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Bibliography Notes summarizes and highlights some of thescientic literature in our 20,000 citation bibliography on the

 physical and ecological effects of roads and off-road vehicles. Weoffer bibliographic searches to help activists access important 

biological research relevant to roads.

 A Review of the Impacts of Off-Road Vehicles onSpecial Ecosystems

 By Adam Switalski and Allison Jones  Editor’s Note: This BiblioNote is an excerpt fromWildlands CPR and Wild Utah’s ORV BMPs published in2008. To see a list of Best Management Practices for plan- ning and management of ORV routes or to view the full report visit: http://www.wildlandscpr.org/ORV-BMPs

Certain ecosystems are very rare, or aredisproportionately ecologically or socially

important. These “special ecosystems”need particular management attention because

they are oten more sensitive and more suscep-

tible to damage rom o-road vehicles (ORVs),or because the degradation o these areas by

ORVs is more signicant by virtue o their rarity.This section reviews the impacts o ORVs on

roadless areas, riparian areas, and other specialecosystems.

 Roadless AreasMany orestlands have no roads and have

not been signicantly altered by motorized

disturbances. These roadless areas maintainhealthy soil, provide clean water, and act as a

reuge or wildlie (USDA 2000b; DellaSala andStrittholt 2002). Roadless areas have remained

unroaded primarily because they are remote and

inaccessible. Today, most remote roadless areascan be accessed in just a ew hours on an ORV.

ORVs may negatively impact roadless areas byincreasing legal and illegal harvest o wildlie,

reducing hunter opportunity as seasons become

more restrictive, ragmenting wildlie popula-

tions, and decreasing overall habitat quality andquantity. ORVs may also impact native sh andplant species by enabling non-native invasive

species to travel and be transported deep intoroadless areas.

Roadless areas are very important or avariety o wildlie species. Roadless areas allow

or landscape and regional connectivity, and canact as reugia or a host o wildlie. For example,

one study in Idaho ound that 75 percent o all

elk harvested in a hunting unit were rom road-

 Sensitive wetlands are particularly susceptable to damage from off-road vehicles. Photocopyright Marcel Huijser.

less areas, which was just 25 percent o the orested portion o this drain-age (Thiessen 1976). In Minnesota, researchers ound that wolves could

persist with higher road densities i there was an adjacent roadless area(Mech 1989). During a 10-year study o grizzly bears, Dood et al. (1983)

recorded ve o six illegally killed bears in roaded areas, although their

home ranges included roadless areas.

Roadless areas have the potential to conserve sensitive, threatened,or endangered species (Loucks et al. 2003). Forest Service roadless areas

are known aquatic strongholds or salmonids and other sh species(Quigley et al. 1997). Additionally, roadless areas are a signicant reuge

or native plant species (Gelbard and Harrison 2003). Roadless areas also

generally have less re risk and ewer insect outbreaks than heavily logged

areas (DellaSala and Frost 2001).

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 Riparian Areas and WetlandsRiparian areas are the vegetated areas adja-

cent to streams that are regularly fooded duringhigh fows. Wetlands are areas with saturated

soils that support deep rooted, or obligate wet-

land plants. While riparian areas and wetlands

make up just a small percentage o orestlands,they are generally more productive in plant andanimal biomass and higher in diversity than

the surrounding areas. These areas are alsovulnerable to ORV use. ORVs in riparian areas

can disturb wildlie, cause bank erosion, and in-

crease stream sedimentation. ORVs in wetlandscan cause similar damage to sensitive wetland

soils and plants.

Healthy, vegetated riparian areas provide

cover, oraging, and nesting sites or a numbero animals. In addition to providing habitat or

resident populations, riparian areas have been

shown to act as important corridors or wildlie(Naiman et al. 1993, Machtans et al. 1996, Bur-

brink et al. 1998). One study ound that riparianareas contained up to 10 times the number o

migrant birds per hectare than adjacent, non-riparian plots (Stevens et al. 1977). Healthy

riparian zones and streams are also crucial orsh populations (Stevens et al. 2005 and reer-

ences within).

