Cows in Range Creek? Grazing to resume to reduce fire threat

Faced with the persistent threat of wildfire in remote Range Creek Canyon, the University of Utah proposes bringing cattle back to the archaeological research area in the hopes of knocking back invasive cheatgrass. Conditions were so hazardous last summer that rockfall triggered a fire that burned 900 acres up canyon from the field station. The Lighthouse Fire was the fourth since the canyon southeast of Price came into public ownership a decade ago, according to Duncan Metcalfe, the U. anthropology professor who oversees excavations there. Through a program of "prescriptive" grazing, Metcalfe hopes a couple hundred cows can devour much of the cheatgrass that carpets the canyon floor every spring. This two-foot-high annual dries out early and can easily ignite by the time fire season hits. But cheatgrass, though nutritious, is palatable for only a brief window in the spring, perhaps a week or two, before its seed heads cure into prickly pods. The canyon had been grazed for more than a century while the Wilcox family owned the bottom lands in the lower canyon and controlled the surrounding public lands. A decade ago they transferred 1,513 acres to the state, which has entrusted the U.’s Natural History Museum of Utah with managing the undisturbed archaeological resources along with two adjacent 640-acre sections of state land. Grazing is allowed under the conservation easement attached to the former Wilcox land, which is to be managed primarily for research and the preservation of its ancient Fremont Indian sites. The Bureau of Land Management administers the slopes towering above the canyon floor. No cattle have been here since the transfer except for some limited grazing in 2006-07...more