Tài liệu Ecology and Management of a Forested Landscape Fifty Years on the Savannah River Site pptx

Percent basal area for species associated with sandhill woodlandand remnant pine savanna communities on the Savannah River Site.118 Table 4.4.. Percent basal area for species associated

Fifty Years on the Savannah River Site

Ecology and Management

of a Forested Landscape

Edited by John C Kilgo and John I Blake

Foreword by H Ronald Pulliam

Edited by John C Kilgo and John I Blake

Foreword by H Ronald Pulliam

KILGO BLAKE

Cover design: Amy StirnkorbCover photo: John Kilgo

Advance praise for

Ecology and Management

of a Forested Landscape

“The history of ecological research at the Savannah River Site is testimony to the power

of long-term studies, interdisciplinary collaboration, and the application of basic science

to land management challenges This volume wonderfully documents that history and provides a comprehensive review of our current understanding of the dynamics and functioning of this diverse landscape.”

—Norman L Christensen Jr., professor of ecology and founding dean, Nicholas School of the Environment and Earth Sciences, Duke University, North Carolina

“Ecology and Management of a Forested Landscape is a unique chronicle of the successful

ecological rehabilitation and restoration of a degraded, formerly agriculture-dominated system, starting with research and moving through adaptive natural resource manage- ment With a case-study approach containing applications and concepts extending beyond the southeastern United States, this book is invaluable to all ecologists—from the academic to the practicing land manager.”

—W Mark Ford, research wildlife biologist, USDA Forest Service, Northeastern Research Station, West Virginia

“The Savannah River Site is a priceless model of ecological recovery and restoration.

It provides hard evidence of how a mutually beneficial relationship between humankind and natural systems might develop This book’s clearly stated goals and objectives are admirably supported by data that cover large temporal and spatial spans.”

—John Cairns Jr., University Distinguished Professor of Environmental Biology Emeritus, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University

JOHN C KILGO is research wildlife biologist, USDA Forest Service, Southern

Research Station, Center for Forested Wetlands Research JOHN I BLAKE is assistant

manager of the research program with the USDA Forest Service, Savannah River.

FORESTS / ECOLOGICAL RESTORATION

Island Press is the only nonprofit organization in the United States whoseprincipal purpose is the publication of books on environmental issues andnatural resource management We provide solutions-oriented information

to professionals, public officials, business and community leaders, andconcerned citizens who are shaping responses to environmental problems

In 2005, Island Press celebrates its twenty-first anniversary as the leadingprovider of timely and practical books that take a multidisciplinary

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Support for Island Press is provided by the Agua Fund, The Geraldine R.Dodge Foundation, Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, Ford Foundation,The George Gund Foundation, The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation,Kendeda Sustainability Fund of the Tides Foundation, The Henry LuceFoundation, The John D and Catherine T MacArthur Foundation, TheAndrew W Mellon Foundation, The Curtis and Edith Munson Foundation,The New-Land Foundation, The New York Community Trust, Oak

Foundation, The Overbrook Foundation, The David and Lucile PackardFoundation, The Winslow Foundation, and other generous donors.The opinions expressed in this book are those of the author(s) and do notnecessarily reflect the views of these foundations

of a Forested Landscape

Copyright (c) 2005 Island Press

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright

Conventions No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by anymeans without permission in writing from the publisher: Island Press, 1718Connecticut Ave., Suite 300, NW, Washington, DC 20009

ISLAND PRESS is a trademark of The Center for Resource Economics

Copyright is claimed in the work of I Lehr Brisbin Jr., Kurt A Buhlmann,William D Carlisle, Michael B Caudell, Brent J Danielson, J Whitfield Gibbons,Judith L Greene, Nick M Haddad, Charles H Hunter Jr., Paul E Johns, Robert

A Kennamer, Yale Leiden, Barton C Marcy Jr., John J Mayer, Tony M Mills,William F Moore, Eric A Nelson, Sean Poppy, Travis J Ryan, David E Scott,Barbara E Taylor, Tracey D Tuberville, Lynn D Wike, Christopher T Winne, inthe foreword, and the index to the Island Press edition

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication data.

Ecology and management of a forested landscape : fifty years on the

Savannah River Site / edited by John C Kilgo and John I Blake ; foreword by

H Ronald Pulliam

p cm

Includes bibliographical references and index

ISBN 1-59726-010-X (cloth : alk paper) — ISBN 1-59726-011-8 (pbk : alk.paper)

1 Forest ecology—South Carolina—Savannah River Site 2 Restorationecology—South Carolina—Savannah River Site I Kilgo, John C ( JohnCarlisle), 1967– II Blake, John Irvin

QH105.S6E28 2005333.75′153′097577—dc222004025494

British Cataloguing-in-Publication data available.

Printed on recycled, acid-free paper

Design by Paul Hotvedt

Manufactured in the United States of America

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

List of Figures and Tables ix

Industrial Operations and Current Land Use 12

Chapter 2 The Physical Environment 19

Climate and Air Quality 20

Soils and Geology 30

Water Resources 41

Chapter 3 SRS Forest Management 57

Silviculture and Harvesting Activities 59

Prescribed Fire Management 75

Chapter 5 Threatened and Endangered Species 264

Smooth Purple Coneflower 266

Commercial Forest Products 328

Fishery of the Savannah River 338

Figure 1.3 Bottomland hardwood forests occurred on the floodplains oflarger streams and rivers 5

Figure 1.4 Pre-European vegetation types of the Savannah River Site.Color insert

Figure 1.5 Cut-over condition of much of the Savannah River Site at thetime of government acquisition 11

Figure 1.6 Land use on the Savannah River Site in 1951 Color insertFigure 1.7 Satellite image of the Savannah River Site and surroundingregion, March 1999 Color insert

Figure 1.8 Land-use areas of the Savannah River Site Color insertFigure 1.9 Aerial view of a developed area and surrounding forest on theSavannah River Site 14

Figure 1.10 Size of the workforce on the Savannah River Site, 1987–2003.16

Figure 2.1 Topographic relief on the Savannah River Site 32

Figure 2.2 Geological stratigraphy and groundwater systems of theSavannah River Site 34

Figure 2.3 General soil map of the Savannah River Site Color insertFigure 2.4 Major streams, wetlands, and larger lakes of the Savannah RiverSite 42

Figure 2.5 Relative mean monthly discharge for major streams on theSavannah River Site 48

Figure 2.6 During reactor operations, the high flow rates and temperatures

of reactor cooling water destroyed riparian vegetation in FourmileBranch, Pen Branch, and Steel Creek 51

Figure 2.7 Aerial view of Ellenton Bay, a large Carolina bay bisected by autility right-of-way 55

Figure 2.8 Hydroperiods for fifty-six Carolina bays on the Savannah RiverSite 56

Figure 3.1 Longleaf pine planted in an old field on the Savannah River Site,early 1950s 61

Figure 3.2 Net number of acres planted 1953–2003 or seeded successfully1960–1971 at the Savannah River Site for slash pine, loblolly pine,longleaf pine, and various hardwood species including cypress 62Figure 3.3 Longleaf pine planted in cutover scrub oak on the SavannahRiver Site, early 1950s 63

Figure 3.4 Changes in silviculture and harvesting practices on the

Savannah River Site 1952–2001 71

Figure 3.5 Number of wildfires and average area per fire 1954–2002 on theSavannah River Site 77

Figure 3.6 Trends in prescribed burning at the Savannah River Site,

Savannah River Site during reactor operations 90

Figure 3.10 Degraded wetland areas of the Pen Branch corridor and delta

on the Savannah River Site that were impacted by thermal releases fromreactors and later restored as part of the mitigation effort 91

