DOINews: BLM-Montana/Dakotas: Botanist Plants with Little Big Horn Students

"Rosehips are a fruit that come from a different type of flower called a hypanthium," explains BLM Montana/Dakota State Office botanist Wendy Velman to a group of students who are leaning in to inspect the small berry Velman holds in her hand.

BLM Montana/Dakotas State Office botanist Wendy Velman (right) works with Little Big Horn College students.

Sitting along a small tree line, Velman and about 10 students gather to learn what a botanist's life is like in the field. She closely examines a sample and explains the painstaking process of properly identifying and cataloging plants.

This photo shows a closeup of a rosehip.

Not only will this be the first sample collection for many of these students, it also is the very first time any student at the Crow Reservation's Little Big Horn College has collected samples that will stay with the school.

BLM Montana/Dakotas State Office botanist Wendy Velman demonstrates how to key and press herbarium samples.

"We collected field data and we went through and collected the actual seeds, so we got about three or four thousand seeds collected in about 20 minutes," said Velman. "Some of these seeds will actually become property of the college and will be used in the program that we're trying to get started about native plant growth of culturally significant species."

The chokecherries and Woods Wild Rose seeds collected near the college are also important to sage-grouse habitat, another benefit for partners like the BLM and Natural Resource Conservation Service.

Little Big Horn College students bag chokecherries on the Little Big Horn River.

"This is also a 'Seeds for Success' collection," explains Velman. "That means that some of the seeds will stay here to help train the next generation of conservationists. The rest will be deposited into the national repository for the 'Seeds of Success' program. Herbarium specimens collected will be sent to the Smithsonian Institute, the BLM herbarium in Billings, and the closest land grant university, which in this case is Montana State."

A Little Big Horn College student collects samples in a chokecherry stand on the Little Big Horn River.

This bag holds freshly picked chokecherries.

Eventually, Velman would like to return to the Crow Reservation and replant native species to help keep the cultural heritage alive and restore habitats for species like the sage grouse. As for today, it's all about the science and education.

She says, "We are literally using this as the seed to plant the interest in students to start a conservation education."

Learn more about Little Big Horn College at www.lbhc.edu and the Seeds of Success Program at www.blm.gov/SOS.

Story and Photos by: Brad Purdy, public affairs specialist, BLM Montana/Dakotas State Office
March 25, 2015

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BLM-Montana/Dakotas