2023 Amargosa Valley BioBlitz
Hello All,
The Pahrump Field Office in the Bureau of Land Management will be hosting a BioBlitz from Thursday, April 20th to Sunday, April 23rd, in Amargosa Valley, Nye Co, NV. These dates were selected primarily to coincide with the best weather possible, while still having most plants and organisms active. The days we planned the BioBlitz also happens to fall on Earth Day.
The boundary of the BioBlitz will be limited to just BLM land managed by the Pahrump Field Office, within the Amargosa Valley Drainage (see map Amargosa BioBlitz 2022_PFO BLM). Within this area there is over 555,000 acres of BLM land to cover, including three ACEC’s (Big Dune, Ash Meadows, and Amargosa Mesquite). The BioBlitz will exclude Ash Meadows NWR (USFWS), the Nevada section of Death Valley NP (NPS), Devil’s Hole (NPS), private land, and other areas of the valley under Department of Energy and Department of Defense management.
If you’ve received this email I am hoping you will assist me and other biologists within the BLM to attend this BioBlitz.
If you are able to and interested in attending this BioBlitz please reply to Corey Lange (clange@blm.gov) with your contact information (email and phone number) and you will receive all future information and emails about the BioBlitz.
If there are people you know that want to attend the BioBlitz that I did not include in this original email, please feel free to forward this email to them.
Amargosa Valley is an extremely biodiverse area, with Ash Meadows considered to have the second greatest concentration of endemic species in North America. Nearly all of the endemic species in Ash Meadows rely on springs. Some of those springs occur on BLM land, and a large portion of Carson Slough falls within the BLM’s Ash Meadows ACEC. Besides Ash Meadows, Big Dune and Lava Dune are home to at least 4 described species of endemic insects, with possibly 5 to 6 more undescribed species found nowhere else. Additionally, many of the small mountain ranges and sandy areas in Amargosa Valley have never been surveyed, and just one of many questions the BLM wants answered is what rodent species live on Big Dune and Lava Dune. Other rare or uncommon species that live in Amargosa Valley that the BLM would like more location information for include the Atomic Tarantula (Aphonopelma atomicum), Mojave Fringe-toed Lizard (Uma scoparia), LeConte’s Thrasher (Toxostoma lecontei), and White-margined Beardtongue (Penstemon albomarginatus).
Amargosa Valley has received an enormous amount of interest from the solar industry over the past couple of years with the announcement of the Green Link West project. Because of that there are now 15+ solar projects proposed for Amargosa Valley. The BLM really wants to have a greater understanding of the biodiversity of Amargosa Valley and this BioBlitz will be a huge help.
This link is to the iNaturalist project that will collect all of the observations that are made during the BioBlitz. Please join the project and I will be sending more information about the BioBlitz soon
.
https://www.inaturalist.org/projects/2023-amargosa-valley-bioblitz
Thank you,
Corey Lange
Comments
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Wow, sounds like a great time! I wont be able to make it this year, but hopefully there will be future Amargosa BioBlitzes that I can attend.
Thanks Corey,
Sounds super fun, and I'd absolutely love a chance to see some more of the interesting tiger beetle subspecies around there, do more herping, etc., but unfortunately I'm always tied up with Earth Day festivals on the weekends surrounding Earth Day. If there's some unexpected change I'll shoot you an email!
Will
PS - I will likely swing through Big Dune in August. Lemme know if the phenology of any of the endemics lines up
following just in case
@mildredfuller absolutely! Email me at clange@blm.gov with your name and contact information and I'll make sure you get all future information on this BioBlitz. I'll also update this post with more information in the next couple of weeks.
Aloha kākou,
Mahalo nui (thanks so much) for the invite. I will be defending my thesis on 4/17 so will still be in Hawaiʻi at that time, but I hope you all have a very productive BioBlitz! I wish I could join, I bet the blooms are going to be incredible this year.
ke aloha,
Kaleiheana
Hello All,
The BioBlitz planning is in full swing and less than 2 weeks away at this point. Lots of interest in this event but if you are interested in attending please email me at clange@blm.gov
Surveys happening are:
• Small mammal surveys at Big Dune and Lava Dune: 6 people total
• Plant group surveys around Ash Meadows, White-margined Penstemon, and other areas: no cap on the number of people
• Fish surveys of Ash Meadows ACEC: 6 people total
• Fringe-toed Lizard surveys at Big Dune: no cap on the number of people
• Bee Bowl Trapping: 5 people total
• Bat Acoustic and Mist-netting: 6 people total
• Giuliani’s Dune Scarab at Big Dune: no cap on the number of people
• Amphibian surveys of Ash Meadows ACEC: 6 people total
• Sheet and black-lighting for insects: total dependent on locations
• Scorpion black-lighting: 3 total but if others bring their own black lights then more can join.
• Night driving roads for reptiles: no cap on the number of people
this was useful information!
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