CONSERVATION

Nebraska's Sand Hills: Gone with the Wind?

		Researchers inspect a sandy dune

A $1.8 million National Science Foundation grant will help University of Nebraska-Lincoln researchers find out what it takes for the Nebraska Sand Hills to shed their vegetation and move at the mercy of the wind.

Research was spurred by the discovery by UNL geoscientists that the Sand Hills lost their cover and became mobile as recently as 900 years ago. Today, the 20,000-square-mile Sand Hills are stable and covered by native grassland interspersed with wetlands and lakes.

"This is a study of sand, grass and water and how they interact to stabilize the Sandhills," said associate professor and grant coordinator David Wedin, an Institute of Agriculture and Natural Resources ecosystems ecologist.

The Sand Hills' status affects not only a $5-billion-a-year cattle industry, but also the recharge of much of the High Plains (Ogallala) Aquifer, a crucial water resource for not only Nebraska, but also neighboring states.

It's not just any old drought that will cause the dunes to become active, said David Loope, UNL geoscientist and co-investigator of the grant with research associate professor Geoff Henebry, ecosystem ecologist with the Institute of Agriculture and Natural Resources. Even during the Dust Bowl years in the 1930s, for example, the Sand Hills remained stabilized.

"The water table helps the grasses hang in there, but if the drought is prolonged enough, the wetlands dry up, and it breaks the back of the system," Loope said.

Monitoring of test areas in the Sand Hills will improve understanding of plant water use, microclimate, soil moisture dynamics, groundwater recharge, and dune destabilization and recovery.

INSTITUTE OF AGRICULTURE AND NATURAL RESOURCES