Taxonomy and Ecology Of Inland Sand Dune ... - Mycorrhizae

Materials and MethodsI. STUDY SITENorth Park, located in north centralColorado, is a controlled basin withtopographic barriers defined bymountain ranges (FIG. 1). North Parkoccupies almost all of Jackson Countyand covers an area of about 2254 km 2 .At the north, its boundary is within a fewkilometers of the Colorado-Wyomingstate line and the IndependenceMountains. At the south is the RabbitEars Range that runs east and west andseparates North Park from Middle Park.The Park Range forms the westernboundary of North Park. North Park'seastern boundary is the crest of theMedicine Bow Range and extends to theNever Summer Mountains. North Park'sfloor is almost flat and at an elevationthat varies from 7900 to 8100 feet (2408to 2469 m) above sea level. However,the surrounding mountains rise from2,000 to 5,000 feet (610 to 1524 m)above the floor (Beekly, 1915).Sand dunes cover much of North Park’snortheastern border. A major dormantdune field covers 86.8 km 2 adjacent tothe Medicine Bow Range. The activesand dunes in this field are east andnortheast of the Canadian River andrange in elevation from 2469 to 2652 mabove sea level. The north sand hills(3.81 km 2 ) were the site (R78W T10N)of this study, and are located about 10km east of Cowdrey, CO; the East sandhills (3.46 km 2 ) are about 16 kmnortheast of Walden, CO. These twosites are the only major active sanddunes in North Park.North Park's climate is characterized bylong, cold winters and short, coolsummers. Rainfall is variable; thebordering mountainous areas are moist,and the basin low lands are arid (Hail,1965). To characterize the region,Huddleston (1968) used climatic datacollected over a period of 18 years inSpicer, CO, located 28 km southwest ofthe southern end of the North Parkdunes. He estimated that the area nearSpicer has only 46 frost-free days