Clarks Fork Yellowstone Partnership

10/16/2026

10/15/2026

Fall Watering for Trees
While the above-ground parts of deciduous trees go dormant into the fall, the root systems remain active until the ground freezes and requires moisture for continued growth. Prolonged dry periods, especially when late summer and fall temperatures are high, can result in root damage, stunted growth, early defoliation, branch and tip dieback, and even overall death of sensitive trees and shrubs.
Water when air temperatures are above 40 degrees and there is no snow cover on the ground.

Read Abi's full Urban Alert for more information on fall watering.
https://www.montana.edu/cope/email-format/admin/view.php?draft=13992&uid=6942e0ba2fb853.12496963

Photo: Watering around the active root zone (along the drip-line, and beyond) can set up the trees for fewer winter-related injuries associated with water stress.

10/15/2026

Aspen trees can "remember" a drought.

University of Utah researchers found that a dry year left a chemical signature in the trees' newly grown leaves in later seasons in a three-year experiment. Even after the drought ended, their defenses had changed.

Some chemicals that discourage insects and other plant eaters increased. Another group of defensive compounds declined. The mix of fungi living on the leaves also shifted.

The researchers call this a "functional memory." It describes a lasting biological response to past conditions, not a tree remembering an event the way a person does.

To investigate, the team grew quaking aspens in a research garden using rootstock collected from five national forests in Utah and Colorado.

From 2021 through 2023, they varied the water supplied to the trees to simulate drought. They then collected leaves and measured their defensive chemicals.

Trees exposed to drought in the previous year produced leaves with higher concentrations of salicinoid phenolic glycosides, compounds that help deter herbivores.

Higher levels of these chemicals were associated with less canopy damage. The team also found no evidence that the increased investment in these defenses came at the expense of growth.

But the response was not simply stronger protection across the board.

Levels of condensed tannins, another chemical defense that can help ward off microbes, fell. Changes in leaf chemistry were also linked to differences in the fungal community.

That leaves a question unanswered: does this chemical memory help aspens recover, or make them more vulnerable?

Read the study:
"Functional memory of drought affects leaf chemical defenses and microbial interactions in aspen." New Phytologist

10/13/2026

10/13/2026

10/05/2026

10/03/2026

10/01/2026

🌱 **NEW SOIL DATA JUST DROPPED!**

October 1 means something special if you work with land, water, agriculture, conservation—or are simply curious about what’s beneath your feet.

📢 **Today is the annual update of USDA’s Web Soil Survey!**

The USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service refreshes its official soil survey database **just once each year, on October 1**. That annual refresh incorporates new soil information, updates existing data and interpretations, and makes the latest official soil information available through the **Web Soil Survey**.

So…what exactly can you do with it?

🗺️ **Web Soil Survey is a FREE online tool that lets you draw an area around your property—or any location you’re interested in—and explore the soils found there.**

Depending on what you want to learn, you can investigate information such as:

🌾 Agricultural and forage potential
💧 Drainage and water-table characteristics
🌊 Flooding and ponding potential
⛰️ Slope and landscape characteristics
🪨 Depth to bedrock or other restrictive layers
🌱 Soil texture, including sand, silt and clay
🏡 Limitations for certain land uses
🌧️ Runoff, infiltration and erosion considerations
🐄 Information useful for farm and ranch management and conservation planning

**Why should we care about soil when we're talking about watersheds?**

Because a watershed starts long before water reaches a creek or river.

The soils across our landscape influence **how rainfall and snowmelt move, where water infiltrates, where runoff occurs, how easily sediment can erode, and how our working lands respond to both wet and dry conditions.**

Understanding the soil beneath us is another piece of understanding—and caring for—the entire watershed.

💻 **Take a look at your own property!**

Search **“USDA Web Soil Survey,”** open the map, define your **Area of Interest**, and start exploring.

And if you've used Web Soil Survey before, **today is a great day to take another look—the annual October 1 data refresh is here!**

🌱 **Know your soil. Know your land. Know your watershed.**

When you change your screen resolution, the application resets the calibration to “(not to scale)”, but it remembers the previous value of pixels per inch until you explicitly change it, because it will still be valid if you return to the previous screen resolution.

09/28/2026

One advantage of fall planting – Knowing what you are going to get.
Fall planting has all kinds of benefits, one of the most obvious is that choosing plants in the fall is that they will be showing their fall color, there is no need to rely on a description on a label. Here are a few shrubs and small trees that put on a show in the fall.
*Serviceberry (Amelanchier spp.) – hues of red, deep orange
Amur Maple (Acer ginnala Maxim.) – color range from red, orange to scarlet and burgundy
*Three-leaf sumac (Rhus trilobata) – amber-purple to red and orange coloration
*Golden Currant ( Ribes aureum) – deep burgundy to purple that can also be yellow, bright red and orange
*native to Montana