Figure 3.11 Planting trees in the Pen Branch corridor on the SavannahRiver Site, 1993 92

Figure 3.12 A drainage ditch from a Carolina bay on the Savannah RiverSite 94

Figure 3.13 Aerial view of restored Carolina bays on the Savannah RiverSite 98

Figure 3.14 Distribution of remnant and degraded savanna plant

communities in relation to land-use and fire exclusion history, mappedfor potential savanna restoration on a representative section of theSavannah River Site 100

Figure 4.1 Forest land-use associations of the Savannah River Site Colorinsert

Figure 4.2 Potential vegetation types of the Savannah River Site Colorinsert

Figure 4.3 Pine savanna 115

Figure 4.4 Sandhill woodland 116

Figure 4.5 Forested Carolina bay 123

Figure 4.6 Herbaceous Carolina bay 126

Figure 4.7 Longleaf pine plantation, two to three years old, with developed shrub-scrub understory 128

well-Figure 4.8 Loblolly pine stand on an old-field site (“old-field pine”) 129Figure 4.9 Mature loblolly pine stand with some understory development.130

Figure 4.10 Mature slash pine stand with little understory but a hardwoodmidstory 130

Figure 4.11 Upland hardwood forest 131

Figure 4.12 Flooded swamp 142

Figure 4.13 Bottomland hardwood forest with herbaceous understory 149Figure 4.14 Bottomland hardwood forest with switchcane understory 150Figure 4.15 Old-field conditions typical of rights-of-way and other openareas 158

Figure 4.16 First-order (headwater) stream 189

Figure 4.17 Third-order stream 190

Figure 4.18 Terrestrial snakes associated with xeric upland habitats andmesic floodplain habitats on the Savannah River Site 212

Figure 4.19 Aquatic snakes associated with stream systems and Carolinabays on the Savannah River Site 213

Figure 4.20 Salamanders and frogs associated with Carolina bays on theSavannah River Site 214

Figure 4.21 Turtles associated with Carolina bay wetlands on the SavannahRiver Site 216

Figure 4.22 Locations of terrestrial refugia for wetland turtles in uplandssurrounding Dry Bay on the Savannah River Site during autumn-winter,1994–1997 Color insert

Figure 4.23 Abundance of strong- and weak-excavating cavity-nesting birds and total bird species richness on plots with all coarse woodydebris removed and with none removed on the Savannah River Site.230

Figure 4.24 Abundance, species richness, and diversity of birds in threesuccessional stages of bottomland hardwood forest on the SavannahRiver Site 234

Figure 4.25 Probabilities of occurrence of four area-sensitive birds inbottomland hardwood forests of various widths on the Savannah RiverSite 236

Figure 4.26 Number of shrub-successional bird species and total number ofbird species in clear-cuts of various sizes on the Savannah River Site 237Figure 4.27 Densities of Bachman’s sparrows in clear-cuts isolated byvarious distances from areas with source populations on the SavannahRiver Site 238

Figure 4.28 Number of small mammals captured in longleaf pine stands ofvarious ages on the Savannah River Site 257

Figure 4.29 Number of cotton mice captured on plots where tornadodamage created a pulse of dead wood in 1989 on the Savannah RiverSite 261

Figure 4.30 Diversity and species richness of small mammals in three sizes

of clear-cuts on the Savannah River Site 262

Figure 5.1 Locations of smooth purple coneflower populations on theSavannah River Site 269

Figure 5.2 The response of individual smooth purple coneflower plants toburning and cutting treatments at the Burma Road population area,Savannah River Site 271

Figure 5.3 Flowering patterns of smooth purple coneflower followingburning and cutting treatments at the Burma Road population area,Savannah River Site 271

Figure 5.4 Potential shortnose sturgeon spawning habitat in the SavannahRiver adjacent to the Savannah River Site 284

Figure 5.5 Population growth of American alligators in Par Pond on theSavannah River Site, 1972–1988 287

Figure 5.6 Seasonal use of the Savannah River swamp system by woodstorks, 1983–2002 290

Figure 5.7 Average numbers of wood storks observed per aerial survey ofthe Savannah River swamp system, 1983–2002 293

Figure 5.8 Locations of bald eagle nest sites and management areas on theSavannah River Site 296

Figure 5.9 Number of groups and size of post-breeding-season population

of red-cockaded woodpeckers on the Savannah River Site, 1975–2003.304

Figure 5.10 Location of active and inactive red-cockaded woodpeckergroups and recruitment stands within habitat management areas during

2001 on the Savannah River Site 306

Figure 5.11 Artificial cavity inserts, developed at SRS, have become a criticaltool in red-cockaded woodpecker recovery efforts rangewide 307Figure 5.12 A red-cockaded woodpecker cavity tree with an encroachingmidstory below 308

Figure 6.1 Volume of wood in softwoods and hardwoods sold on theSavannah River Site, 1955–2003 335

Figure 6.2 Total value of wood sold for all species on the Savannah RiverSite, 1955–2000, and the average unit price of the wood sold duringeach year 336

Figure 6.3 Habitats used by waterfowl and locations of nest boxes forbreeding wood ducks and hooded mergansers on the Savannah RiverSite 351

Figure 6.4 Population parameter estimates for female wood ducks usingnest boxes on the Savannah River Site, 1979–1995 354

Figure 6.5 Maximum numbers of ring-necked ducks, lesser scaup,

buffleheads, and ruddy ducks observed per year during aerial surveys ofPar Pond and L Lake on the Savannah River Site, 1982–2003 358Figure 6.6 Hunter recovery locations in the eastern United States of 594ring-necked ducks originally banded on the Savannah River Site,1985–2002 359

Figure 6.7 Wild turkey observations recorded during South CarolinaDepartment of Natural Resources summer brood surveys 1974–2003 onthe Savannah River Site 363

Figure 6.8 Number of Virginia opossum, raccoon, and striped skunkcaptured per year during the Small Furbearer Survey, Savannah RiverSite, 1954–1982 367

Figure 6.9 Number of red fox, gray fox, and bobcat captured per year duringthe Small Furbearer Survey, Savannah River Site, 1954–1982 370Figure 6.10 Expansion of wild hog distribution on the Savannah River Site.375

Figure 6.11 Estimated size of the deer population and number of deerharvested on the Savannah River Site, 1965–2003 383

Figure 6.12 Relationship between the number of deer-vehicle accidentsand (a) the estimated size of the deer population and (b) the size of theworkforce on the Savannah River Site 387

Tables

Table 2.1 Mean monthly rainfall and extremes for the 773-A area at theSavannah River Site for the period 1952–2001 22

Table 2.2 Predicted extreme precipitation recurrence estimates by

accumulation period and observed extreme total precipitation

received in the Savannah River Site region, August 1948–December

1995 23

Table 2.3 Ranges for monthly mean, monthly high, and monthly lowtemperature and monthly mean, maximum, and minimum relativehumidity, 1964–2001, from A Area at the Savannah River Site 24Table 2.4 Historical average pan evaporation at the Edisto ExperimentStation, Blackville, South Carolina, 1963–1992 25

Table 2.5 Monthly occurrences of tornadoes, hurricanes, thunderstorms,and snow or ice in the Savannah River Site region 27

Table 2.6 Chemical characteristics of selected upland soils, by depth, onthe Savannah River Site 40

Table 2.7 Hydrologic characteristics of major streams on the SavannahRiver Site 46

Table 2.8 Chemical characteristics of major streams on the Savannah River Site 49

