VALUE AND USE
SPECIES: Gaultheria shallon | Salal 



WOOD PRODUCTS VALUE : 
NO-ENTRY


IMPORTANCE TO LIVESTOCK AND WILDLIFE : 
Browse:  In many areas, salal is browsed at least moderately by deer and
elk [28,53,113].  However, use varies geographically as well as
seasonally.  Salal is heavily browsed by black-tailed deer on the Queen
Charlotte Islands of British Columbia [45].  Persistent leaves enhance
winter value, and in many areas, including the Oregon Coast Range, salal
is an important winter food for black-tailed deer and mule deer
[14,15,65,100,103].  Deer use is often heaviest when other low-growing
species become covered with snow [64,65].  High elevation stands are
generally not used by deer in winter [64].  Seasonal black-tailed deer
use has been documented as follows in western Washington [14]:

                  percent total volume

Jan.  Feb.   March  April  May  June  July  Aug.  Sept.  Oct.  Nov.   Dec.
30.4  12.3   15.2   12.9   1.1  0.5   3.9   17.2  1.0    5.1   --     27.6

Roosevelt elk consume some salal browse, particularly during the winter
months [8,53].  Light to moderate elk use has also been reported during
fall and spring in some areas [116], but elsewhere, browse may be
ignored during spring and summer [53].  Winter elk use may occasionally
be locally heavy [116].  Salal is considered an important "emergency"
food in some locations [128].

Small mammals such as the mountain beaver also feed on salal [128].
This shrub is a preferred food of the mountain beaver in parts of the
western Cascades [68].  Leaves make up a small portion of the
white-footed vole's July diet in parts of Oregon [133].

In some areas, domestic sheep and goats browse salal [113].

Fruits and flowers:  Salal fruit is readily eaten by many birds and
mammals [67].  The band-tailed pigeon, wrentit, ruffed, spruce, and blue
grouse, and numerous songbirds feed on "berries" when available
[28,87,138].  In some areas, blue grouse chicks exhibit a marked
preference for salal fruit, and both chicks and adults consume large
numbers during July and August [77].  Some hummingbird use of flowers
has also been reported [107].  Black-tailed deer of western Washington
consume the flowers of salal [14].  Mammals such as the red squirrel,
black bear, black-tailed deer, Townsend's chipmunk, and Douglas'
squirrel also feed on salal fruit [45,87].



PALATABILITY : 
Salal browse is at least moderately palatable to many big game species,
but relatively unpalatable to domestic livestock [128].  In some
locations, leaves are readily eaten by black-tailed deer [23].  Deer
often exhibit a marked preference for tender sprouts on burned-over
sites [113].  Evergreen foliage remains palatable during the winter
months.  Overall palatability of salal has been rated as follows
[64,113,116]:

                        CA            OR             WA

Cattle            poor to useless     ----          ----
Domestic sheep    poor                ----          ---- 
Horses            useless             ----          ----
Elk               ----                ----          fair
Deer              fair to poor        moderate      ----
Domestic goats    fair to poor        ----          ----

Salal fruit is palatable to a wide variety of birds and mammals.


NUTRITIONAL VALUE : 
Browse:  The nutrient content of salal browse varies according to plant
part and with the stage of phenological development.  However, in
general browse has relatively low nutritional value.  Black-tailed deer
which fed exclusively on salal browse exhibited signs of malnutrition
[64].  Nutrient content has been documented as follows [14,111]:

crude       ether       crude       N-free      total       Ca
protein     extract     fiber       extract     ash
                              (percent)   
6.75         5.19       21.78        58.23      6.65        1.203

Mg          K           PO4
0.434       0.572       0.272

                  average percent weight -

                  N      P       Mg    Ca     Na         K              

stem             .25     .05     .05   .18    .0010     .24
foliage          .81     .08     .21   .81    .0030     .40

Fruit:  Nutrient value of salal fruit is listed below [101]:

            kjoules     calories    protein   carbo.    ash     lipid   
            x 1,000                 (g)         (g)     (g)     (g)

fresh       15.52        3.71       0.13      0.79      0.03     0.05
dried       14.69        3.51       0.06      0.88      0.04     0.01

            Ca         Fe         Mg
            (mg)       (mg)       (mg)

fresh       3.77       0.04       0.91
dried       3.44       0.04       0.21


COVER VALUE : 
Salal provides important cover for a variety of wildlife species [27].
Western hemlock/dwarf Oregon grape-salal, western hemlock/vine
maple-salal, and Sitka spruce-salal communities offer good hiding cover
for deer and elk, although dense shrub development can sometime limit
big game use [61,127].  Red huckleberry-salal shrubfields protect
black-tailed deer from winter winds [65].