Riparian areas also provide a number o

ecosystem service unctions including captur-ing, storing, and ltering water. Following a

storm or snowmelt, riparian areas hold and

store water and slowly release it back to thestream, resulting in healthy and normal hy-

drographs. Degraded riparian areas typicallyexhibit more stream fashing. Healthy riparian

areas, through bankcover and root masses, also

serve to stabilize stream banks. Stable streambanks have been shown to be very important

or sh habitat (USDA 1985), water tables nearthe surace (Richards 1987, Stevens et al. 1995),

and most importantly or preventing erosion(Stevens et al. 2005). Trimble (1997) ound that

up to 76% o total sediment entering creeks may

come rom creek bank erosion alone.

Wetlands provide similarly importantecosystem unctions, such as improving water

quality by ltering sediments, nutrients and

contaminants rom the water column (Mee andCarroll 1994). They are also critically impor-

tant habitats or an impressive variety o plantsand both vertebrate and invertebrate species,

including many ederally threatened and endan-

gered species.

Other Special AreasClis are unique eatures on a landscape that provide security or

many nesting raptors. ORVs have the potential to disturb nesting birds

when routes are located close to clis (Hamann et al. 1999). Caves are animportant eature or breeding bats. Human disturbance can cause bats

to abandon a roost and lead to population declines (Pierson and Rainey

1994). Caves and old mine tunnels are a lure or a number o orest visi-tors and recreationists. For many, simply seeing one rom a trail is reason

enough to explore, and some o those explorers will go on to vandalize thecave or mine. Unortunately vandalism can sometimes mean purposely

disturbing roosting bats, and sometimes even with means that includereworks, shooting, and re (pers. comm., George Oliver, Utah Division o

Wildlie Resources). Alpine meadows are also sensitive to human dis-

turbance because o their short growing season and slow soil ormation(Fitzgerald et al. 1994). Finally, much like other special areas, the increase

o ORV use in remote areas is threatening archaeological and historic sites.Increased visitation has resulted in intentional and unintentional damage

to many cultural sites (USDI 2000b, Schiman 2005).

— Adam is Science Coordinator for Wildlands CPR and Allison isConservation Biologist for the Wild Utah Project.

— references on next page — 

 Arid environments and cliff habitats require special protections from the impacts of off- road vehicles. Photo by Dan Funsch.

— Impacts of Off-Road Vehicles on Special Ecosystems, cont’d from page 16 — 

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Literature Cited 

— continued from previous page — 

Burbrink, F.T., C.A. Phillips, and E.J. Heske. 1998. A riparianzone in southern Illinois as a potential dispersal

corridor or reptiles and amphibians.  Biological Conservation 86(2): 107-115.

DellaSala, D.A., and J. Strittholt. 2002. Scientic basis or

roadless area conservation. Report prepared by WorldWildlie Fund and Conservation Biology Institute. 91p.

DellaSala, D.A., and E.J. Frost. 2001. An ecologically basedstrategy or re and uels management in national orest

roadless areas.  Fire Management Today 61: 12-23.Dood, A.R., R.D. Brannon, and R.D. Mace. 1986. Final

programmatic environmental impact statement: the

grizzly bear in northwestern Montana. Montana

Department o Fish, Wildlie, and Parks, Helena. 287p.Fitzgerald, J.P., C.A. Meaney, and D.M. Armstrong. 1994.

Mammals o Colorado. University Press o Colorado,

Niwot, CO. 467p.

Gelbard, J.L., and S. Harrison. 2003. Roadless habitats asreuges or native grasslands: interactions with soil,

aspect, and grazing.  Ecological Applications 13(2): 404-415.

