Las Vegas Sun

March 28, 2024

ENVIRONMENT:

Bombs away: As long as it’s to seed park

Seed Bomb

Leila Navidi

A bit of green growth is subtle as a result of seeding done by the BLM at the site of the Bonnie Springs Fire in Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area.

Seed Bomb

A burnt joshua tree at the site of the Bonnie Springs Fire in Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area on Wednesday, March 10, 2010. Launch slideshow »

Davis Dam

Beyond the Sun

The National Park Service is planning to bomb a new park near Laughlin.

Seed bomb, that is.

The agency is building a park complex on land south of Davis Dam near Laughlin.

By next year, the site will have fishing piers, playgrounds and nature trails. But park officials fear that locals won’t come to the park because of its history as a haven for the homeless.

That’s where the seed bombs come in.

Instead of buying seeds for landscaping and handling the work itself, the Park Service is gathering an army of youth groups and Scout troops to collect seeds from native plants on the site and in nearby meadows this spring, during what is expected to be one of the best wildflower seasons on record.

In the fall, it’ll gather more volunteers to pack the seeds into mud balls and disks, which in spring 2011 will be hurled by yet more volunteers into the disturbed desert at the park as part of an opening ceremony.

“The indirect goal is to engage the local community and foster awareness of the desert flora and the new park development,” says Sandee Dingman, a biologist with the Park Service who is coordinating the program. “There is a concern that the local community will think it’s simply a fancier transient park. We need local communities to take ownership in a place as a part of a community for it to realize its full potential. This is one way we’re hoping to foster that appreciation.”

More important, she said, the Park Service wants to get children outside. Mounting research shows that children exposed to nature from an early age grow into more well-rounded and well-adjusted adults. Some studies show children exposed regularly to nature are less likely to be obese.

Seed bombing is a good way to restore the habitat, get the community involved in the park and get children outside having fun, Dingman says.

Seed bombing, also known as seed pelleting or seed balling, is a popular sowing technique, but not one that has been well studied, UNLV ecologist Scott Abella says. It is popular in rangelands where ranchers have been known to drop thousands of seed bombs out of low-flying airplanes to improve grasslands for grazing.

The technique is popular with guerrilla gardeners: groups of stealth plant lovers known to seed bomb vacant lots and neglected medians. In London, the San Francisco Bay Area and Los Angeles, subversive gardeners have been known to go to such extremes as trespassing on vacant land to plant vegetables. But the seed bombs are still the most popular and least controversial form of guerrilla gardening.

And for good reason: It’s fun.

Seed bombers spend a lot of time with friends wandering among colorful wildflowers, collecting seeds. That’s followed by a day of making mini-mud pies. Then a few months later, throwing the mud pies into the desert. Eventually, the bombing bears flowers.

What’s not to love?

Its effectiveness for desert landscaping is uncertain because it hasn’t been studied, Abella says. Simply spreading seeds is probably faster and easier. But that doesn’t mean seed bombing won’t work or that it won’t work better for certain plants, Abella adds.

A group of land managers in 2008 gathered volunteers to collect blackbrush seeds in the Las Vegas area and used seed bombing to spread them into new territory and rehabilitate habitat. It appeared to work well.

The only major problem with seed bombing in Southern Nevada, even for your yard, is that native seeds are hard to come by. Collecting native seeds on federal land is illegal unless you have special permission, and most of Nevada is federal land. Most nurseries don’t carry seeds for true Mojave Desert natives and are just as likely to hand you seeds for Sonoran cactuses.

It’s also hard to predict which seeds will germinate and which ones will be duds. Coating some seeds in dirt and clay could actually hinder their germination. Mesquite seeds, for example, need to be scarified before they can germinate. In their native habitat, they’re dispersed via washes, where the fast-flowing water scrapes the seed pods against rocks and debris and scratches them up. Simply snapping out the seeds and mushing them into a mud pie isn’t going to cut it.

Other plants have specific moisture requirements that might never be achieved if the seed is encased in mud.

But for others, seed bombing is perfect, Dingman says. The mud keeps the seeds in place longer, and over time rain dissolves the clay, releasing the seed into the soil. The mud pies help prevent desert winds from blowing the seeds away and protect the seeds from hungry birds.

Figuring out what works best is a big part of community projects such as the one taking shape in Laughlin, Abella says. It educates locals about desert flora and could lead to more native plants popping up in yards, medians and parks across the region. And the stronger the native plant populations are, the less likely they are to be pushed out by non-natives.

“This could really help suppress invasive species,” Abella says. “It won’t keep them out, but it can keep their numbers smaller and reduce their impacts on other species.”

For more information on participating in the Park Service’s Laughlin seed collection and distribution, log on to getoutdoorsnevada.org.

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