DISTRIBUTION AND OCCURRENCE
SPECIES: Heracleum lanatum | Cow Parsnip 



GENERAL DISTRIBUTION : 
Cow parsnip occurs from Newfoundland west to Alaska and south to
California, Arizona, New Mexico, Kansas, Missouri, and Georgia
[22,26,30,47,68].  It is not found in northern Canada or in the extreme
southern and southeastern regions of the United States.


ECOSYSTEMS : 
   FRES11  Spruce - fir
   FRES17  Elm - ash - cottonwood
   FRES19  Aspen - birch
   FRES20  Douglas-fir
   FRES21  Ponderosa pine
   FRES23  Fir - spruce
   FRES25  Larch
   FRES26  Lodgepole pine
   FRES28  Western hardwoods
   FRES29  Sagebrush
   FRES34  Chaparral - mountain shrub
   FRES35  Pinyon - juniper
   FRES36  Mountain grasslands
   FRES37  Mountain meadows
   FRES38  Plains grasslands
   FRES39  Prairie
   FRES41  Wet grasslands
   FRES44  Alpine


STATES : 
     AK  AZ  CA  CO  CT  DE  GA  ID  IL  IN
     IA  KS  KY  ME  MD  MA  MI  MN  MO  MT
     NE  NV  NH  NJ  NM  NY  NC  ND  OH  OR
     PA  RI  SC  SD  TN  UT  VT  VA  WA  WV
     WI  WY  AB  BC  MB  NB  NF  NS  ON  PE
     PQ  SK


ADMINISTRATIVE UNITS : 
     APIS  BAND  BELA  CRLA  CRMO  CURE
     CUVA  DENA  DEPO  FOCL  GLAC  GLBA
     GRPO  GRSM  INDU  ISRO  KATM  LACL
     LAVO  MORA  MUWO  NOCA  OLYM  ORCA
     PORE  PIRO  REDW  SACN  SEQU  SLBE
     VOYA  YOSE  YELL


BLM PHYSIOGRAPHIC REGIONS : 
    1  Northern Pacific Border
    2  Cascade Mountains
    3  Southern Pacific Border
    4  Sierra Mountains
    5  Columbia Plateau
    6  Upper Basin and Range
    8  Northern Rocky Mountains
    9  Middle Rocky Mountains
   10  Wyoming Basin
   11  Southern Rocky Mountains
   12  Colorado Plateau
   13  Rocky Mountain Piedmont
   14  Great Plains
   15  Black Hills Uplift
   16  Upper Missouri Basin and Broken Lands


KUCHLER PLANT ASSOCIATIONS : 
   K003  Silver fir - Douglas-fir forest
   K004  Fir - hemlock forest
   K008  Lodgepole pine - subalpine forest
   K011  Western ponderosa forest
   K012  Douglas-fir forest
   K014  Grand fir - Douglas-fir forest
   K015  Western spruce - fir forest
   K018  Pine - Douglas-fir forest
   K019  Arizona pine forest 
   K021  Southwestern spruce - fir forest
   K023  Juniper - pinyon woodland
   K025  Alder - ash forest
   K037  Mountain-mahogany - oak scrub
   K038  Great Basin sagebrush
   K049  Tule marshes
   K050  Fescue - wheatgrass
   K051  Wheatgrass - bluegrass
   K052  Alpine meadows and barren
   K055  Sagebrush steppe
   K063  Foothills prairie
   K064  Grama - needlegrass - wheatgrass
   K066  Wheatgrass - needlegrass
   K067  Wheatgrass - bluestem - needlegrass
   K074  Bluestem prairie
   K081  Oak savanna
   K093  Great Lakes spruce - fir forest
   K098  Northern floodplain forest
   K107  Northern hardwoods - fir forest


SAF COVER TYPES : 
     5  Balsam fir
    12  Black spruce
    13  Black spruce - tamarack
    16  Aspen
    18  Paper birch
    38  Tamarack
    63  Cottonwood
   107  White spruce
   203  Balsam poplar
   204  Black spruce
   205  Mountain hemlock
   206  Engelmann spruce - subalpine fir
   208  Whitebark pine
   210  Interior Douglas-fir
   211  White fir
   212  Western larch
   217  Aspen
   218  Lodgepole pine
   220  Rocky Mountain juniper
   221  Red alder
   235  Cottonwood - willow
   236  Bur oak
   237  Interior ponderosa pine


SRM (RANGELAND) COVER TYPES : 
NO-ENTRY


HABITAT TYPES AND PLANT COMMUNITIES : 
Cow parsnip occurs in a wide variety of forested habitat types, as well
as grassland, shrubland, meadow, alpine, and riparian zones
[3,13,14,34,85].  