Hamann, B., H. Johnston, P. McClelland, S. Johnson, L. Kelly,

and J. Gobielle. 1999. Birds. Pages 3.1-3.34 in Joslin,G. and H. Youmans, coordinators Eects o Recreation

on Rocky Mountain Wildlie: A Review or Montana.Committee on Eects o Recreation on Wildlie.

Montana Chapter o the Wildlie Society. 307p.

Loucks, C., N. Brown, A. Loucks, and K. Cesareo. 2003. USDAForest Service roadless areas: potential biodiversity

conservation reserves. Conservation Ecology 7(2): 5.http://www.consecol.org/vol7/iss2/art5 

Machtans, C.S., M.A. Villard, and S.J. Hannon. 1996. Use oriparian buer strips as movement corridors by orest

birds. Conservation Biology 10(5): 1366-1379.

Mech, L.D. 1989. Wol population survival in an area o highroad density. American Midland Naturalist 121: 387-389.

Mee, G.K. and C.R. Carroll. 1994. Principles o ConservationBiology. Sinauer Associates, Inc. Sunderland, MA.

Naiman, R.J., H. Decamps, and M. Pollock. 1993. The role o

riparian corridors in maintaining regional biodiversity.

 Ecological Applications 3(2): 209-212.

Pierson, E.D., and W.E. Rainey. 1994. The distribution,status and management o Townsend’s big-eared

bat (  P. townsendii ) in Caliornia. Report to CaliorniaDepartment o Fish and Game, Sacramento, CA. 48pp.

Quigley, T.M., and S.J. Arbelbide, editors. 1997. An

Assessment o Ecosystem Components in the InteriorColumbia Basin and Portions o the Klamath and Great

Basins. Volume 1, 2, 3, and 4. USDA Forest Service andUSDI Bureau o Land Management. Portland, OR. PNW-

GTR-405.

Schiman, L. 2005. Archaeology, O-Road Vehicles, and theBLM. Published online April 20, 2005.  Archeaology.http://www.archaeology.org/online/eatures/southwest/  

Stevens, L.E., B.T. Brown, J.M. Simpson, R.R. Johnson. 1977.

The importance o riparian habitat to migrating birds.

Importance, Preservation and Management o RiparianHabitat: A Symposium July 9, 1977, Tuscon, Arizona,

USDA Forest Service General Technical Report RM-43, p.156-164.

Stevens, L., P. Stacey, A. Jones, D. Du, C. Gourley, and J.Catlin. 2005. A protocol or the rapid assessment

o southwestern stream-riparian ecosystems. Pages

397-420 in Van riper, C. and D.J. Mattson, editors, The

Colorado Plateau II – Biophysical, Socioeconomic andCultural Research: Proceedings o the Seventh BiennialConerence o Research on the Colorado Plateau.

University o Arizona Press, Tucson, AZ.

Thiessen, J.L. 1976. Some relations o elk to logging, roading,and hunting in Idaho’s Game Management Unit 39.

Pages 3-5 in Hieb, S.R., editor, Proceedings o the elk-logging-roads symposium, Moscow, ID: Forestry Wildlie

and Range Experiment Station, University o Idaho.

Trimble, S.W. 1997. Contribution o Stream Channel Erosionto Sediment Yield rom an Urbanizing Watershed.

 Science 278(5342): 1442–1444.USDA (U.S. Department o Agriculture, Forest Service). 1985.

Fisheries Surveys Handbook. R4 FSH 2609.23. USDA

Forest Service, Intermountain Region, Ogden, UT. 400p.USDA (U.S. Department o Agriculture, Forest Service). 2000.

Forest Service Roadless Areas Conservation FinalEnvironmental Impact Statement, 1. Forest Service,

Washington D.C.USDI (U.S. Department o the Interior, Bureau o Land

Management). 2000. Strategic paper on cultural

resources at risk. Bureau o Land Management,Washington, D.C. 18p. http://www.blm.gov/heritage/

docum/00atriskpaper3.pd