In southwest Montana, a creative partnership is improving sagebrush habitat, providing jobs, and empowering youth, one project at a time.

For eight years, SGI and partners have conducted a long-term conifer removal project in the Warner Mountains in SE Oregon. In addition to removing encroaching trees, university researchers studied how the removal affected sage grouse.

The Etchart Family worked with the NRCS, TNC, and the CO Cattlemen’s Agricultural Land Trust to place much of the ranch in a conservation easement protecting this prime working land from development and preserving habitat for elk, deer, and sage grouse.

New study shows that sage grouse population growth rates are 12% higher following long-term conifer removal.

New conservation easement in Washington state preserves more than 2,000 acres of native sagebrush range in critical sage grouse habitat, adding to a 6,800-acre easement the neighboring ranch placed under a conservation easement in 2019.

The Burke Family’s long partnership with NRCS has led to better forage for livestock and wildlife and, in 2017, their ranch was protected in perpetuity through a NRCS-supported conservation easement.

The Blair family has worked hard to make their ranch profitable and resilient which benefits wildlife and the next generation. Read all about their work with SGI and other groups that have helped them earn a 2020 Leopold Conservation Award.

Learn about the Strategic Action Watershed Team and how these partner-positions are adding significant capacity to NRCS offices across the West.