Table 3.1 Acreage treated by various silvicultural practices at the SavannahRiver Site 1952–2001 65

Table 3.2 Pre- and postburn fuel loading and total fuel reduction 80Table 3.3 Observed annual mean twenty-four-hour PM10values from threecounties near the Savannah River Site 84

Table 3.4 General ecological impacts from post-European settlement in theCentral Savannah River Area and strategies for ecological restoration 86Table 3.5 Species richness for taxa in Pen Branch compared with disturbedpost-thermal and late-successional forested reference sites at theSavannah River Site 93

Table 3.6 Level of disturbance to surface hydrology by drainage ditches inisolated depression wetlands at the Savannah River Site in 2002 95Table 3.7 Effects of burning, harvesting, and harvesting plus burning onthe average herbaceous species richness and percent wetland speciesoccurring in Bay 93 on the Savannah River Site before and after closingthe drainage ditch in 1994 96

Table 3.8 Savanna grasses, composites, and legumes selected for

experimental introduction to old-field pine sites at the Savannah RiverSite to establish founder populations 101

Table 4.1 Extent of forest cover types on the Savannah River Site 111Table 4.2 Extent of vegetation types on the Savannah River Site 114Table 4.3 Percent basal area for species associated with sandhill woodlandand remnant pine savanna communities on the Savannah River Site.118

Table 4.4 Percent basal area for species associated with Carolina bay forestsand savanna communities on the Savannah River Site 124

Table 4.5 Percent basal area for species associated with upland oak-pinewoodland and pine-hardwood forest communities on the SavannahRiver Site 134

Table 4.6 Percent basal area for species associated with upland slope andhardwood communities on the Savannah River Site 138

Table 4.7 Percent basal area for species associated with swamp

communities on the Savannah River Site 144

Table 4.8 Percent basal area for species associated with river and largestream bottom habitats on the Savannah River Site 146

Table 4.9 Percent basal area for species associated with stream bottomcommunities on the Savannah River Site 152

Table 4.10 Habitats of aquatic insects on the Savannah River Site 162Table 4.11 Habitats of aquatic arthropods on the Savannah River Site 165Table 4.12 Habitats of other aquatic invertebrates on the Savannah RiverSite 166

Table 4.13 Conservation status of aquatic invertebrates of the SavannahRiver Site 172

Table 4.14 Butterfly species of the Savannah River Site, organized byfamily, with month and habitat of occurrence 176

Table 4.15 Number of butterfly species on the Savannah River Site, byfamily 183

Table 4.16 Fish species confirmed at the Savannah River Site 185

Table 4.17 Relative density of fish in streams recovering from thermalimpacts and in undisturbed streams on the Savannah River Site 193Table 4.18 Percent composition of fishes from Par Pond on the SavannahRiver Site, 1969–1980 199

Table 4.19 Number of fish (and percent composition) captured in twostudies of Carolina bays and isolated depression wetlands on theSavannah River Site 201

Table 4.20 Habitat characterizations and rarity rankings of amphibians andreptiles of the Savannah River Site 205

Table 4.21 A typology of species rankings for amphibians and reptiles onthe Savannah River Site based on geographic range, habitat specificity,and local population size 210

Table 4.22 Bird-habitat matrix for the Savannah River Site, South Carolina.240

Table 4.23 Typical avian communities associated with six commonhabitats on the Savannah River Site 228

Table 4.24 Taxonomic listing and conservation status of the mammals ofthe Savannah River Site 254

Table 4.25 Primary habitats of nongame mammals of the Savannah RiverSite 258

Table 4.26 Levels of foraging bat activity over nine habitats on the

Savannah River Site 260

Table 5.1 Number of ramets for three smooth purple coneflower

populations on the Savannah River Site, 1988–2003 270

Table 5.2 Sensitive plants occurring on the Savannah River Site, with theirglobal and state ranking and number of populations for each species in

1990, 1995, and 2000 276

Table 5.3 The Nature Conservancy and South Carolina Department ofNatural Resources rarity and vulnerability rankings used on the

Savannah River Site 278

Table 5.4 Estimated population size and sex ratios of American alligators inPar Pond on the Savannah River Site 1972–1974 and 1986–1988 286Table 5.5 Wood stork use of the Savannah River swamp system,

Table 5.8 Acreage receiving midstory control and prescribed burning forred-cockaded woodpecker management on the Savannah River Site,1990–2003 309

Table 5.9 Number of red-cockaded woodpeckers translocated to the

310Table 5.10 Number of southern flying squirrels removed from red-

Table 6.4 Estimated total number of trees by species and diameter class onthe forested land area on the 2001 Savannah River Site in 1992 333Table 6.5 Comparative volume, value, and revenue sold from selectedclear-cut or regeneration sales versus thinning or partial-cut sales1987–1996 on the Savannah River Site 336

Table 6.6 Area raked, total sales revenue, and unit value per acre for pinestraw harvest at the Savannah River Site, 1991–2000 337

Table 6.7 Estimate of percentage of fish species harvested from NewSavannah Bluff Lock and Dam on the Savannah River during the 1999access creel census 340

Table 6.8 Christmas Bird Count data for small game birds at the SavannahRiver Site, 1979–2002 342

Table 6.9 Small game harvest at Crackerneck Wildlife Management Areaand Ecological Reserve, Savannah River Site, 1984–2003 344

Table 6.10 Locations on the Savannah River Site where waterfowl andother selected aquatic birds have been observed, 1952–1997 349Table 6.11 Number of wild turkeys trapped on the Savannah River Site bythe South Carolina Department of Natural Resources for off-site

restocking programs, 1978–2000 361

Table 6.12 Wild turkey harvest data recorded on Crackerneck WildlifeManagement Area and Ecological Reserve, 1983–2003 362

Table 6.13 Causes of mortality among 132 radio-instrumented wild turkeys

on the Savannah River Site and the Crackerneck Wildlife ManagementArea and Ecological Reserve, 1998–2001 363

Table 6.14 Annual number of beaver trapped on the Savannah River Site,1983–2003 369

Table 6.15 Number of wild hogs removed annually from the SavannahRiver Site, 1965–2003 377

Savannah River Site, 1986–2000

cockaded woodpecker cavities on the Savannah River Site, 1986–2003

In 1539, Hernando de Soto and his band of six hundred soldiers, gold ers, and Indian guides set out to explore the interior of what is now thesoutheastern United States De Soto and his men traveled north and eastfrom Florida and across the upper coastal plain of Georgia before cross-ing the middle Savannah River into South Carolina Although their exactroute is unknown, they would have passed through a heavily forestedlandscape, perhaps following Indian trails and sticking, as much as pos-sible, to the open, sandhill scrub forest and longleaf pine–dominated up-lands, avoiding the more difficult terrain of the tupelo-cypress swampsand bay forests of the bottomland floodplains.

