Letter of support sent for Critical Agricultural Research and Extension grant application
During the Nov. 25 administrative public hearing, the Board of Mesa County Commissioners ratified a letter to Colorado Parks and Wildlife (CPW) in support of a Critical Agricultural Research and Extension grant application submitted by CSU Extension.
The letter supports the grant proposal “Integrated Research and Extension to Foster Post-Wildfire Livestock Grazing and Landscape Recovery” submitted by Dr. Tony Vorster of Colorado State University, with Regional Rangeland Specialist at Colorado State University Extension, Retta Bruegger.
The proposal seeks to study post-fire impacts and grazing readiness post-wildfire across western Colorado, including the 2025 Turner Gulch Fire in Mesa County.
The letter follows:
The Mesa County Board of County Commissioners is pleased to offer our support of the USDANIFA-AFRI grant proposal, “Integrated Research and Extension to Foster Post-Wildfire Livestock Grazing and Landscape Recovery” submitted by Dr. Tony Vorster of Colorado State University, with Regional Rangeland Specialist at Colorado State University Extension, Retta Bruegger.
As with many Colorado counties, Mesa County experienced several fires in 2025, the largest of which burned more than 31,699 acres in the Unaweep Canyon. A significant portion of the acreage burned was agricultural pasture and a federal grazing allotment. The uncertainty surrounding the future of returning to the lease, combined with the urgent needs to relocate the cattle, has caused considerable stress for the producers reliant on this land.
The project proposed through this grant application aims to improve post-wildfire decision-making in Colorado and beyond. The team will engage agricultural producers, federal agencies, and other groups and stakeholders to better understand and inform the post-fire grazing decision-making process. Research will be conducted using field data and remote sensing to characterize the rates of post-fire vegetation recovery, and use these data to help improve decisions after fire that supports agricultural producers and landscape recovery.
Rangelands, forests, and shrublands are critical grazing areas for the state’s livestock industry. Unfortunately, these lands burn in wildfires, including this past summer where over 200,000 acres burned in western Colorado, with lasting impacts for many years. Grazing lands burned in wildfire are large, remote, and often understudied, and recovery can be highly variable across the landscape. This means that there can be a lack of information on vegetation recovery, which can lead to uncertainty and even conflict on when it’s appropriate to graze these lands after fire. This project would provide value to our community and livestock growers by providing information that can help inform post-fire grazing decisions to protect the land and support the viability of the livestock industry in our state.
Mesa County is optimistic that this research and our engagement as an advisory board member will identify potential risks and offer implementation solutions to those risks within Mesa County. Further, we hope to gain a better understanding of post fire recovery on agricultural lands and the decision-making processes that inform our federal land management partners responsible for returning cattle to the allotments.
We sincerely hope that you will recognize the value of the proposed project as it addresses the critical need of supporting agriculture post-wildfire in the western United States.
