WPEF volunteers sow over 20,000 whitebark seeds at Coeur d’Alene nursery
What makes whitebark pine seeds so valuable to grizzly bears, Clark’s nutcracker, and other species – their large size packed full of nutrient dense calories – is exactly what makes them challenging to plant in a nursery setting. On a Whitebark Pine Ecosystem Foundation volunteer service day at the U.S. Forest Service nursery in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho we watched an automated, pneumatic seeder plant a tray of ponderosa pine seeds every few seconds. Not so with whitebark! Each seed needs to be carefully situated in its growing tube by a human planter. And that’s a big deal this year in Coeur d’Alene because they received orders to plant over 300,000 whitebark pine seeds this spring.
They reached out to see if we could help, and on April 1st and 2nd eleven eager volunteers from as far away as British Columbia, Grangville, Idaho, and Bigfork, Montana traveled to Spokane to help plant approximately 20,000 whitebark seeds. The seeds our WPEF volunteers planted will germinate in approximately two weeks and will grow in the Forest Service greenhouse for two years before being transplanted back to the National Forest, Park, or BLM area where they were gathered. Our volunteers planted whitebark seeds from Grand Teton National Park, Bridger-Teton National Forest, Payette National Forest, BLM lands in Idaho’s Silver Valley, Flathead National Forest, and more.
We plan to contribute to the whitebark seed sowing at the nursery again, so watch for a call for volunteers in late winter next year. A huge thank you to nursery staff, Aram Eramian and Gabe Traver, for welcoming us to the nursery and helping us to get our hands dirty planting the next generation of whitebark trees. We can’t wait to come back next year and see how they’re doing!
– Erin Clark, Education and Communication Committee lead