24 FORAGE CONDITIONS AND PROBLEMS. 
vegetation salt grass (Distichlis spicata) and bordering it grease wood 
(Sarcobatus vermiculatus). These are in turn surrounded by the usual 
shrubs of the desert. In places where the drainage waters empty into 
the basins the vegetation is of course very much modified. It is here 
that the ranches occur, and it is upon the impounding of the spring 
waters which reach these sinks that the reclamation of these deserts 
depends. These areas, however, are now no part of the range, but — 
they serve for the culture of winter feed for stock and are in the 
main patented holdings. The condition in the higher mountains was 
discussed in Bulletin 15 of the Bureau of Plant Industry, U.S. Depart- 
ment of Agriculture, to which the reader is referred. 
Surrounding many of these desert sinks a peculiar condition exists 
as regards the distribution of vegetation. On the edges of the major- 
ity of them there are sandy drifts of varying magnitude, in whieh all 
of the desert shrubs may be found growing promiscuously. These 
accumulations of earth are derived from the desert basins during the 
dry, windy weather, and they are consequently very different from 
the ordinary sand dune, inasmuch as they, as well as the desert basins 
themselves, are very alkaline, the salts being blown out during the 
dry season. The vegetation of one of these dunes in Long Valley, - 
Nevada, will serve as an illustration. There appeared in these mounds 
erease wood (Sarcobatus vermiculatus), black sage (Artemisia tri- 
dentata), bud sage (Artemisia spinescens), hop sage (Grayia spinosa), 
and saltbush (Atriplex confertifolia). On the ‘‘sleek desert” sides of 
these mounds occurred a scattering growth of salt grass, sometimes 
extending over the mounds, while on the edge of the more salty areas 
were also scattering growths of suaeda (Dondia depressa crecta) and 
iodine weed (Sprrostachys occidentalis). None of these shrubs except 
the first mentioned is to be considered a salt-loving plant, but all were 
able to thrive here, doubtless because they became established before 
the drifts. For the same reason they are not to be considered sand 
binders, although they did serve that useful purpose here. 
The feed on the desert mesas of Catlow Valley is furnished almost 
entirely by needle grass (Stipa thurberiana), orchard barley (Sztanion 
longifolium and S. villosum), prairie June grass (Aveleria. cristata), 
wheat grass (Agropyron sp.” G. & H. No. 306), Indian millet (Ory- 
zopsis cuspidata), and giant rye grass (/lymus condensatus). To these 
should be added Nuttall’s saltbush (Atriplex nuttalli7), which grows 
here, as is common with this species, almost pure in irregular areas, 
usually of a few acres in extent, in the general sagebrush mesa. The 
grasses, it must be understood, are in small scattering bunches, and it 
would doubtless take more than 50 acres to support a steer for one 
year on the general mesa. The conditions described in Steins and Pine 
«This species, although quite abundant, was not secured in proper condition for 
determination. 
