Sagebrush?
Yes.
Around Oregon's Glass Buttes one will find 5 species. Low sage where the soil is less that 18 to 20 inches deep. Soils get very wet as spring snows melt due to shallow bedrock or a clay layer, the ground will drain though. Never any taller than knee high and typically half that. Pronghorn like extensive stands are they're able to open it up and run through that ground.
Wyoming Big Sage on soils from 2 to 3 feet deep. Usually gets about waist high.
On the deepest soils, 3 ft to infinity is Tall or Basin Big Sagebrush which can be 4 to 8 ft tall. In the early days settlers looked for extensive stands of big sage. Makes great farmland if water is available.
Next is Mountain Big Sage usually in areas exceeding about 4,500 ft in elevation. About the same stature as Wyoming but with a different growth form with all of the flowering stems emerging from the top of the shrub's canopy.
Last is Silver Sagebrush found in small basins that have no drainage. These will hold standing water in the spring a phenomena the other species cannot tolerate.
None of them are truly palatable to stock and/or most wildlife. Too many nasty chemicals. Pronghorn and Sage Grouse are the exceptions with sage often making up to 80% of their winter diets. Chew up a leaf or two and one will understand.
Cattle will eat sage bark and the dead twigs if they are indeed desperate, but it's a weight losing starvation deal.
The only thing approaching a tree out there is Western Juniper. Also some Mountain Mahogany that's classified as a shrub rarely exceeding 15 ft in height. Mahogany though is great winter forage for deer and elk.
Last edited by 1minute; 07/11/22.
