Mark your calendars for the Botany Field Trip Saturday May 4, 2024

Each year RINS Volunteers look forward to the Botany Field Trip. We have hosted several talented botanists over the past twenty-three years and each of them has imparted their knowledge and expertise regarding the plants in Utah. We have visited many different sites to learn to identify shrubs, grasses and trees that occur primarily on desert landscapes. This desert landscape consists primarily of shrub-steppe habitat and is the preferred habitat that our nesting raptors rely on to successfully raise their young.

Vegetation represents an important element of data that a RINS volunteer collects; this data is crucial in understanding the health of a given habitat, which raptors and wildlife intimately rely on to survive and thrive day-to-day and throughout the year.

The vegetation that is present on any given landscape becomes a key indicator of the overall health of that ecosystem. Since vegetation is considered a natural resource, it is managed by various agencies with the intent to protect wildlife, manage grazing, wildfire restoration, both flood and dust control, plus aesthetics.

RINS volunteers collect vegetation data at each nest site, so the Botany Field Trip is a great resource for learning how to identify native and invasive plants in Utah.