Redd Counts Hanford Vegetation Map . The Hanford Site was established in central Washington State in the early 1940s as part of the Manhattan Project. Plutonium for nuclear weapons was created and refined on the site for 50 years.
Information is available about the history of the site.
For both security and public safety, access to the production facilities and a large buffer zone was strictly controlled. This desert site contains abundant native wildlife. The Hanford Site is bounded on the west by Rattlesnake Mountain, a large, treeless basalt mountain. The ALE Reserve and the encompassing Research Park have provided the foundation for several long-term ecological studies. While the data collected from these studies were designed to answer specific research questions, the length and consistency of the records enable the data to be used to answer broader questions relating to the maintenance of species, environmental restoration, and land management.