Prescribed Grazing: Develop a Countywide Plan

Project Brief

Prescribed grazing (also known as prescribed herbivory) enables fuel treatment in sloped and difficult to access areas where other vegetation management options are challenging or impractical. Grazing is being utilized to reduce fire risk in rural, semi-rural and urban areas of the county, but the practice is not widely spread, the region has few prescribed grazing contractors, and most landowners and agencies lack experience with it as an approach to vegetation management. The RPP team developed an initial spatial model showing areas of intermediate slope in high fire risk areas that may be candidates for prescribed grazing. Building on this initial model, we recommend developing a county-wide prescribed grazing plan to identify areas of high fire risk where herbivory is likely the most cost effective vegetation management tool, identify and engage willing landowners, identify funding sources/models and ways to aggregate projects for grant applications, and develop educational materials for landowners and agencies to accelerate adoption. The Fire Safe Council received 1.9 million dollars in 2022 when they applied for funds for the front country based on numerous known areas that desired this treatment for fire fuel reduction. This planning effort helped to coordinate several of the participants. A pilot project for an 8000 acre HOA in Buellton is also underway, although that has not received funding yet. Capacity of local grazing operators is a limiting factor.

Status: Funded (Funding was received in August 2021 from the Santa Barbara Foundation for a South Santa Barbara County planning effort, though this remains a need for North County as well. CEQA funding was also included in the grant proposal, and recommended practices will be addressed during that analysis.)

Cost: Medium

Funding Sources: Fire Prevention Grant Cycle

Permitting: The California Vegetation Treatment Program (VTP) provides the overarching EIR for this concept, however this requires project-specific CEQA analysis (costs for CEQA were included in the grant received by the FSC. If prescribed grazing to reduce fuel loads is recommended in waterways, coordination with the Regional Water Quality Control Board (RWQCB) may be required.

Prescribed Herbivory/Grazing has the ability to improve vegetation management within the county on private and public lands. Appropriately applied, herbivory can reduce fire fuels, create mosaics of open space in thick brush, reduce invasive species, improve native habitat and maintain fuel treatments. It also prevents grassland transition to shrub-land, reducing the risk of high-severity fires in these areas. By using herbivory at scale, the area of fuel treatment can be increased, while reducing cost and maintenance. But implementing prescribed grazing requires collaboration amongst key players and landowners, and consistent funding. This proposal will develop a coordinated herbivory program for the South Coast/Santa Ynez Valley portions of Santa Barbara County on both private land and select public lands. While prescribed herbivory has already been implemented at Elings park and the San Marcos Preserve, the strategic vision of this plan would address additional high risk and inaccessible areas. This project will build upon regional planning efforts already underway and be instrumental in moving the adoption and implementation of herbivory across the region, yielding significant environmental and community benefits.

Desired Outcomes, Reasons for This Approach, Success Metrics

This project will develop a collaborative framework for the adoption of prescribed herbivory and a plan to expand its use regionally. Currently, there is little coordination among landowners and entities interested in prescribed herbivory. A regional plan would prioritize areas for grazing and coordinate landowners in strategic networks to increase regional fire prevention and ecological health. This networking effort would increase the capability for landowners to compete for state and federal funding. Funders have a strong interest in fire prevention and ecological restoration, and prescribed herbivory addresses both goals by reducing fuel loads as well as restoring native grasslands. It is estimated that 95 percent of grasslands have been lost in California, and prescribed herbivory can help restore them. Native grasslands also store water in their roots and increase the landscape’s resilience to fire. Our goal is to identify several bundles of projects that reach a fundable scale and to develop partnerships amongst landowners, the CRCD, and key partners. The effort would bring resources to the region for prescribed grazing as well as increase awareness of the ecological and community benefits of prescribed herbivory.

Urgent Need and Goals

Every year, Santa Barbara and neighboring counties are ravaged by wildfires. The severity, frequency, and cost of these fires is increasing in the face of a warming climate, chronic drought, increased development in the wilderness urban interface (WUI) and the spread of invasive species, creating catastrophic wildfires and risk of subsequent debris flows. There is an urgent need to develop cost-effective and ecologically sound solutions that mitigate fire risk, preserve community assets and increase habitat health. Prescribed grazing has the potential to improve land management and mitigate fire risk across grassland and shrub communities, particularly in areas with steeper slopes that are prone to landslides post fire, by reducing fuel loads, reducing the spread of invasive species, and avoiding conversion of grasslands to shrubs. Longer term goals include developing systems and partnerships that enable us to increase prescribed grazing capacity within the project area, increase the number of acres where prescribed grazing is deployed, and enable all priority areas suitable for prescribed grazing with willing landowners and land managers to be grazed regularly as part of regional fire prevention efforts.

