Simple technique helps ranchers and threatened sage-grouse weather drought
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Jayme DeLoss
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A low-tech method developed by Colorado State University and partners has revolutionized how federal agencies, conservation organizations and ranchers restore degraded meadows and ranchlands across the West.
A study led by CSU researcher Renée Rondeau has found that strategically placing rocks in the wet meadows of Gunnison’s sagebrush hills slows water, reconnects the floodplain and increases wetland plant cover by 40%, despite unprecedented drought in the West. This technique benefits ranchers and the Gunnison sage-grouse, which is federally listed as a threatened species.
Results published in the Journal of Restoration Ecology show that low-tech restoration structures were effective at rewetting intermittent streams and wet meadows within the arid landscape, even though six of the nine monitored years were considered drought years. Non-native invasive weeds declined, while forbs and grasses important to sage-grouse and livestock operations increased.
“The amazing part of this project was how well this technique worked on intermittent streams, which occupy vastly more area than perennial streams in the arid Southwest,” said Rondeau, who is a conservation planner and ecologist in CSU’s Colorado Natural Heritage Program. “This research has the power to transform the way federal agencies are restoring sage-grouse habitat.”
Co-author Bill Zeedyk, head of Zeedyk Ecological Consulting and a former U.S. Forest Service employee, developed the restoration technique.
“This project has been 12 years and thousands of hours in the making,” Zeedyk said. “It is the culmination of work by a huge team.”
The Bureau of Land Management, USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service, Intermountain West Joint Venture and private landowners have adopted Zeedyk’s restoration method, with other watersheds across the western United States emulating the Gunnison model.
“The Natural Resources Conservation Service was so impressed with the results that they included it in the 2018 Farm Bill, so private landowners can apply for funding to implement this technique,” Rondeau said.
The NRCS provides financial and technical assistance for low-tech efforts including the Zeedyk method through its Framework for Conservation Action in the Sagebrush Biome and Climate-Smart Mitigation Activities supported by the Inflation Reduction Act.
Group effort
A public-private partnership – including ranchers, the Bureau of Land Management, the U.S. Forest Service, CSU Colorado Natural Heritage Program, Colorado Parks and Wildlife, The Nature Conservancy, the Upper Gunnison River Water Conservancy District, BIO-Logic and Zeedyk Ecological Consulting – formed the Gunnison Wet Meadow Restoration Project in 2011 to restore degraded wet meadows.
The partnership has built nearly 900 rock structures – known as Zeedyk structures – in seven watersheds across the sagebrush ecosystem of the Gunnison River Basin. They began building structures in 2012 and are still collecting vegetation data to assess changes.
Ranch owner Brett Redden, whose ranch was the first site to be restored, considered the project to be a success and shared photos of the results with his ranching community.
Gunnison Wet Meadow Restoration Project efforts continue, and Rondeau and her co-authors have expanded their work to other regions in Colorado.
“Habitat restoration around these streams will provide ecological benefits, including forage, cover, nesting, water and movement corridors for wildlife and livestock,” Rondeau said.