seek-Though no doubt grand by modern-day standards and magnificent tobehold, the forests encountered by De Soto had already been modifiedfor centuries by Indians seeking to improve their hunting grounds andincrease the abundance of edible berries and other wild foods But thechanges wrought by Native Americans were relatively minor compared

to what was to come Four hundred years after De Soto’s travels, the lands of the upper coastal plain had been almost entirely cleared for in-tensive agriculture, and even much of the swampy lowlands had beendrained and cleared These dry, infertile lands provided a farmer littleyield and a difficult life, however, so by the mid-twentieth century, manyfarmers had left, leaving the patchwork of abandoned farms and second-growth forests still seen throughout most of the upper coastal plain today.Can land degraded by centuries of poor agricultural practices be re-stored to something approaching its original productivity and diversity?This book tells the remarkable story of fifty years of natural resource man-agement and restoration of the forested landscape of the Savannah RiverSite (SRS) In 1950, the Atomic Energy Commission began purchasingland and relocating thousands of descendants of the original Europeansettlers who had cleared the land and tried to eek out a living from it

up-xvii

Shortly afterward, researchers from the Universities of Georgia and SouthCarolina and the Philadelphia Academy of Sciences were invited to work

on the site, and the USDA Forest Service began an aggressive program toreplant and restore the forests As a result of these efforts, the SavannahRiver Site is one of the best-studied ecological research sites in NorthAmerica, and an amazing diversity of native flora and fauna exist in whatwas once corn and cotton fields, pastures, and degraded and poorly man-aged forests

Editors John Kilgo and John Blake have assembled a talented group ofauthors, all of whom are intimately familiar with the subject matter oftheir chapters Some authors are university faculty who for years havetraveled back and forth from schools across the country to work at theSavannah River Site because of the unique research environment the siteoffers Others are permanent residents working on site at Westinghouse,the U.S Forest Service, or the University of Georgia’s Savannah RiverEcology Laboratory Their collective knowledge of the history, ecology,and management of the Savannah River Site is itself a unique resource,and this book serves to make their knowledge and experience available

to others

Today, most of the original forest traversed by De Soto is gone In

1989, in “Longleaf pine and wiregrass: Keystone components of an

en-dangered ecosystem” (Nat Areas J 9:211–213), Reed F Noss estimated

that less than 30 percent of bottomland and riparian forests and only 14percent of longleaf forests remain in the Southeast and only 3 percent

of longleaf habitat survives as old growth Some of the unique species ofthe southeastern forests (e.g., Carolina parakeet, ivory-billed woodpecker,and Bachman’s warbler) are gone forever, but—though many of the re-maining species are threatened or endangered—much of the original di-versity of the region has survived Our ability to ensure the long-termviability of the region’s biological diversity depends on three criticalsteps: (1) inventorying the existing diversity of native species, (2) deter-mining the habitat requirements of the threatened species, and (3) restor-ing habitats and managing them to provide for the habitat requirements

of native flora and fauna

In summarizing fifty years of research into the biotic communities andnative species of the Savannah River Site, this book provides a compre-hensive overview of the forest management practices that can supportlong-term forest recovery and restoration of native habitats The success ofthe management efforts at SRS is attested to by the 103 species of reptilesand amphibians, 87 fish species, 69 species of dragonflies and damselflies,

99 species of butterflies, 64 rotifer species, and literally thousands of otherspecies that still exist there Not only the presence of species but also theirhabitat requirements have been documented in detail, even for often ig-nored groups such as aquatic invertebrates As a result of reintroducing orregenerating appropriate native species, restoring natural hydrologicalcycles in the lowlands and regular burning in the uplands, controllingnon-native invasive species, and carefully regulating hunting and fish-ing, the native flora and fauna of the Savannah River Site is flourishing.Our ability to preserve the native biological diversity of the south-eastern United States, or any other region of the world, over the nextthousand, or even hundred, years is still uncertain There are those whofeel we have done too little too late, and the loss of habitat and poormanagement practices of the past combined with our ignorance andgreed in the future will inevitably lead to massive losses of biological di-versity This book stands as a counterargument to that bleak and gloomyview of the future and provides a concrete example of the role that goodscience combined with good management can play in ensuring that ourdescendants will be able to enjoy the splendors of nature that have de-lighted our own generation.

H Ronald Pulliam

Regents Professor of Ecology

University of Georgia

August 12, 2004

In 1950, the United States Department of Energy (then the U.S AtomicEnergy Commission) began purchasing the land that became the presentSavannah River Site (SRS) All residents were removed (figure A), and in

1951 the government closed the site to the public to begin work on duction of nuclear weapons materials At the time, abandoned agricul-tural fields dominated upland areas, and the SRS and the USDA ForestService initiated an aggressive reforestation program Concurrently, theprimary site contractor at the time, E.I DuPont de Nemours Co., sub-contracted researchers from the University of South Carolina, thePhiladelphia Academy of Sciences, and the University of Georgia (whichwould eventually establish the Savannah River Ecology Laboratory) toinitiate baseline ecological surveys of the site Since that time, researchersfrom those organizations and many others have intensively studied andmonitored the natural resources of the SRS The initial inventory of thefauna and flora established both a baseline for future comparison and aphilosophy of stewardship for resources that persists today Althoughmanagement objectives have changed, the SRS goal for stewardship hasremained focused upon innovative leadership in resource managementthrough sound scientific and technical strategies In 1972, the Depart-ment of Energy designated the SRS as the nation’s first National Envi-ronmental Research Park, a place where the effects of human impacts onthe environment could be studied The SRS has provided excellent op-portunities for research within that concept The comprehensive natureand scope of information on the ecology of the site and its resources isunparalleled

pro-The SRS has made this information available to the public through merous professional journals, reports, and publications by the SavannahRiver Ecology Laboratory, the Savannah River Technology Center, theSouth Carolina Archeology Research Program, the U.S Forest Service,

nu-xx

cooperating universities, and other agencies The SRS has periodicallypublished overviews of the natural resources in various formats How-ever, no publication has integrated information on ecology, natural re-sources, and management practices, and various public groups haveexpressed a desire to obtain that relevant scientific and technical infor-mation about the site in a single document.

This book tells the story of the fifty-year period after human residentsmoved from that 310-square-mile tract of land in the South Carolinacoastal plain Human impact has continued, to be sure The SRS work-force approached twenty-five thousand at its peak in 1991 Nuclear re-actors and related facilities have been constructed, as well as several largecooling reservoirs, and environmental contamination has occurred (thereare sites on SRS designated under the provisions of the Resource Conser-vation and Recovery Act and the Comprehensive Environmental Re-sponse, Compensation, and Liability Act) These impacts have generallybeen localized within the site, however; industrial development (not in-cluding rights-of-way and reservoirs) constitutes less than 3 percent ofthe site’s area, and surface contamination exists in only 0.6 percent of thearea The SRS manages its forests on a far longer rotation length thanmost managed lands in the Southeast Thus, the vast majority of the landarea of SRS has suffered relatively minimal human impact in the past fiftyyears We hope that this book will provide its readers with a better un-derstanding of the plant and animal populations and communities pres-ent on the SRS and the effect on them of fifty years of land management

by the Department of Energy

Figure A At the time of

government acquisition, all towns and buildings were removed or demolished (J Kilgo)

This work was supported by the U.S Department of Energy–SavannahRiver Operations Office through the U.S Forest Service–Savannah River(USFS-SR) under Interagency Agreement No DE-AI09-00SR22188, whichalso supported authors from USFS-SR Authors from the Savannah RiverEcology Laboratory (SREL) were supported by the Environmental Reme-diation Sciences Division of the Office of Biological and EnvironmentalResearch, U.S Department of Energy, through Financial Assistance Award

No DE-FC09-96SR18546 to the University of Georgia Research dation Authors from Westinghouse Savannah River Company weresupported by the U.S Department of Energy under contract DE-AC09-96SR18500 Authors from the U.S Forest Service Southern Research Sta-tion (USFS-SRS) were supported by that agency

