WW'W^^^^^^- 



j'-VdmrnsMm 





^t ■ -l^-^^S?;'^^ 'W^ '^' ^^^- ^"' -^ ■ ^^ ■ ^ -^ •■ 



Figure 8.— Natural revegetation on the 19-year-old mine- 

 waste dumps at the Elkol-Sorensen mine in Wyoming. The 

 waste material, sloping about 40°, ranges from boulders to 

 find sand. The foreground shrubs are mostly rabbitbrush. 

 The denser trees and shrubs on the slope were planted by 

 the University of Wyoming on an experimental basis. Of 

 these, the Russian-olive is doing best. Although sparsely 

 vegetated, these east-facing slopes were some of the best 

 revegetated steep waste piles observed. October 1978. 



Examination of many western surface coal 

 mines will disclose experimental test plots- 

 some active but most seemingly abandoned or 

 waiting to be reevaluated for long-term results. 

 These experimental test plots include plantings 

 and surface manipulations conducted or guided 

 by various Federal agencies such as the U.S. 

 Forest Service, Soil Conservation Service, and 

 the Bureau of Land Management, and by State 

 agencies and local universities. The Forest Serv- 

 ice Intermountain Forest and Range Experi- 

 mental Station, and later the Forest Service 

 SEAM program, sponsored many experiments in 

 the northern Great Plains area, including experi- 



ments at the Decker mine (Richardson and 

 others, 1975), one of the oldest of its kind and 

 one that continues to be monitored. Quantitative 

 analyses of results of most of these experi- 

 ments, however, were not available at the time of 

 this study, in part because of changes in mining 

 reclamation personnel. Some plantings on the 

 test plots bear little resemblance to what is 

 planted on adjacent lands because they were 

 made for general research purposes rather than 

 for the specific needs of a particular mine. 

 In some mined areas, nonnative species are 

 predominant. 



At some mines, experimentation on a large 

 scale is being done by mining companies. These 

 experiments are conducted to assess the useful- 

 ness of specific reclamation techniques. 

 Results of these experiments have been 

 reported on at various symposia and in various 

 publications that form the basis for recommen- 

 dations made by the SEAM program and by Cook 

 and others (1974). 



Through the research programs identified 

 above, the significant parameters affecting rec- 

 lamation success have been defined. As in- 

 dicated earlier, revegetation procedures involve 

 few deviations from what good horticultural and 

 ecological sense would have predicted. Param- 

 eters believed to be significant to revegetation 

 success are briefly discussed below in terms of 

 both their effects on the total reclamation proc- 

 ess and on some operating procedures used to 

 enhance their positive effects. Because reclama- 

 tion deals with an interrelated system of plants, 

 soils, topography, and climate, a procedure used 

 to modify any one parameter is likely to affect 

 all. The procedures are discussed under the 

 parameter heading believed to be the most 

 appropriate. 



CLIMATE 



Of all the parameters affecting reclamation, 

 climate is the most important and the least con- 

 trollable. The principal climatic factors affecting 

 plant growth are precipitation, temperature, and 

 wind. These three, separately or in combination, 

 affect the germination, growth, and distribution 

 of plant life. Although temperature extremes and 

 the number of frost-free days, namely, the grow- 

 ing season, affect the time and rate of growth 



23 



