WildEarth Guardians

Sunday, September 10, 2006
WildEarth Guardians: Environmental Group Bids on Grazing Leases

Group plans to ''unranch'' grazing lease by restoring riparian habitat
Contact: Staci Matlock Santa Fe New Mexican

Santa Fe-based WildEarth Guardians is bidding for two more grazing leases totaling 2,000 acres of New Mexico state trust lands.

The environmental organization - which opposes livestock grazing on public lands - currently holds the leases to three former grazing allotments totaling more than 3,000 acres. The first one the group acquired in the mid-1990s was along the Rio Embudo.

In the current competitive bid, WildEarth Guardians offered to pay at least twice what the ranchers are currently paying. Revenues from the leases benefit the public schools and colleges in the state.

The site of one of the competing bids includes 640 acres and more than a mile of the Rio Puerco northwest of Albuquerque, which contains potential habitat for the endangered Southwest willow flycatcher. The current lease paid by the rancher is $500 a year, according to WildEarth Guardians. The second site is a 1,440-acre parcel located northwest of Alamogordo with more than a mile of the Lost River, which provides an essential water source for the state endangered White Sands Pupfish. The current lease is $900 a year.

If the group wins the leases, it will fence out cattle, remove non-native vegetation and work to restore streams and wetlands, said Jim Matison, WildEarth Guardians restoration program director.

One of WildEarth Guardians’ existing leases near Rio Embudo also is up for renewal, and someone else is bidding against the group for the lease, according to Jerry King of the State Land Office. The State Land will decide on the winning bids in October.

Copyright 2006 Santa Fe New Mexican - Reprinted with permission