Habitat Management Plan

How can we help assure the diverse wildlife, plants and natural beauty of the park thrive even as the climate changes, exotic weeds invade, park visitors increase, and hotter summers increase the chance of a destructive wildfire?

Big questions are being considered in a habitat management planning process initiated in Fall 2008. Buford Park's 1994 Master Plan called for Lane County to develop plans to manage the park's unique vegetation types and wildlife that depend on these ecosystems. A lack of funding has delayed the plan development.

In 2006, Oregon Department of Fish & Wildlife (ODFW) designated the Mt. Pisgah area as an important "conservation opportunity area" in its statewide "Oregon Conservation Strategy." In 2008, ODFW awarded Friends a $40,000 grant to assist with developing a habitat management plan, which Friends will match with local (non-federal) dollars and volunteer contributions to help conserve and enhance the park's diverse habitats.  

Download the summary of the DRAFT Habitat Management Plan pdf.

Download the DRAFT objectives and strategies pdf.

Public Comment Period CLOSES Monday, June 15, 2009

Lane County seeks your input on the proposed objectives and strategies for the Howard Buford Recreation Area habitat management plan. To review the objectives and strategies, click here. To provide feedback, contact Lane County Parks at 541-682-2000 or mail them to Lane County Parks, 3050 N. Delta Hwy, Eugene, OR, 97408.

Conservation Vision

The long-term vision for Mt. Pisgah and the Howard Buford Recreation Area is the conservation and restoration of a dynamically functioning prairie-savanna complex, as well as river systems with healthy riparian and aquatic processes and communities in ways that support compatible recreational and educational issues. The upland systems should sustain a mosaic of savanna, oak woodland, and upland prairie with inclusions of wet prairie. This prairie-savanna complex and riparian/aquatic systems should support a stable and diverse community of rare plants and animals including federally and state listed threatened or endangered species and the habitats that support them.

Technical Advisory Group

Lane County Parks Division Manager Todd Winter has convened and is chairing an inter-agency "Technical Advisory Group" (TAG) that involves local land management experts to assist with the planning process. 

The Planning Team

  • Todd Winter, Lane County Parks (Director)
  • Paul Hoobyar, Watershed Initiatives
  • Jason Blazar, Friends of Buford Park & Mt. Pisgah
  • Bruce Newhouse, Ecologist and Friends of Buford Park & Mt. Pisgah STAC representative
  • Ed Alverson, The Nature Conservancy
  • Glenn Miller, Oregon Department of Agriculture
  • Ben Tilley, Bonneville Power Administration
  • Greg Wagonblast, Oregon Department of Forestry
  • Brad Van Appel, Mount Pisgah Arboretum
  • Oregon Department of Fish & Wildlife Springfield Office staff
  • Robert Swift, US Army Corps of Engineers

Conservation Targets

The TAG has examined available data on the vegetation trends, wildlife, and has defined key "conservation targets." 

  • Creeks & Streams

    • Riparian areas with intermittent flows typically running from October through early June.
    • Plant communities common within this system include oak woodland and wet prairie. 
    • Conservation species: Cutthroat trout

  • Willamette Riparian System & Associated Floodplains

    • The riparian area is a dynamic biological and physical system that acts as the interface between terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems. This area encompasses the land and vegetation adjacent to Willamette river channels, oxbow lakes, alcoves, backwater areas, and sloughs that are influenced by perennial or intermittent water and the influence of hydric and fluvent soils.
    • Plant communities common within this system include ash-maple gallery forest, cottonwood bottomland forest, and willow shrub thickets.
    • Conservation species: Upper Willamette spring Chinook, Western pond turtle, northern red-legged frog, cutthroat trout, Oregon chub, and Bald eagle.

  • Oak Woodland

    • A sparsely treed community dominated by oaks with tree density intermediate between the scattered trees of an oak savanna and the interlocking crowns of a closed canopy forest. Tree crowns usually do not touch, allowing sunlight to penetrate to the ground.
    • Oak woodland is frequently located on hillslopes of small buttes and valley foothills. It grades into savanna at the lower end of tree density and into closed canopy forest on the upper end.
    • Conservation species: Western gray squirrel, White-breasted nuthatch, Acorn woodpecker, Wayside aster, Oregon aster.

  • Buckbrush Chaparral

    • Shrub dominated community with few to no trees located on excessively drained to shallow soils on hot, dry hillside exposures and upon gravel bars within the floodplain. The principle shrub species is buckbrush, Ceanothus cuneatus, with associations of snowberry, tall Oregon grape, and the occasional Oregon white oak tree.
    • A population Hedgerow hairstreak, Satyrium saepium, butterflies, uncommon at low elevations (below 1000'), utilize the buckbrush as its sole host plant at Mt. Pisgah.
    • Conservation species: Hedgerow hairstreak, Vesper sparrow, Blue-gray gnatcatcher

  • Wetland Prairie

    • Grass and forb dominated communities with few to no trees or shrubs located on hydric soils that are saturated to the surface during the rainy season and dry during the summer. 
    • Overall topographic relief is minimal but variable, and includes pedestals and hummocks emerging above water level as well as vernal pools.
    • Conservation species: Western Meadowlark, Yellow-Breasted chat, Willow flycatcher, Seeps and swales

  • Bradshaw's Lomatium

    • Bradshaw's Lomatium, Lomatium bradshawii, is a conservation target species at Buford Park because it is federally and state listed as an Endangered species. It occurs in the southeast corner of Buford Park and may be an important population because it is in the southeast corner of its range.
    • Bradshaw's Lomatium occurs only in wet prairie habitat.

  • Upland Prairie and Savanna 

    • Grass and forb dominated communities on non-hydric soils with few to no trees or shrubs (prairie), or with scattered open-grown trees that are not so dense as to break up the continuous grassland groundlayer (savanna). Principle tree species are Oregon white oak, California black oak, ponderosa pine, and less frequently, Douglas fir.
    • These grassland habitats were historically maintained by fire, which prevented succession to forest.
    • Conservation species: Western Meadowlark, Yellow-breasted chat, Wayside aster, Oregon aster, Gumweed/Willow dock/Great copper butterfly, Roemer's Fescue/Mardon butterfly, Camas pocket gopher, seeps and swales, herbaceous balds and rock outcrops.

  •  Public Use

    • Sustain compatible recreation within the Howard Buford Recreation Area. This includeds all uses and activities identified within the 1994 Master Plan. The habitat management plan should provide guidance to ensure that recreation and public use does not jeopardize the significant natural values and conservation opportunities in the Mt. Pisgah area as noted in the Master Plan.

     

Conservation Threats

TAG also identified activities that directly cause stress to the conservation targets, known as conservation threats. The threats of greatest concern are:

  • Encroachment of native trees and shrubs
  • Invasion of non-native vegetation
  • Invasion of non-native terrestrial animals
  • Altered ecological fire regime
  • Impacts from management
  • Impacts from recreation