SALINE SEEP IN MONTANA 



by 



Loren L. Bahls 



Ecologist='= 



and 



Marvin R. Miller 



Hydrogeologist-''* 



INTRODUCTION 



Saline seeps are recently developed saline soils in nonirrigaged 

 areas that are wet some or all of the time, often with white salt 

 crusts, and where crop or grass production is reduced or eliminated. -•* 

 They are manifestations of 20th century dryland agriculture and the 

 crop-fallow rotation system necessary for moisture conservation and 

 small grain production on the scale practiced in Montana. The 

 widespread occurrence and rapid growth of saline seeps have been 

 recognized as one of the most serious conservation problems in 

 the northern Great Plains (14). 



A 1971 Soil Conservation Service (SCS) survey revealed that 

 more than 80,000 acres of nonirrigated Montana cropland had been 

 lost to saline seeps (6). Serious outbreaks of seep have now appeared 

 in northcentral and northeastern Montana and are increasing at a 

 rate of over 10 percent a year. Other estimates show that 150,000 

 to 250,000 acres of cropland have been lost, and if the acreage of 

 saline farnrx, recreation, and stockponds as well as badly eroded 



'•'Ecologist, Montana Environmental Quality Council, Helena 

 >;<*Hydrogeologist, Montana Bureau of Mines & Geology, Butte 

 -••**Definition accepted by Governor's Committee on Saline Seep, 

 August 30, 1973. 



