Leasing to Restore
Competitive Bidding for Livestock Removal
Nearly 30 years ago, Western Watersheds Project made headlines by bidding on and winning the Lake Creek state grazing lease on school trust lands in the mountains of central Idaho.
After a long and widely publicized court battle, WWP officially acquired this lease.
The Lake Creek parcel sits nestled in a semi-arid valley, within the East Fork Salmon River watershed. Bordered on the south by the Jim McClure-Jerry Peak Wilderness, this riparian corridor is an important area for wildlife.
In 1994, WWP began the passive restoration process on what was at the time a cattle-blasted patch of sagebrush and eroding stream banks. Photos taken during this period show the extent of the damage.
July 1994: Years of trampling and heavy grazing had compacted the soil, removed much of the riparian vegetation, and collapsed the banks of Lake Creek into the stream channel.
July 1994: Grasses, forbs, and other vegetation were extirpated or grazed to stubble, while weeds and other undesirable plants moved in, reducing wildlife habitat and cover.
September 2021: Undertaken in the midst of an ongoing and unprecedented drought, a recent visit to the Lake Creek parcel revealed a landscape transformed.
Freed from the impacts of grazing, streamside vegetation has rebounded. Glimpses of Lake Creek are now only occasionally caught through the dense thicket of willows and grasses.
A lush riparian corridor now winds its way along the valley floor. Stream banks and soils are slowly re-stabilizing as the recovery process continues, nearly 30 years later.
Just upstream, beavers have returned to the watershed, working their magic by slowing stream flows, raising the water table, and providing high quality habitat for a host of wildlife species.
Remarkably, this transformation was accomplished not by elaborate or expensive restoration techniques, but through one very simple act:
The removal of livestock.
Now, more than 25 years after winning the Lake Creek lease, WWP once again seeks to restore state trust lands using the competitive bidding process.
In August of 2021, WWP bid on another Idaho state grazing lease, this time in the majestic Sawtooth Valley. The 624 acre Champion Creek parcel contains its namesake creek, as well as a stretch of Fourth of July Creek, just above their confluence with the Salmon River.
The Lake Creek and Champion Creek grazing lease parcels
Both listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act, bull trout (left) and Snake River steelhead (right) rely on Champion and Fourth of July Creeks for crucial spawning habitat
Both streams in the leased parcel have been designated as critical habitat for bull trout and steelhead by the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service.
Use the wipe line to toggle back and forth between Snake River steelhead (pink line) and Bull trout (orange line) USFWS designated critical habitat on Champion and Fourth of July Creeks (parcel bounded in purple)
With a winning bid of $8,200, WWP secured a 20 year lease on Champion Creek with the intention of halting and reversing the degradation caused by decades of livestock grazing.
Much like Lake Creek 30 years ago, Champion Creek is in bad shape (see photos below). A recent visit to document current conditions showed extensive erosion, collapsing banks, a near complete absence of streamside willows, and largely grassless uplands of damaged sagebrush and pulverized soil. A heavily trafficked domestic sheep trail parallels the creek, a clearly visible, dust choked ribbon of denuded and severely compacted ground running along the waters edge.
A visit in early September of 2021 revealed the extensive damage caused by years of intense livestock grazing on Champion Creek
Willows and other riparian plant species have nearly disappeared from Champion Creek
This level of ecological damage is an all too common sight on grazed public lands throughout the West. Decades of abuse, mismanagement, and the inability or unwillingness of agencies to implement or enforce basic regulations has left vast swaths of these lands barren and severely degraded. WWP’s acquisition of the Champion Creek lease presents an opportunity to reverse this trend in a small but ecologically significant portion of the Sawtooth Valley.
Overbrowsed and damaged willows, still hanging on. Notice the sagebrush encroaching - a sign of drying soil and a dropping water table
Despite the overall bleakness of conditions observed on Champion Creek, minute indicators of landscape resilience and recovery potential were also noted. Though clearly over browsed and struggling, the few remaining willows continue to hold on in the rare places where the soil is still moist and relatively intact. Additionally, several large bull trout were seen making their way upstream to spawn. These fish have only recently recolonized Champion Creek after years of it being completely dewatered by irrigation diversion in its lower reaches. Now, with the grazing pressure alleviated, the struggling willows can expand and repopulate, while the bull trout stand to gain improved spawning habitat through stabilized, revegetated banks and reduced sedimentation. Of course, all of this will take time, but the process has begun, and WWP will be closely documenting this recovery as it unfolds in the years to come.
Though relatively small in terms of acreage, and in terms of the broader problem of overgrazing on public lands, recovery stories like these provide a tremendously powerful conservation tool. They are real life examples of landscape recovery from livestock grazing. They are living, breathing, tangible proof of a very simple concept, a concept that can be easily and inexpensively applied to the countless acres of overgrazed and degraded public lands throughout the American West.
Imagining a brighter, greener future for Champion Creek