Project Phases

This project will consist of 3 phases:

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Analyses: Using the RPP Spatial Decision Support System, identify the areas of high priority for fuel treatments that could most efficiently be implemented and yield the maximum community benefit. Deliverable outputs will include maps of appropriate areas as well as actionable but confidential lists of landowners and managers to engage during the outreach phase. Completion: 9/30/21

Community Engagement: Building on RPP outreach efforts, engage current and prospective prescribed grazing contractors to assess their capacity and expansion plans and contact priority landowners to assess their current use of prescribed herbivory, their interest in the practice, and their needs in terms of partnership, support, funding and technical assistance. Identify willing landowners and their needs for inclusion in future fire prevention and resilience grant cycles. Completion: 12/31/21

Aggregate Projects and Prep for Grants: Identify funding sources for future project implementation and bundle projects (estimating 5-10 to start) to match with future funding opportunities. Convene collaborative partners to prepare and submit grants as opportunities arise. Completion: 8/1/22

Elements for the Planning Process

Best management practices for targeted grazing (such as preserving shrub habitats while achieving fuel reduction goals) should be developed as part of the Plan, as well the following components:

-Develop a county wide map and calendar to guide decisions about where and when herbivory could be prescribed.

-Study the logistics, costs, considerations and benefits of using Herbivory and compare it to other strategies.

-Examine herbivory in collaboration and in context of current vegetation management practices.

-Determine when/where herbivory can be used as a maintenance practice to maintain fuel treatments or burned areas vs. using it as an initial treatment.

-Determine the benefits of various herbivores (sheep, goats, cattle) in different areas of the County.

-Develop protocols/BMPs from areas already utilizing herbivory practices.

-Create a platform for collaboration between herbivory clients to decrease costs and manage logistics.

-Expand the network of public and private stakeholders as part of an existing and future fuel treatment network.

-Understand the role of agriculture (grazing and ranch lands) into fire fuel management.

-Identify approved herbivory operators in the County, develop SOPs.

-Develop a public engagement plan to educate potential landowners/managers who are interested in using prescribed herbivory.

-Detail ecological impacts, liabilities and mitigation to safely manage risks.

-Identify funding sources not only limited to fuel management but including private and public sources for habitat improvement, climate change, carbon mitigation, coastal watershed management, resource management and agriculture.

-Incorporate these practices into existing/planned CWPPs as feasible.

Implementation Plan

Cachuma RCD will complete this work in close collaboration with a contractor, LegacyWorks Group (LWG). LWG specializes in creating collaborative community initiatives and developing innovative projects that help communities achieve their environmental and social goals. CRCD and LWG have an extensive history of developing carbon farm plans throughout the region as well as assisting with the development of geospatial modeling of potential compost application to rangelands for Santa Barbara County and working together to design the Conservation Blueprint, among other collaborative projects. LWG will complete the geospatial analysis and mapping portions of the proposed project. With this input, CRCD, LWG and other trusted organizations that have extensive networks and a proven track record of working with landowners will develop educational materials and engage potential landowners/managers in the market development phase. These entities will provide an essential bridge from a trusted network to engage and assist in aggregating potential projects.

Partner Roles, Responsibilities and Experience

CRCD is the project lead and will manage the project overall. LegacyWorks Group will conduct the analyses and develop the geospatial planning tools and identify potential landowners/managers of land that could benefit from the application of prescribed herbivory.

CRCD, LWG and other trusted partners will lead the outreach/education efforts with landowners and land managers.

Potential Herbivory Clients: The RPP has identified a number of private landowners ready to engage in prescribed grazing activities. We will be engaging with those landowners and land managers and adding to that list to add additional private landowners, neighborhood associations, fire districts, restoration groups and nonprofits including land trusts, as well as local municipalities, fire districts, county, state and federal agencies (TBD);

Potential Contract Grazers (Service Providers): Cuyama Lamb, and other current contract grazers. We will also research opportunities for expanding the pool of service providers.

Community Engagement

Prescribed grazing is identified in the RPP as a key strategy for mitigating fire risk to vulnerable and underserved communities, and this project will make it easier to deploy in those areas. This project will engage rural landowners and grazers directly in the project implementation and planning. This project has considerable potential for future scaling throughout the county and the wider region, if successful. Demonstrating the market utility (i.e., demand) and funding capacity for prescribed herbivory to develop significant community environmental benefits will be applicable to additional regions throughout the state. Education and Outreach is essential to this model and will assist in identifying/developing a network of landowners/managers and connecting them with service providers, as well as a template methodology/framework for replication in other communities throughout the state.

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