Foun-Many individuals generously contributed their time, efforts, and ideas

to make this book possible Elizabeth LeMaster, formerly of USFS-SR, wasinstrumental in the original conception of the book Special thanks areoffered to Dumitru Salajanu and Andrew Thompson (USFS-SR) for creatingmost of the maps used herein, to David Scott for providing many of thephotographs, and to Kim Hale for support in putting it all together Don-ald Von Blaricom (Strom Thurmond Institute, Clemson University, SouthCarolina) provided figure 1.3 and associated image analysis Deno Kara-patakis (SREL) provided figure 1.4 Dean Fletcher (SREL) provided the list

of SRS fishes in chapter 4 Kay Franzreb and Chuck Daschelet (USFS-SRS)collected much of the unpublished red-cockaded woodpecker data inchapter 5 The late Tom Lloyd provided invaluable assistance with theforest inventory data in chapter 6 Finally, we wish to thank the multi-tude of land management professionals, from many organizations,whose diligent work during the past fifty years has resulted in the uniqueresource that is the Savannah River Site

xxii

The Savannah River Site,

Past and Present

Land-Use History

David L White

Industrial Operations and Current Land Use

John I Blake, John J Mayer, and John C Kilgo

The land area now owned by the U.S Department of Energy and known asthe Savannah River Site (SRS) has been occupied by humans for about11,500 years In the section titled “Land-Use History,” David White describesthe vegetation of the area prior to European settlement and then provides abrief overview of the area’s long and varied history, with an emphasis on theimpacts of humans upon the landscape Native Americans influenced thelandscape through their use of fire and agriculture Around 1700, SavannahTown was established as the first European settlement in inland South Car-olina, approximately 20 km north of the present SRS Although residentsgrazed cattle and hogs in the woodlands and began to affect native wildlifepopulations, agriculture was not well established until the late 1700s, afterwhich, land clearing increased dramatically Timber and cotton became thedominant products of the area By 1950, when the government acquired theland, much of the site had been cut repeatedly and most of the uplands were

in agricultural fields or bare ground The SRS contracted the U.S Forest ice to reforest the site in 1951 Today, the SRS is almost completely forested

Serv-1

1

and contrasts greatly with the surrounding landscape, which is dominated

by agriculture and suburban development (The material in this section wascondensed and summarized from White and Gaines, 2000.)

In “Industrial Operations and Current Land Use,” John Blake et al first line in general terms the primary missions, activities, and infrastructure ofSRS They then describe the land-use zones, including habitat managementareas for the endangered red-cockaded woodpecker (a primary habitat man-agement area, a supplemental habitat management area, and an other-usearea), the Crackerneck Wildlife Management Area and Ecological Reserve(managed cooperatively by the South Carolina Department of Natural Re-sources), and the research set-aside areas Collectively, these areas form theframework within which SRS land management is conducted

out-Land-Use History

David L White

Creation of the 80,267-ha (198,344-ac or 310-mi2) Savannah River Site(SRS) by the U.S Department of Energy (DOE, formerly the Atomic En-ergy Commission, AEC) in 1951 set the stage for a dramatic change inland use Construction of nuclear production facilities and the refor-estation of abandoned farmland and cutover forests affected SRS ecosys-tems in profound ways The construction and operation of nuclearfacilities from 1953 to 1988 directly impacted about 4,000 ha (9,884 ac)

of land, created almost 2,000 ha (4,942 ac) of cooling reservoirs, and leased thermal effluent in all but one major SRS stream (Upper ThreeRuns) Nuclear facilities now on the site include five deactivated reactors,

re-as well re-as facilities for nuclear materials processing, tritium extractionand purification, waste management, solid waste disposal, and powerplants for steam generation and production of electric power (Noah1995) This section describes the land that became the SRS and the his-torical uses of that land, focusing on agricultural and natural resourceuses of the area

The SRS is located on the Upper Coastal Plain and Sandhills graphic provinces, 30 km south of the Piedmont Plateau (figure 1.1) It issouth of Aiken, South Carolina, and includes portions of Aiken, Barnwell,and Allendale Counties Kolka et al describe the soils and physiography

physio-of the SRS in chapter 2

Pre-European Settlement Vegetation

For the past ten thousand years, oak and pine forests have dominated theSRS area Pine species probably have dominated the uplands of the area forthe past four to five thousand years (Watts 1971, 1980; Delcourt and Del-court 1987) Views of pre- or early-settlement forests in the Central Sa-vannah River Area (CSRA) and adjacent regions from the 1700 and 1800shelp characterize the distribution of plant communities in the region (Von

Figure 1.1 Streams and physiography of the Savannah River Site.

Reck 1733; Michaux 1805; Mills 1826; Lieber 1860; Sargent 1884; Cordle1939; Bartram 1942; Bartram 1958; Lawson 1967; Drayton 1996) Gen-erally, longleaf pine dominated the uplands (figure 1.2), while hard-woods, ranging from oak-hickory to cypress-tupelo forests, dominatedthe “clay land,” terraces, and flood plains (figure 1.3) Canebrakes in ad-jacent regions (Logan 1858; Lawson 1967) and the existence of remnantpatches within the SRS suggest that these communities were common.Frost (1997) described composition and distribution of eleven presettle-ment vegetation types (figure 1.4, in color insert) He defined communitytypes from soils, historical data, and remnant vegetation Longleaf pinewas dominant on 63 percent of SRS forests (80 percent of non-wetlandareas) Swamps, bottomland, and bay forests occupied 22 percent of thesite Estimates of fire-return intervals ranged from one to three years onthe Aiken Plateau to seven to twelve years on more fire-sheltered sites.

Land Use before 1950

The SRS area was used extensively by people prior to the establishment

of the Site in 1951 I consider three broad time periods prior to 1951: European settlement, settlement to 1865, and 1865–1950

pre-Figure 1.2 Pine savannas probably dominated most of the uplands in the area prior

to European settlement (J Kilgo)

Pre-European Settlement

Aboriginal people entered the SRS area about 11,500 years before thepresent (BP), though early use was sporadic and transient and probablyconcentrated along bottomlands and terraces adjacent to streams (Sas-saman et al 1990; Sassaman 1993) Sustained seasonal habitation of thearea began between 9,800 and 8,000 years BP, with winter residentialbases along the first terrace of the Savannah River near the mouths ofmajor tributaries Although use of the region may have declined between8,000 and 6,000 years BP with a warming and drying climate, aborigi-nal populations began to increase again around 6,000 years BP By 3,000years BP, hunting parties used the Aiken Plateau at least seasonally (Sas-saman 1993), and between 3,000 and 2,500 years BP, occupation of theAiken Plateau became more intensive and perennial Population densityapparently fluctuated until the mid-1400s, when a significant portion ofthe aboriginal population is thought to have abandoned the CSRA, prob-ably as a result of political actions of chiefdoms outside the immediatearea (Sassaman et al 1990; Anderson 1994) A severe drought in the mid-1400s also may have affected the distribution of aboriginal populations(Stahle and Cleaveland 1992; Anderson 1994) When Hernando de Sotopassed through the middle Savannah River valley in 1541, he found no

Figure 1.3 Bottomland hardwood forests occurred on the floodplains of larger

streams and rivers (J Kilgo)

people in five days of travel from present-day Greensboro, Georgia, to theSavannah River and beyond, further supporting the contention that sig-nificant aboriginal populations were absent in the CSRA during the twocenturies preceding European settlement.

