Omg is there any rangeland that isn't degraded?? The cheatgrass is horrifying here, there's barely any perennial native grasses left. I am currently encouraging goats and sheep to murder the cheatgrass so it can't reseed as prolifically.
March 20, 2026 at 10:48 PM
Omg is there any rangeland that isn't degraded?? The cheatgrass is horrifying here, there's barely any perennial native grasses left. I am currently encouraging goats and sheep to murder the cheatgrass so it can't reseed as prolifically.
Forget cable management. Ask the men in your life how much they think about cheatgrass management.
Forget the Roman Empire. Ask the men in your life how often they think about cable management.
September 30, 2025 at 3:00 AM
Forget cable management. Ask the men in your life how much they think about cheatgrass management.
Andrew the plant guy has been taking out the cheatgrass and he’s a goddamn machine. Otherwise I’d probably be hip deep.
March 20, 2026 at 11:31 PM
Andrew the plant guy has been taking out the cheatgrass and he’s a goddamn machine. Otherwise I’d probably be hip deep.
...brb I have cheatgrass to report
June 11, 2025 at 10:48 PM
...brb I have cheatgrass to report
Also bottlebrush squirrel tail grass can out-compete cheatgrass in high desert savannahs and studies in the Great Basin have shown that once you bring it in the ecosystem shifts back towards other perennial grasses.
December 7, 2025 at 9:09 PM
Also bottlebrush squirrel tail grass can out-compete cheatgrass in high desert savannahs and studies in the Great Basin have shown that once you bring it in the ecosystem shifts back towards other perennial grasses.
A thing that has only existed here for 150 years: a bird's nest made almost entirely of cheatgrass, an invasive annual grass from Europe that has been devastating western rangelands since about the mid 19th C.
May 12, 2026 at 1:34 AM
A thing that has only existed here for 150 years: a bird's nest made almost entirely of cheatgrass, an invasive annual grass from Europe that has been devastating western rangelands since about the mid 19th C.
Cheatgrass is awful. I managed to eliminate it from my Santa Fe home
An all-hands-on-deck effort, tens of millions in funding and a breakthrough herbicide are helping but not halting a destructive force slowly enveloping the best sagebrush left on Earth.
"I think you have to kind of accept that we're going to have cheatgrass forever," one weed specialist said.
"I think you have to kind of accept that we're going to have cheatgrass forever," one weed specialist said.
Inside Wyoming’s fight against cheatgrass, the ‘most existential, sweeping threat’ to western ecosystems - WyoFile
An all-hands-on-deck effort, tens of millions in funding and a breakthrough herbicide are slowing but not halting a destructive force steadily enveloping the best sagebrush left on Earth.
wyofile.com
December 1, 2025 at 3:26 PM
Cheatgrass is awful. I managed to eliminate it from my Santa Fe home
You need hay because the grass goes dormant when it gets too little light or too little precipitation, and if you allow your grazing stock to eat their pastures down to the ground during that time they'll kill the grass. See also: me letting the sheep kill the cheatgrass.
April 16, 2026 at 3:41 PM
You need hay because the grass goes dormant when it gets too little light or too little precipitation, and if you allow your grazing stock to eat their pastures down to the ground during that time they'll kill the grass. See also: me letting the sheep kill the cheatgrass.
The apparition
that is welcome to haunt fall:
Virginia creeper
🌱 #nativeplants ?
Feels like a "neonative" to the western U.S. similar to Alaskan mule deer or PNW barred owls. It's native to the continent & we've facilitated its spread, but it's not like...cheatgrass. Sometimes a problem.
that is welcome to haunt fall:
Virginia creeper
🌱 #nativeplants ?
Feels like a "neonative" to the western U.S. similar to Alaskan mule deer or PNW barred owls. It's native to the continent & we've facilitated its spread, but it's not like...cheatgrass. Sometimes a problem.
September 26, 2026 at 6:34 PM
The apparition
that is welcome to haunt fall:
Virginia creeper
🌱 #nativeplants ?
Feels like a "neonative" to the western U.S. similar to Alaskan mule deer or PNW barred owls. It's native to the continent & we've facilitated its spread, but it's not like...cheatgrass. Sometimes a problem.
that is welcome to haunt fall:
Virginia creeper
🌱 #nativeplants ?
Feels like a "neonative" to the western U.S. similar to Alaskan mule deer or PNW barred owls. It's native to the continent & we've facilitated its spread, but it's not like...cheatgrass. Sometimes a problem.