VALUE FOR REHABILITATION OF DISTURBED SITES : 
Once established, salal spreads aggressively and is well-suited for use
as a ground cover on erosive banks, roadcuts, highway right-of-ways, and
other types of reclaimed ground [80,129].  It can also aid in
stabilizing coastal dunes and in protecting vulnerable watersheds [28].

Salal may be propagated by seed [28,80].  Cleaned seed averages
3,209,000 per pound (7,068/kg) and remains viable for "moderate periods"
when properly stored [28].  Seed is generally sown in winter or spring
[138].  Seedlings exhibit slow growth, but propagation from seed is
generally the most economical means of growing salal [129].  Seed
collection, handling, and planting methods have been considered in
detail [28,80,129].

Salal can also be propagated vegetatively from root, stem, or rhizome
cuttings, although propagation can be difficult and initial growth slow
[28,129].  Best results are generally obtained from cuttings taken in
late summer [80].  Salal can also be propagated by layering, or from
suckers and stolons [28].  Various modes of vegetative propagation have
been examined in detail [28,80,129].


OTHER USES AND VALUES : 
Fruit of salal was traditionally utilized by many native peoples of the
Northwest [101].  The spicy fruit was eaten fresh, dried, or mashed into
cakes [28,50,130].  Leaves were dried, mixed with kinnikinnik
(Arctostaphylos spp.) and smoked [28,50].  Teas made from the leaves
were used to treat coughs, tuberculosis, and diarrhea [50].

Salal is cultivated as an ornamental.  Plants are used in landscaping
[50] and serve as an excellent ground cover [66].  Salal can be used to
attract wildlife species to backyard gardens [80].  The attractive
foliage is used by florists under the name "lemon leaf" as an addition
to cut flowers [28,87,113].

The sweet, "bland but pleasant" fruit can be used alone or mixed with
other wild berries to make jellies or preserves [28,80].  Approximately
8 minutes of harvesting is required to collect 0.44 pint (250 ml) of
fruit [83].  Many species of Gaultheria contain oil of wintergreen and
can be used as flavoring agents [113].


MANAGEMENT CONSIDERATIONS : 
Timber harvest:  Salal commonly increases after timber harvest
[2,61,89].  Generally, if present in the understory prior to harvest, it
will also form part of the postdisturbance community [22].  Heavy
thinning can increase salal biomass by up to 2.8 times [117].  The
effects of timber harvest on salal have been examined in a number of
studies [8,30,31,57,70,71,73,79,94,112,115,131].

Competition:  Salal competes vigorously with conifer regeneration in
some locations [79].  On moist sites, this shrub commonly competes with
Douglas-fir, Sitka spruce, and western hemlock, and to a lesser degree
with western redcedar [143].  In general, the nutrient-demanding Sitka
spruce is most harmed by competition with salal [89], but salal can also
significantly reduce the basal area and stocking of Douglas-fir
seedlings on some sites [16].  In some areas, salal vigorously competes
with Douglas-fir for both water and nutrients [15,41,104] resulting in
poor seedling growth [134].  In many problem areas, soil moisture
deficits are common during the growing season, and competition for
moisture may be of primary significance [109].  Competition is often
pronounced in drier low elevation forests of coastal British Columbia
where dense thickets of salal commonly form on cutover sites [24,42].
Growth of forest crop trees is commonly reduced at approximately 6 to 8
years after planting in coastal Sitka spruce-western hemlock-western
redcedar, and western hemlock forests where a dense ground cover of
salal is present [92,134].  This growth check period may be due to the
direct effects of competition with salal or allelopathy associated with
this ericaceous shrub [134].  Anderson [3] reports that a dense growth
of salal can also inhibit regeneration of maples (Acer spp.), as samaras
are physically prevented from reaching the forest floor [3].