Native Americans had significant impacts on the southeastern scape through their use of fire and agriculture They used fire extensivelyfor hunting and land clearing, although the extent of its historical use atthe SRS is not known In contrast to fires ignited by lightning strikes,which are most frequent during the spring and summer, Native Ameri-cans set fires during the fall, winter, and spring Alteration of fire seasonand frequency, especially on the more mesic part of the landscape, mayrepresent the largest-scale impact on the landscape by Native Americans

land-in the region (White 2004)

Native American agriculture apparently did not begin in the CSRAuntil approximately 800 years BP (Sassaman et al 1990), later than else-where in the Southeast, and its extent is not known Areas along streamswere used most extensively, corn, beans, and squash being the maincrops Land clearing involved various ways of killing trees followed byburning Native Americans practiced field rotation but not crop rotation.Generally, aboriginal agricultural techniques were much less erosive anddamaging to the soil than those associated with Europeans after settle-ment (Herndon 1967; Trimble 1974)

The population declines during the 1400s and 1500s probably had asignificant impact on fire dynamics, the area cleared for cultivation, andthe level of hunting pressure, but the degree of impact is not known.Thus, the CSRA landscape first described by explorers and settlers in thelate 1600s resulted from a combination of natural disturbance patternsand, to a lesser extent, those brought about by Native Americans

Settlement to 1865

Savannah Town, 20 km (13 mi) northwest of the current SRS boundaryand just south of Augusta, Georgia, became the first inland settlement inSouth Carolina around 1700 and served as an important trading post.Whether the proximity to Savannah Town directly affected the SRS area

is not known The earliest land plats on the present-day SRS date fromthe 1730s (Brooks and Crass 1991), but settlement of the area did notoccur until the 1760s (Brooks 1988) Woodland cattle grazing probablyoccurred in the SRS between the 1730s and the 1760s, but the dates andextent are not known (Brown 1894; Meriwether 1940; Brooks 1988) The

predominant land use before 1780 was woodland cattle grazing and tered small-scale farming Crop cultivation and timber cutting prior to

scat-1780 was limited and occurred primarily along streams and terraces(Brown 1894) Planters grew rice and indigo to an unknown extent.Cowpens were common in the SRS area in the 1700s (Brown 1894;Bartram 1942) They were mostly 40 to 160-ha (100–395-ac) cleared areaswith enclosures for cattle, horses, and hogs and buildings for the cowpenkeepers (Dunbar 1961) Cattle also grazed the uncleared upland forests,bays, and bottomlands along streams They used savannas in summerand cane swamps in winter The widespread abundance of cattle likelyimpacted native grazers, cane and other forage plants (see the appendixfor scientific names of plants), and soil erosion and water quality alongstreams and near cowpens Hogs were abundant in the region (Schoepf1911; Frost 1993), but their abundance in the CSRA was not documenteduntil 1825 (Mills 1826) Cattle and hog abundance peaked in 1850 Hogsdirectly impacted the regeneration and survival of longleaf pine (Schoepf1911) and competed with species that were dependent on hardwood mast.Several local (Mills 1826; Brown 1894) and regional (Ashe 1682; VonReck 1733; Logan 1858; Chapman 1897; Bartram 1958; Lawson 1967) ref-

erences cite an abundance of gray (Canis lupus) and red wolves (Canis

rufus), panthers (cougar, Felis concolor), and “wild cats” (bobcat, Lynx rufus), as well as game species, notably white-tailed deer (Odocoileus vir- ginianus) and wild turkey (Meleagris gallopavo) Bison (Bison bison) were

also probably abundant based on their numbers above (Logan 1858) andbelow (Von Reck 1733) the SRS Tarleton Brown (1894), who lived nearthe SRS in 1769 and later along Lower Three Runs, and Mills (1826) de-scribe the abundance of certain predator and game species and the con-stant effort to eliminate the former Logan (1858) characterized thedynamic relationship between the decline of the native fauna, theprocess of settlement, and the extensive peltry trade with Native Ameri-cans in the South Carolina upcountry (Piedmont) Much of this infor-mation is relevant to the SRS area South Carolina passed laws to control

or eliminate predators from 1695 to 1786 (Heaton 1972) Bison and thelarge predators were the first species eliminated, largely before 1800

White-tailed deer, black bear (Ursus americanus), beaver (Castor

canaden-sis), and other species were reduced dramatically before 1800; other

species such as the raccoon (Procyon lotor), opossum (Didelphis virginiana), muskrat (Ondatra zibethicus), and squirrel (Sciurus spp.) suffered declines throughout the 1800s By 1900, the Carolina parakeet (Conuropsis caroli-

nensis) and the passenger pigeon (Ectopistes migratorius) were extinct or

near extinction (Salley 1911), as was the ivory-billed woodpecker

(Campephilus principalis), though due to habitat destruction as opposed

to direct harvest

Establishment of grain and sawmills on SRS streams increased in thelate 1700s From 1780 to 1865, there was a dramatic increase in cottonfarming, and by 1825 cotton and lumber were the primary staples in theCSRA From 1825 to 1860, the amount of improved land (defined in the

1850 census as “only such as produces crops, or in some manner adds

to the productions of the farmer”) increased from 4 percent to 31 percent

of the total, so that in 1860, about 70 percent of the land on farms waswoodland

Though many swamps, bays, and creek bottoms of the Upper CoastalPlain were cleared, drained, and cultivated between 1845 and 1860(Hammond 1883), SRS swamp forests along the Savannah River in the1840s were relatively intact, with only patchy human disturbance (Ruf-fin 1992) However, timber and fuelwood harvests in the upland forestswere substantial before 1865 Sawmills were abundant on SRS streams(Brooks and Crass 1991; Ruffin 1992) Lumbermen released floodgates onSRS streams to facilitate transport of rafts of lumber to Savannah The

1840 census indicates that forests within the Barnwell district were usedmore than those in surrounding counties, or in many areas of the south-eastern United States Demands on forests included the 1833 construc-tion and operation of the Charleston to Hamburg (North Augusta)Railroad, Savannah River steamboats, and domestic fuelwood use

Approximately 30 percent and 45 percent of Aiken and BarnwellCounties, respectively, was improved land (mostly cultivated) during

most of the period from 1900 to 1950, with cotton and corn productionaccounting for the majority of cultivated land “Shifting agriculture,” theabandonment of “worn out” land for “new” land, prevailed in the nine-teenth and twentieth centuries The abandoned land eventually reverted

to forest As a result, estimates of land under cultivation at any time mask

or underrepresent the cumulative impacts of cultivation on the landscape.During this period, most of the SRS consisted of relatively small, dis-persed farms, largely related to the increase in tenant farming after 1865.Tenancy peaked in 1925, and erosional land use increased with tenancy(Trimble 1974) Mechanization of southern agriculture did not occuruntil the 1930s and came even later to most of the farms of the SRS(Cabak and Inkrot 1996) While soil erosion increased after 1870, it wasprobably not extensive until after 1900 However, based on local soil de-scriptions for the SRS area (Carter et al 1914; H H Bennett 1928; Rogers1990), severe erosion was not common, and even moderate erosion wasnot extensive Drainage and cultivation of upland depressions and bays

in Barnwell County were uncommon before 1912 (Carter et al 1914) butincreased rapidly after 1930 An estimated two thirds of depression wet-lands on the SRS ultimately were drained, primarily for agricultural pur-poses (see chapter 3)

Agricultural chemical use in the SRS area increased significantly in thelate 1800s with the dramatic increase in fertilizer use (South Carolina De-partment of Agriculture, Commerce and Industries and Clemson College1927) With the arrival of the boll weevil in South Carolina in 1917,farmers initiated applications of calcium arsenate, and by the 1930s mostCSRA farmers were “mopping” cotton crops with calcium arsenate, water,and molasses (Brunson 1930; South Carolina Extension Service 1940,1946; A Barker, Allendale, S C., pers comm.) This mixture was the pre-dominant pesticide used in the area until the late 1940s, when farmersbegan using DDT and other organic pesticides for a variety of cotton pests(Boylston, Nettles, and Sparks 1948; South Carolina Extension Service1951)