Cheatgrass is short as fuck and does not provide a great deal of forage or habitat for anything except cheatgrass. It's fucking useless.
August 22, 2025 at 10:18 PM
Cheatgrass is short as fuck and does not provide a great deal of forage or habitat for anything except cheatgrass. It's fucking useless.
Remember that year *all* the cheatgrass in Oregon burned??
July 28, 2026 at 2:54 AM
Remember that year *all* the cheatgrass in Oregon burned??
Also sheep cannot erradicate cheatgrass whereas bottlebrush squirreltail does a good job out-competing it for space, and where it wipes out cheatgrass you see a resurgence in perennial native rangeland grasses that provide year round food & habitat for native wildlife.
August 22, 2025 at 10:17 PM
Also sheep cannot erradicate cheatgrass whereas bottlebrush squirreltail does a good job out-competing it for space, and where it wipes out cheatgrass you see a resurgence in perennial native rangeland grasses that provide year round food & habitat for native wildlife.
Anyway today I put down a gallon bag of my own seed mix: bottlebrush squirreltail (Elymus elymoides), a small native bunchgrass that can outcompete cheatgrass; Idaho fescue (Festuca idahoensis), a native western fescue; and basin wildrye (Leymus cinereus).
May 12, 2026 at 1:38 AM
Anyway today I put down a gallon bag of my own seed mix: bottlebrush squirreltail (Elymus elymoides), a small native bunchgrass that can outcompete cheatgrass; Idaho fescue (Festuca idahoensis), a native western fescue; and basin wildrye (Leymus cinereus).
This is burrow of paleocastor, a beaver ancestor that lived into the mid-Miocene, at the agate fossil beds in Nebraska. Inside the case with it is some cheatgrass. Cheatgrass has even invaded the grasslands of the past!
en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palaeoc...
en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palaeoc...
May 7, 2025 at 5:21 PM
This is burrow of paleocastor, a beaver ancestor that lived into the mid-Miocene, at the agate fossil beds in Nebraska. Inside the case with it is some cheatgrass. Cheatgrass has even invaded the grasslands of the past!
en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palaeoc...
en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palaeoc...
And thus even more cheatgrass will invade, and the next fire in this area will be even worse.
What a cycle to be stuck in....
#IdahoFire
What a cycle to be stuck in....
#IdahoFire
Nor do we have the resources to replant sagebrush and bitterbrush for wildlife in burned areas. There are too many burn scars and they are too big. Plus, the seedling will just get burned again at this rate.
July 28, 2026 at 4:26 PM
And thus even more cheatgrass will invade, and the next fire in this area will be even worse.
What a cycle to be stuck in....
#IdahoFire
What a cycle to be stuck in....
#IdahoFire
🎶Hashem, won't you buy me 10lbs of bottlebrush squirreltail seed
I'm rewilding rangelands, I have a great need
I must replace cheatgrass so critters can feed
HaShem, won't you buy me 10lbs of bottlebrush squirreltail seed 🎶
I'm rewilding rangelands, I have a great need
I must replace cheatgrass so critters can feed
HaShem, won't you buy me 10lbs of bottlebrush squirreltail seed 🎶
Bottlebrush Squirreltail
Bottlebrush Squirreltail, Elymus elymoides, brevifolius, californicus, Sitanion hystrix, Elymus hystrix, bigeloviana, Sitanion jubatum,
greatbasinseeds.com
August 22, 2025 at 6:33 PM
🎶Hashem, won't you buy me 10lbs of bottlebrush squirreltail seed
I'm rewilding rangelands, I have a great need
I must replace cheatgrass so critters can feed
HaShem, won't you buy me 10lbs of bottlebrush squirreltail seed 🎶
I'm rewilding rangelands, I have a great need
I must replace cheatgrass so critters can feed
HaShem, won't you buy me 10lbs of bottlebrush squirreltail seed 🎶
The new study rightly warns that cheatgrass could wipe out half of northeast Wyoming’s mule deer habitat, but it leaves out the biggest driver of this invasion: livestock grazing.
wyofile.com/mule-deer-co...
wyofile.com/mule-deer-co...
