ENMU-Ruidoso awarded $449,999 U.S. Forest Service collaborative restoration grant

ENMU-Ruidoso was recently awarded a $449,999 U.S. Forest Service Collaborative Forest Restoration Program grant to fund prescription treatments on national forest service and Mescalero land. The grant, written by Chair of Mathematics and Sciences and Assistant Professor Quentin Hays, sets aside money to harvest trees and implement prescribed fire on Lincoln National Forest and Mescalero Apache Tribal lands as part of a forest resiliency plan that also takes into account habitat of the threatened Mexican spotted owl. "This allows us to brings the parties to the table and enables us to act as unbiased intermediaries to bring the tribe, the Bureau of Indian Affairs and the U.S. Forest Service together to talk about issues that were hard to talk about in the past," Hays said. "It helps us to develop common goals for forest management taking into account threatened species, the changing climate and increased prevention of wildfires with the goal of promoting forest resiliency." A long-contested issue, the Mexican spotted owl was listed as threatened in 1993 under the Endangered Species Act. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service completed a recovery plan in 1995. The original plan was updated in 2012 to include guidelines for forest management in the face of recently increasing large-scale wildfires. Hays said approximately 60,000 acres on the Sacramento District of the Lincoln National Forest are affected by owl-recovery guidelines. The Rocky Mountain Research Station (USFS) in Cloudcroft conducted a long-term study of Mexican spotted owls in the region, and the grant will build on its findings and implement treatments on Lincoln National Forest and Mescalero Apache Tribal lands within the owl habitat...more