Federal Agency: National Park Service (NPS)
Academic Institution: North Dakota State University (NDSU)
NPS Project Team Jose “Ramon” Jasso, Blake McCann, Jesse Schiferl, and Thomas Smith
Principal Investigator: Shawn DeKeyser, School of Natural Resource Sciences
Co-PI's: Joseph Zeleznik and Rakhi Palit, School of Natural Resource Sciences
M.S. Students: Elise Bakke and Madison Engler
Project Summary
The Knife River Indian Villages National Historic Site is located in west-central North Dakota near the confluence of the Knife and Missouri Rivers. It is famous for the Hidatsa, Mandan, and Arikara earth lodge communities who were well known for their farming abilities, craftsmanship, and trading. The Historic Site was also where Sacagawea resided for a time, who famously aided Lewis and Clark on their expedition.
The Historic Site has a total area of 1,758 acres with a number of different ecological communities which include prairie, river, riparian, and forest. The North Forest is a long, narrow forest partially located on the Missouri River floodplain, and is over 2 miles long and approximately 200 acres in size. The Forest is dominated by Green ash (Fraxinus pennsylvanica) and Box elder (Acer negundo), with occasional Cottonwood (Populus deltoides) and American elm (Ulmus americana). The Forest has had minimal regeneration recently with declining health of the existing Green ash trees from Ash fomes (Perenniporia fraxinophila), which in known to cause trunk rot. Additionally, the understory vegetation has many invasive and weedy species as dominants, such as Dame’s rocket (Hesperis matronalis), Smooth brome (Bromus inermis), Kentucky bluegrass (Poa pratensis), Common motherwort (Leonurus cardiaca), and Catnip (Nepeta cataria).
We initially surveyed the overstory, understory and tree rings of the entire Forest to get baseline data and an overall understanding of the species composition, age and configuration. We also conducted herbicide trials on the control of the dicot weeds of the Forest, which will be helpful with post management restoration needs. NDSU and the NPS have also identified different restoration treatments to be tested which include debris removal, clear cutting, planting of trees, seeding understory species, and exclusion of deer. The treatment site locations have all been identified and work on installing all the treatments is underway. The ultimate goal is for all the restoration treatments to be established during the growing season of 2025.
Once the restoration treatments are installed, students will monitor the progress of the plantings/seedings. We will continue to monitor the herbicide trials for the next two field seasons, and plan to test a suite of “grass only” herbicides for control of Smooth brome and Kentucky bluegrass starting in 2025. Finally, we will develop a long-term plan for the NPS to aid in the restoration pathway of the North Forest. Post management will have to consider invasive species, potential herbivory, and future pathogens that could affect the Forest’s development.
Photo 1: Green ash tree with “trunk rot” that fell after high winds.
Photo 2: The invasive Dame’s Rocket with its bright purple flowers, a common understory species of the North Forest.
Photo 3: A picture of tree rings, showing the whitish 1966 ring found in many samples. There was a storm that dumped 13” of rain and caused a large flood in the area on June 24, 1966.
Photo 4: Herbicide trial for weedy dicots showing unsprayed area on the left of the blue and red flags, and sprayed area on the right.