Mule deer could lose half their northeast Wyoming habitat to cheatgrass without help - WyoFile
New study shows deer avoid cheatgrass-covered areas, but authors also provide hope.
wyofile.com
September 9, 2025 at 3:21 PM
The new study rightly warns that cheatgrass could wipe out half of northeast Wyoming’s mule deer habitat, but it leaves out the biggest driver of this invasion: livestock grazing.
wyofile.com/mule-deer-co...
wyofile.com/mule-deer-co...
One reason this fire went from 30 acres to 3000 in 6 hours is because the rangelands it's in have been heavily degraded by cheatgrass and another is that the sagebrush is too thick on it. The combo means there's a ton of real dry fuel despite some unseasonable rain.
July 19, 2026 at 12:25 PM
One reason this fire went from 30 acres to 3000 in 6 hours is because the rangelands it's in have been heavily degraded by cheatgrass and another is that the sagebrush is too thick on it. The combo means there's a ton of real dry fuel despite some unseasonable rain.
They're all three perennial bunchgrasses with deep roots. Basin wildrye was the dominant grass in this area when Europeans arrived. The bottlebrush squirreltail will help keep back cheatgrass in the pasture where I put the seed down, giving the bigger grasses time to establish.
May 12, 2026 at 1:41 AM
They're all three perennial bunchgrasses with deep roots. Basin wildrye was the dominant grass in this area when Europeans arrived. The bottlebrush squirreltail will help keep back cheatgrass in the pasture where I put the seed down, giving the bigger grasses time to establish.
cheatgrass on boise like bezos on seattle
June 1, 2025 at 11:39 PM
cheatgrass on boise like bezos on seattle
Perish the thought. Bottlebrush squirreltail is the only native grass that outcompetes cheatgrass and allows the native perennial bunchgrass ecosystem to restore itself. It's habitat restoration. Not my fault she grows invasive European grasses.
August 28, 2026 at 1:43 AM
Perish the thought. Bottlebrush squirreltail is the only native grass that outcompetes cheatgrass and allows the native perennial bunchgrass ecosystem to restore itself. It's habitat restoration. Not my fault she grows invasive European grasses.
I can't do that part but I can text you three times a day and be like "quick shove some calories in your face!!" along with an appropriate animal picture. Like so:
November 16, 2023 at 2:58 AM
I can't do that part but I can text you three times a day and be like "quick shove some calories in your face!!" along with an appropriate animal picture. Like so:
This cheatgrass is knee high and chock a block full of seeds. Foresters can hate on shrubs coming into post-fire sites but it’s a hell of a lot better than this.
May 19, 2026 at 7:25 PM
This cheatgrass is knee high and chock a block full of seeds. Foresters can hate on shrubs coming into post-fire sites but it’s a hell of a lot better than this.
A new study shows deer avoid cheatgrass-covered areas, which could imperil the species as the invasive vegetation spreads. But the report's authors also provide hope in the form of certain herbicides that can be used in a targeted way.
Mule deer could lose half their northeast Wyoming habitat to cheatgrass without help - WyoFile
New study shows deer avoid cheatgrass-covered areas, but authors also provide hope.
wyofile.com
September 9, 2025 at 2:28 PM
A new study shows deer avoid cheatgrass-covered areas, which could imperil the species as the invasive vegetation spreads. But the report's authors also provide hope in the form of certain herbicides that can be used in a targeted way.
*EVACUATION ORDER*
GO NOW issued for Robie Creek zone RC-06 #IdahoFire
helicopters working Upper Shaw Mountain Road / Cottonwood Creek. Tankers will continue working the Ridge
I'm seeing smoke further up than I'd prefer. But fire behavior in timber will be far different than sage/cheatgrass
GO NOW issued for Robie Creek zone RC-06 #IdahoFire
helicopters working Upper Shaw Mountain Road / Cottonwood Creek. Tankers will continue working the Ridge
I'm seeing smoke further up than I'd prefer. But fire behavior in timber will be far different than sage/cheatgrass
July 8, 2026 at 2:34 AM
*EVACUATION ORDER*
GO NOW issued for Robie Creek zone RC-06 #IdahoFire
helicopters working Upper Shaw Mountain Road / Cottonwood Creek. Tankers will continue working the Ridge
I'm seeing smoke further up than I'd prefer. But fire behavior in timber will be far different than sage/cheatgrass
GO NOW issued for Robie Creek zone RC-06 #IdahoFire
helicopters working Upper Shaw Mountain Road / Cottonwood Creek. Tankers will continue working the Ridge
I'm seeing smoke further up than I'd prefer. But fire behavior in timber will be far different than sage/cheatgrass