@peak.org

S H A R P S H O O T E R

O.S.S.S.Annual Meeting

Put February 17-18 on yourcalendar for the OSSS AnnualMeeting. The meeting will beon the Oregon Coast. Detailswill be in the next issue ofthe Sharpshooter.