Cooperative Agreement for CESU-affiliated Partner with North Atlantic Coast Cooperative Ecosystem Studies Unit

The US Geological Survey, Southwest Biological Science Center (SBSC), is offering a funding opportunity to a CESU partner for field data collection of plant species composition, vegetation structure, and soil conditions in big sagebrush ecosystems.  Big sagebrush ecosystems provide habitat for a range of wildlife species and support livestock grazing, which is an important contributor to the sustainability of rural western economies and is nearly ubiquitous within the sagebrush biome.  However, big sagebrush plant communities are in decline and being transformed by multiple threats including invasive annual grasses and changing climate.   The goal of this opportunity is to enable scientists of CESU Partner to sample vegetation and soils in big sagebrush ecosystems. The objective of this opportunity is data characterizing the species composition, vegetation structure and soil conditions at selected big sagebrush shrubland sites.