Forest use, in the form of land clearing, logging, and turpentining, creased dramatically between 1865 and 1950 U.S Census records andother records (Frothingham and Nelson 1944) suggest that naval storesproduction peaked in CSRA counties between 1880 and 1890 after thestatewide peak in 1879 Statewide production fell sharply after 1890 butincreased again after 1920

in-Longleaf pine was still quite prevalent in CSRA forests in the 1880s(Anonymous 1867; Hammond 1883), and loggers did not cut much of

the river swamp until about 1900 (Fetters 1990) Between 1910 and theearly 1930s, extensive railroad logging occurred within the SRS At leastnine companies logged the SRS with at least 22 km (14 mi) of rail linealong the swamp, 40 km (25 mi) along Upper Three Runs, and unknownamounts along other streams Between 1880 and 1925, the area of wood-land on farms decreased from 65 percent to 33 percent By 1938, logginghad impacted 70 percent of the Savannah River swamp with additionaloperations occurring between 1938 and 1950 (Mackey and Irwin 1994).

In the late 1940s, sawtimber and pulpwood harvests throughout Aikenand Barnwell Counties were extensive (McCormack 1948)

Other significant drains on forest resources included harvests for ing, fuelwood, and the railroads Use of the yellow pines and otherspecies as fuelwood continued until the 1890s, but nationally and re-gionally the railroads’ impact peaked in the 1880s Initial clearing forconstruction alone yielded an estimated 3 to 12 ha of cleared line perkilometer of rail (11–48 ac per mile; derived from Derrick 1930) Withinthe SRS, rail lines were built after the Civil War The railroads brought in-creased use of longleaf pine and swamp forests, creating new land forcrops and eventually creating settlements and towns, from which manyagricultural and timber products flowed

fenc-The rather rapid decline of longleaf pine during the late nineteenthand early twentieth centuries resulted from a combination of factors, in-cluding hogs, destructive wildfires, and naval stores activities (Ashe1894) Hog saturation densities in Barnwell County were high enoughbetween 1840 and 1900 to severely impact longleaf pine establishment(Frost 1993) A decline in fire frequency after 1880, related to passage ofstock laws, further impacted establishment of longleaf pine After 1880,pressures on the land from agriculture and wood use, coupled with firesuppression efforts of the 1930s, drastically reduced the once extensivelongleaf pine forests in the SRS and throughout the rest of the South

Land Condition in 1951 and 2001

After the Atomic Energy Commission acquired the SRS in 1951, it thorized the U.S Forest Service to manage most of the land and to act

au-as consultant to the AEC and the DuPont Company, the project tractor (Savannah River Operations Office 1959) Much of the site hadbeen cut repeatedly, and the timber was of little value (figure 1.5) A 1951forest inventory conducted for a real estate appraisal classified about48,724 ha (120,400 ac) as forest land, including 25,643 ha (63,365 ac) as

con-pine, 10,296 ha (25,443 ac) as hardwood, 11,021 ha (27,233 ac) as swamp,and 1,764 ha (4,358 ac) as plantation (U.S Army Corps of Engineers1951) The remaining 32,265 ha (79,727 ac) were in agricultural land.These figures include existing roads, buildings, and other infrastructureand therefore overestimate actual vegetated areas Recent analysis (Sumer-all and Lloyd 1995; White 2004) of an orthorectified mosaic of 1951 aer-ial photos (figure 1.6, in color insert) yielded results comparable to theinventory appraisal and estimates by the Savannah River Operations Of-fice (1959) Agriculture accounted for 38 percent of SRS land Most of thiswas cropland or recently plowed ground The majority of the uplandswere in agricultural fields and bare ground The two forested land classesconsisted of “forest,” which represented mostly intact forest, much ofwhich was distributed along streams and the Savannah River (44 percent),and “regenerating forest,” which represented regenerating woody vege-tation from abandoned agricultural land and cutover forests (18 percent).The initial focus of management was to reforest abandoned farmland,and by 1960, the Forest Service had planted 24,000 ha (59,304 ac; seechapter 3 for details) Forested land increased dramatically between 1951and 1988 (White and Gaines 2000) In 2001, virtually all of the SRS was

Figure 1.5 Cut-over condition of much of the Savannah River Site at the time of

government acquisition (U.S Forest Service files)

forested; only 12 percent of the forest stands were less than ten years old,and 72 percent were more than thirty years old Satellite imagery of theregion illustrates the impacts of reforestation of the SRS (figure 1.7, incolor insert) The green, forested SRS contrasts sharply with the sur-rounding landscape, dominated by agriculture and urbanization.

Industrial Operations and Current Land Use

John I Blake, John J Mayer, and John C Kilgo

The management of natural resources at the Savannah River Site (SRS)has been variously executed over the years to meet conservation andrestoration objectives, to provide research and educational opportunities,and to generate revenue from the sale of forest products However, thesemanagement activities have been implemented under the constraints im-posed by the Site’s nuclear mission and the objectives for which the SRSwas established This management challenge has been further compli-cated by the vast area encompassed by the Site, as well as the complexspatial mosaic of operational facilities and natural features This sectionprovides a general description of both the operational infrastructure andthe land-use framework within which natural resource management ac-tivities occur

SRS Background and Operations

The SRS is one of several government-owned, contractor-operated siteswithin the U.S Department of Energy’s nuclear defense complex It is man-aged as a controlled area with limited public access It was constructed dur-ing the 1950s to produce basic materials (e.g., plutonium-237 and tritium)used in nuclear weapons Responsibility for these activities was initiallyassigned to the Atomic Energy Commission, whose mission was later as-sumed by the Department of Energy Following the end of the Cold War,the Site’s mission changed to stewardship of the nation’s nuclear weaponsstockpile, nuclear materials, and the environment (Mamatey 2004).Activities associated with the nuclear mission at SRS occur in severalindustrialized or developed areas located around the site There are fivenuclear production reactors; two chemical separations facilities; a heavywater extraction plant; a nuclear fuel and target fabrication facility; a tri-tium extraction facility; waste processing, storage, and disposal facilities;

and various administrative support facilities The production reactors, theheavy water extraction plant, and the nuclear fuel and target fabricationfacility are no longer operational The last reactor was shut down in 1988.Several of these latter facilities have been decommissioned, and the re-mainder are scheduled to be decommissioned by 2026 (Austin, Noah,and Nelson 2003).