On some sites in western Washington, salal may actually add nutrients to
the soil and apparently has no adverse effect on the growth of
Douglas-fir [45,79].  Klinka and others [79] report that the amount of
nitrogen tied up by salal is relatively small and is not likely to be
critical for tree growth except on very poor sites.  In some areas,
conifer regeneration is typically better on sites dominated by salal
than on sites dominated by western swordfern or vine maple [29].

Still, much research has focused on ways to eliminate salal to improve
conifer regeneration.  Recommendations for minimizing salal competition
with conifer seedlings include [89]:

           (1) preventing fires on naturally regenerated clearcuts
           (2) preparing seedbeds to encourage prompt natural 
               regeneration
           (3) planting seedlings immediately after timber removal;            
               adding fertilizers where necessary

Successive light treatments may be preferable to a single heavy tree
removal [104].  When thinning, particular care should be taken to avoid
creating large gaps in the canopy [104].  It may be desirable to
maintain greater stand density on dry sites with salal present [104].
Competition between conifer seedling and salal occurs largely below
ground [16], and seedlings should be planted as early as possible after
timber harvest to allow seedlings a "head start" [16].  In some areas,
planting densities necessary to shade out salal quickly are
impractically high [16].  Models have been developed which explore the
effects of salal competition on the growth of various conifer seedlings
[88].  The effects of competition have been considered in detail
[16,41,88,89,92,104,135,136,142,143].  However, in many instances,
elimination of salal is difficult, uneconomical, or impractical.
Bunnell [15] reports that "...attempts to reduce salal abundance may be
unwarranted; the species appears well adapted to persist."

Chemical control:  Salal is resistant to many herbicides including
2,4-D, velpar, 2,4,5-T, amitrole, picloram, and silvex [12,106,120].
Site characteristics [24,41] and season and mode of application can
greatly influence the response of salal to herbicides [121].  Repeated
application of Garlon is effective although often impractical [24] or
prohibitively expensive.  Silvex can also be relatively effective in
reducing cover when properly applied [121].  Salal appears to be most
susceptible to foliage sprays in diesel oil carriers when applied at
budbreak [121].  Plants are less seriously damaged by herbicides applied
late in the growing season or by those applied in water or oil-in-water
emulsions [121].  In test applications, few of the damaged salal plants
were actually killed by herbicides, and recovery was generally rapid
[121].  However, herbicides can sometimes produce sufficient control for
conifer release [121].  Detailed information on the response of salal to
herbicides is available [12,17,21,24,45,120,121].

Mechanical removal:  Various types of mechanical removal or soil
disturbance can stimulate sprouting of salal and produce increased cover
[45].  As rhizomes are broken, new plants commonly form [15].  Harvest
techniques which disrupt rhizomes, such as the use of skidders, can
produce additional management problems by fostering the spread of salal
[15].  In coastal British Columbia, spot scarification appears to be
relatively ineffective in producing long-term control of salal [24].
Pretreatment levels can be reached by the third growing season [24].
Blade scarification was more effective, reducing cover to 6 percent but
resulted in significant site degradation [24].  Details on mechanical
treatments are available [24,41,135,136].

Biomass:  In general, aboveground biomass of salal appears to be
inversely proportional to the amount of overstory foliage [85]:

                              stand age
                              (years)
                      22          30          42          73

salal
biomass (kg/ha)   6300.6      4112.2      3394.0      1010.2

Heavy fertilizer application can decrease the aboveground biomass of
salal [117].

Wildlife:  Salal fruit production may be limited beneath a closed canopy
[15].  Disturbances which eliminate portions of the overstory presumably
increase fruit production.  Where management goals are aimed at
increasing winter big game forage, evidence suggests that salal will
respond favorably to thinning [15].

Research indicates that mountain lion, coyote, and wolf urine can be
used to inhibit or stop deer use of salal browse [124].

Livestock:  Salal is susceptible to trampling damage [102].

Chemical composition:  Evidence suggests that salal may be somewhat
allelopathic [25,136,141].  The foliage and roots of salal are resistant
to decay and can reduce decomposition and water availability [79].

Related categories for Species: Gaultheria shallon | Salal