Cow parsnip is a member of the Pacific silver fir (Abies amabilis)
old-growth forest in Washington [2].  Cow parsnip occurs in whitebark
pine (Pinus albicaulis) communities of Montana [3].  It is a common
understory species in subalpine fir (Abies lasiocarpa) and Engelmann
spruce (Picea engelmannii) habitat types of the Intermountain West
[9,12,20,69].  A subalpine fir/cow parsnip association in Montana, and a
cow parsnip-western coneflower (Rudbeckia occidentalis) community type
in Wyoming are described [14,20].  A climax black hawthorn (Crataegus
douglasii)-cow parsnip habitat type has been described for Washington
and Idaho [13,50].  A climax quaking aspen (Populus tremuloides)/cow
parsnip habitat type has been described for Utah and Wyoming [57,58].

Cow parsnip is found in seral quaking aspen community types in Wyoming,
Idaho, Utah, Colorado, and Montana [7,34,41,57,58,85], and is a dominant
understory species in quaking aspen-dominated communities of Utah,
Colorado, and Montana [41,64].  An quaking aspen/cow parsnip habitat
type has been described for Colorado and Idaho [34,41].  In Canada, cow
parsnip is a member of the subboreal, aspen-dominated spruce zone
[8,11,75].

In eastern Idaho, western Wyoming, and northern Utah, cow parsnip occurs
in a red-osier dogwood (Cornus sericea)/cow parsnip riparian habitat
type [86].  A California false hellebore (Veratrum californicum)-cow
parsnip habitat type has been described in Washington [32].  Cow parsnip
occurs in riparian areas dominated by willow (Salix spp.) throughout the
Intermountain West [19,29,77].

The following publications list cow parsnip as a community dominant or
codominant:  

Steppe vegetation of Washington [13]
A vegetation study in the subalpine zone of the western North Cascades,
  Washington [20]
Riparian community type classification of eastern Idaho-western Wyoming
  [86] 

Species not previously mentioned but commonly associated with cow
parsnip include incense-cedar (Calocedrus decurrens), black cottonwood
(Populus trichocarpa var. hastata), narrowleaf cottonwood (P.
angustifolia), thinleaf alder (Alnus incana ssp. tenuifolia), Sitka
alder (A. sinuata), bigtooth maple (Acer grandidentatum), bigleaf maple
(A. macrophyllum), Pacific yew (Taxus brevifolia), dwarf bilberry
(Vaccinium myrtillus), grouse whortleberry (V. scoparium), roses (Rosa
spp.), mountain snowberry (Symphoricarpos oreophilus), western snowberry
(S. occidentalis), Saskatoon serviceberry (Amelanchier alnifolia),
bristly gooseberry (Ribes setosum), common chokecherry (Prunus
virginiana), California hazel (Corylus cornuta var. californica), fowl
bluegrass (Poa palustris), California brome (Bromus carinatus), blue
wildrye (Elymus glaucus), field horsetail (Equisetum arvense), bluejoint
reedgrass (Calamagrostis canadensis), fireweed (Epilobium
angustifolium), western aster (Aster occidentalis), large-leaved avens
(Geum macrophyllum), sweet-scented bedstraw (Galium triflorum), stinging
nettle (Urtica dioica), Sitka valerian (Valeriana sitchensis), smooth
woodrush (Luzuli hitchcockii), menziesia (Menziesia ferruginea),
queencup beadlily (Clintonia uniflora), tall larkspur (Delphinium
occidentalis), Richardson's geranium (Geranium richardsonii), saw
groundsel (Senecio serra), and bracken fern (Pteridium aquilinum)
[11,12,20,29,57,58].  

Related categories for Species: Heracleum lanatum | Cow Parsnip