SRS facilities are located in twenty separate developed areas around thesite, which encompass a total of 1,781 ha (4,403 ac) The administrativeareas are situated around the periphery of the site, while the industrializedoperations areas (e.g., nuclear reactors, separations and waste manage-ment facilities) are in the inner core of the 803-km2(310-mi2) footprint,with sufficient buffer lands to protect both the surrounding communitiesand the security of these classified operations (figure 1.8, in color insert).Additionally, remote facilities, less than 1 to 2 ha (1–5 ac) in size, are scat-tered around the site They include power substations, sanitary wastewatertreatment facilities and lift stations, cooling water intake and pump sta-tions, field laboratories, maintenance buildings, and various security fa-cilities Perimeter security barricades control personnel and vehicle access.The infrastructure necessary to support these various administrativeand operations areas is massive Site utilities provide electricity, steam,cooling water, domestic water, service water, and sanitary waste treat-ment The SRS has an extensive internal transportation infrastructure,which consists of approximately 225 km (140 mi) of primary roads and2,253 km (1,400 mi) of secondary roads (including logging roads and jeeptrails) Recent traffic flow on primary roadways has been in the thousands

of vehicles per hour during periods of worker shift change The SRS has

a railway system consisting of approximately 96 km (60 mi) of track Italso has used the Savannah River to transport large, heavy loads to thesite The various pipelines, transmission lines, roads, and railways allhave maintained rights-of-way associated with them (Noah 1995).Buffer zones between industrialized areas and surrounding undevel-oped habitats are minimal (figure 1.9) Most transitions are abrupt, withmaintained lawns or parking lots ending at the forest edge Due largely

to the close proximity of industrialized and undeveloped areas, the dustrialized areas are used by various wildlife species The presence of anumber of medium-sized species (e.g., opossum, eastern cottontail, grayfox, and raccoon) within facility areas demonstrates that perimeter fences

in-do not effectively deter wildlife movement Mayer and Wike (1997) in-umented 153 species in and around developed portions of the site How-ever, they considered most (58.3 percent) uncommon in these areas, and

doc-introduced or invasive species made up 50 percent of the abundantspecies Foraging and feeding were the most commonly observed activi-ties Of the eight subhabitats surveyed, landscaped areas away frombuildings and structures were the most heavily used Potential impacts

to humans from such urban wildlife include contaminant transport,physical injury, disease transmission, and destruction of property Po-tential impacts to wildlife in these areas include physical harm and con-taminant exposure (Mayer and Wike 1997)

In an effort to fulfill its nuclear operations in a safe, secure, and ronmentally responsible manner, the SRS has operated an extensive en-vironmental monitoring program since 1951 Both on-site and off-sitelocations and media are monitored for potential impacts Monitoringprograms cover a suite of potential contamination pathways, includingsurface water, groundwater, drinking water, ingestion, contact, and air

envi-Figure 1.9 Aerial view of a developed area and surrounding forest on the Savannah

River Site (Westinghouse Savannah River Co files)

Annually, thousands of samples (air, water, soil, sediment, food, tion, and animal tissue) from both within and around the site are taken

vegeta-to support different analyses, and the potential human dose impacts arecalculated for the different pathways In 2003, the estimated dose to themaximally exposed individual from all pathways was 0.19 millirem(mrem; Mamatey 2004), which is 0.05 percent of the dose (360 mrem)received annually by people from natural and other manufacturedsources of radiation (e.g., x-ray, television; Arnett and Mamatey 2000).Screening of both aquatic and terrestrial biota doses for 2003, the mostrecent year available, resulted in all sampled sites passing the pathwayscreening (Mamatey 2004)

The SRS has significant social and economic effects on the area side of its boundary It contributes to South Carolina and Georgiathrough employment and purchasing and through educational, research,technology transfer, business development, and community assistanceprograms The site is located in the Central Savannah River Area, con-sisting of eight counties in South Carolina and Georgia The regioncontains eight county governments and thirty-eight incorporated mu-nicipalities SRS employment has varied over the life of the Site, with amaximum of 38,582 employees during the peak construction period in

out-1952 During the early 1990s, the SRS was the largest single employer inSouth Carolina (Reed et al 2002; Grewal and Noah 2004) However, em-ployment has declined in recent years with the Site’s reduced post–ColdWar missions (figure 1.10)

Stewardship plans for the SRS have been developed for the next fiftyyears In the near term, work will continue to improve environmentalquality, clean up legacy waste sites, and manage any future waste producedfrom Site operations This effort will include the construction of new fa-cilities, retooling of existing Site facilities for new missions, and recon-figuration of the Site to a form that is more conducive to meeting missionrequirements In the decades ahead, SRS will consolidate its functions to-ward the center of the site As new missions are funded, facilities will beplaced near areas of current industrialization to minimize maintenancecosts, infrastructure needs, and developmental and environmental im-pacts Natural resource management is an integral component of the SRSLong Range Comprehensive Plan (U.S Department of Energy 2000).Specifically, the plan defines three natural resource goals: demonstrateexcellence in environmental stewardship; provide natural resource infor-mation critical to the Department of Energy’s science base; and providecost-effective, flexible, and compatible programs to support SRS missions

Current cleanup efforts at many Department of Energy sites, ing SRS, cannot restore those federal lands to acceptable levels for unre-stricted public use This is due in part to the nature of the contaminationand the lack of proven cleanup and treatment technologies Some hazardsmay require attention for many centuries Consequently, long-term stew-ardship will be needed at those sites to ensure that the selected remedies willremain protective for future generations (U.S Department of Energy 2000).

includ-Natural Resource Management

Because the SRS conducts natural resource management within theframework of several land-use areas (see figure 1.8), knowledge of the ob-jectives for those areas is important in understanding SRS land manage-ment The SRS Long Range Comprehensive Plan (U.S Department ofEnergy 2000), the Land Use Baseline Report (Noah 1995), and the Nat-ural Resource Management Plan (U.S Department of Energy 2005) pro-vide overviews of land-use conditions, strategies, and activities Moredetailed information on specific management objectives and practiceswithin particular zones can be found elsewhere (NUS 1984; Davis andJanecek 1997; Edwards et al 2000; Caudell 2000) Here we provide gen-eral background information on natural resource management in themajor land-use areas and the rationale for partitioning the site

Figure 1.10 Size of the workforce on the Savannah River Site, 1987–2003.

The various programs and entities with land-use areas include the

red-cockaded woodpecker (Picoides borealis) management program, the

Crackerneck Wildlife Management Area and Ecological Reserve, and theDepartment of Energy Set-Aside Program Although other endangeredand threatened species occur on SRS, the red-cockaded woodpecker re-covery program influences the largest portion of the landscape (Edwards

et al 2000) About two thirds of the upland forest areas are managed forthis species and for the associated fire-maintained savanna conditionsthat support a great diversity of species In the mid-1980s, the first wood-pecker management plan delineated the SRS roughly as a donut shape,with the outer perimeter as the recovery area and the core containing theindustrial areas In 1997, a new plan detailed the current red-cockadedwoodpecker habitat management areas (see figure 1.8) Primary factorsconsidered from a landscape perspective included minimizing smokeproblems from prescribed burning, optimizing savanna restoration op-portunities through compatibility with ecological land classification,increasing management flexibility, and retaining prime industrial devel-opment sites The plan incorporated the Department of Defense concept

of including a “supplemental habitat management area” where lowerwoodpecker population densities are accepted to achieve greater flexi-bility The woodpecker management plan provides specific guidelines onthe kind and amount of timber harvest, development, and other activityallowed in each zone (Edwards et al 2000)

Within the industrial core or “Other Use Area” (figure 1.8) are most ofthe original industrial facilities Infrastructure developments that dissectthe area heavily impact wildlife (Mayer and Wike 1997) and other natu-ral resources They include transportation, power, and communicationsfacilities; monitoring equipment; soil and groundwater closure projects;and support facilities In order to minimize mission conflicts, there is aneed to maintain industrial management flexibility and to limit naturalresource goals in this zone However, at least one population of an en-dangered plant, numerous sensitive species, and considerable wetlandhabitat occur near the industrial facilities

The South Carolina Department of Natural Resources, in conjunctionwith the U.S Department of Energy, manages the Crackerneck WildlifeManagement Area and Ecological Reserve primarily as wildlife habitat toenhance recreational hunting, fishing, and nonconsumptive use (Caudell2000) Objectives are similar to those on many state lands and wildlifemanagement areas The Crackerneck area encompasses about 4,450 ha(11,000 ac) of wetland and mesic land with predominately pine forest,