Ale Enclosed

ALE - not a beer, just an acronym for Arid Land Ecology, thousands of acres of sagebrush grassland set aside for research in 1972, when I worked for Battelle as an editor for Environmental research. I went up yesterday as volunteer to pull weeds away from the enclosures around stream beds where willows are growing. The enclosures are about fifty yards across and vary from one to two hundred yards long. the perimeters are marked by poles about 12 feet high with ten rows of wire at 8 inch intervals along each pole.These wires carry electricity to deter the huge mammals from eating the willows and anything else they require to live. Jennifer (USFW)staff, Deb Jennings and myself cleaned the fence on four out of fourteen of the enclosures.
Naomi Sherer