11 



engineers, and range conservationists at the 

 Ranger District level know these locations so that 

 disturbance can be prevented. 



D. RECOMMENDATIONS FOR FURTHER ASSESSMENT 



1. Further field surveys of potential habitats and 

 known sites . Additional field surveys should be 

 made in the Lolo National Forest in areas of moist 

 Thuja plicata - Tsuga heterophylla forest. Because 

 these plants may not appear every year and may be 

 quite sensitive to varying climatic conditions 

 (Wagner and Wagner 1990) , areas of apparently 

 suitable habitat that were searched without 

 success in 1991 should be checked again. These 

 include portions of Barette, Moncure and McCormick 

 creeks . 



2 . Establishment of monitoring studies to assess 

 population condition and status . Monitoring 

 studies should be established to better determine 

 population dynamics and the effects of any habitat 

 alteration on Botrychium minganense . The methods 

 outlined in Lesica (1987, Lesica and Ahlenslager 

 1991) are suitable for monitoring these 

 populations and could be combined with other 

 techniques such as ECODATA plots. 



