An Assessment of the Need for Native Seeds and the Capacity for Their Supply Interim Report (2020) / Chapter Skim
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3 Preliminary Observations
3 Preliminary Observations
Pages 40-49
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From page 40... ...
beautification and native plant awareness in designed landscapes. Depending on their objectives and budget, native seed users vary in their need for and the scale at which they use provenance-specific seed mixes that are likely to become established and to survive changing climate conditions and thus to facilitate ecosystem recovery and maintain biodiversity.
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From page 41... ...
, federal land management agencies strongly influence the market for native seeds. The committee is interested in understanding more about the determinants of seed choice and the decision-making processes concerning ecological restoration in these agencies, which vary both among the agencies themselves and even among different divisions within a single agency (e.g., BLM field offices, USFS districts)
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From page 42... ...
The committee is also interested in how seed choices influence the success of ecological restoration. Seeding for restoration may not meet all stated goals: the seeds may not germinate, or the plants may not persist, or the plants may persist but not fulfill the objective of recovery of biodiversity, failing at such specific tasks as controlling invasive species or reestablishing selfsustaining native plant populations.
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From page 43... ...
Budgets available to native seed users appear to vary tremendously, as does the mix of native plant genetic attributes that buyers seek. Users' budgets may be affected by funding source, timeframe, project location (urban versus rural)
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From page 44... ...
There are features of the native seed market that economic theory predicts should make it quite volatile. Some suppliers collect wildland seed or produce seed in cultivated fields speculatively, without a contract, in an attempt to predict highly uncertain future demand for specific species (Camhi et al., 2019; Peppin et al., 2010; Taylor et al., 2018)
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From page 45... ...
Furthermore, in many cases best practices for the long-term seed storage of native plant species are poorly understood. The key questions for the committee in this are how much storage is available, how much expanding storage capacity could reduce the volatility of the seed market and the price of seeds, and what measures could be taken to expand storage capacity.
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From page 46... ...
Second, there are only a handful of institutions, such as the USFS and Mid-Atlantic Regional Seed Bank, that conduct seed collection, processing, and banking in support of creating a sustainable supply of ecoregional native plant seeds. Outside of these institutions, most seed collection is done on a short-term, individual, or project basis, or it is done by commercial entities with no standardization, regulation, or use of available native seed programs, as is also true of much of nursery plant production.
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From page 47... ...
Restoration in virtually every urban center depends on native plant materials from distant sources; a 2018 survey of eastern native plant materials users found average distances to suppliers of 375–415 miles, even though 74 percent of users expressed a preference for local ecotypes. 4 Urban centers rely much more heavily on live plant material than on bulk seed in managing urban ecosystems, but bulk seed use is on the increase, which may create a need to expand the supply.
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From page 48... ...
2016. Cheatgrass die-offs as an opportunity for restoration in the Great Basin, USA: Will local or commercial native plants succeed where exotic invaders fail?
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From page 49... ...
2018. Recommendations for increasing the supply and lowering the cost of native plant materials in Nevada through strategic support of the native plant materials industry.
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