Project Details

Provide evidence about the nature of the problem and the need to address it. Identify the significance of the problem using a variety of data sources. For example, if a habitat restoration project is being proposed to benefit greater sage-grouse, describe the existing plant community characteristics that limit habitat value for greater sage-grouse and identify the changes needed for habitat improvement.

Provide an overall goal for the project and then provide clear, specific and measurable objectives (outcomes) to be accomplished by the proposed actions. If possible, tie to one or more of the public benefits UWRI is providing.

Aspen is among the most biodiverse vegetation types in the Intermountain West stands and can play a disproportionate role in ecosystems relative to the amount of land occupied. Isolated seral aspen stands in the East Tintic and Onaqui Mountains are dying due to conifer encroachment.  Without disturbance they risk being lost.

Conifer encroachment into aspen stands results in increased competition for light and resources.  Aspen are shade intolerant and require periodic disturbance to stimulate suckering, remove competition from conifer, and maintain open canopy conditions.  As aspen habitat age and are encroached by conifer, ecosystem function and wildlife habitat quality decreases. The aspen stands within the East Tintic and Onaqui mountains are small, remote, and isolated, and can provide highly valuable habitat to avian and terrestrial wildlife. Conifer encroachment into aspen stands also reduces the light and space available for a healthy understory, reducing the amount and quality of grass and forb species available for forage. By opening up stands, more area is realized for grass, forb, palatable brush and aspen shoots, increasing carrying capacity for ungulates and other wildlife species.

Additionally, increased fuel loading within the aspen stands due to conifer encroachment, increases the likelihood of higher-severity wildfire and reduces the capacity for healthy aspen stands to act as a natural fire barrier.

Without treatment these stands will continue to decline eventually resulting in the loss of the aspen resource within these watersheds.

LOCATION: Justify the proposed location of this project over other areas, include publicly scrutinized planning/recovery documents that list this area as a priority, remote sensing modeling that show this area is a good candidate for restoration, wildlife migration information and other data that help justify this project's location.

TIMING: Justify why this project should be implemented at this time. For example, Is the project area at risk of crossing an ecological or other threshold wherein future restoration would become more difficult, cost prohibitive, or even impossible.

BLM WDD Management Plans
1)	Pony Express Resource Management Plan (BLM 1990), as amended:
a)	Wildlife and Fisheries: Decision 4 (protect habitat values), Decision 5 (improve crucial habitats), Decision 10 (upland game birds).
b)	Fire Management: Decision 1 (fire suppression).
c)	Range: Decision 1 (forage use).

2)	Salt Lake District Proposed Fire Management Plan Amendment (BLM 1998):
a)	The FMP specifically mentions the reintroduction of fire into the ecosystem to meet desired resource management objectives (p. 7).'Vegetation management would include a wide variety of management activities including prescribed fire, mechanical manipulation, seeding to a less flammable and more desired species, fuel break establishment, and other strategies (p. 8).'

3)	Rangeland Health Standards and Guidelines for Healthy Rangelands. BLM Utah State Office (1997). Standard 3:
a)	Desired species...are maintained at a level appropriate for the site and species involved. As indicated by: frequency, diversity, density, age classes, and productivity of desired native species necessary to ensure reproductive capability and survival.

4)	Utah Wildlife Action Plan. DWR Publication Number 15-14, State of Utah, Department of Natural Resources, Division of Wildlife Resources, Effective 2015-2025:
a)	The proposed action supports mitigating threats to Aspen-Conifer including: 
i)	Increasing disturbance from either prescribed or natural fire. Recent studies have shown that larger scale burns (e.g., 5,000 acres) that burn more intensely have been the most successful in terms of aspen regeneration. Higher-intensity burns stimulate higher numbers of young aspen per unit area, than lower-intensity burns. A larger treatment area distributes ungulate browse pressure, allowing most young aspen stems to reach a safe height.
ii)	Applying mechanical disturbance agents such as timber harvest. This can also be used to stimulate aspen regeneration and avoid or reduce resource losses to conifer beetles. As with fire, larger mechanical treatment areas serve to distribute browsing pressure and reduce damage to individual stems, increasing regeneration success.
iii)	Monitoring smaller, naturally-occurring or human-created disturbances for ungulate damage, and taking follow-up actions such as fencing, hazing, hunting, and/or domestic grazing management, may be required to prevent or reduce damage caused by domestic, wild, or feral ungulates.

5)	Utah Mule Deer Statewide Management Plan. Utah Division of Wildlife Resources:
a)	Section IV Statewide Management Goals and Objectives. This proposal will address Habitat Objective 2: Improve the quality and quantity of vegetation for mule deer on a minimum of 500,000 acres of crucial range by 2019 (see pages 19 and 20). 
i)	Strategy B: Work with land management agencies, conservation organizations, private landowners, and local leaders through the regional Watershed Restoration Initiative working groups to identify and prioritize mule deer habitats that are in need of enhancement or restoration.
ii)	Strategy D: Initiate broad scale vegetative treatment projects to improve mule deer habitat with emphasis on drought or fire damaged sagebrush winter ranges, ranges that have been taken over by invasive annual grass species, and ranges being diminished by encroachment of conifers into sagebrush or aspen habitats, ensuring that seed mixes contain sufficient forbs and browse species. 
iii)	Strategy F: Encourage land managers to manage portions of pinion-juniper woodlands and aspen/conifer forests in early successional stages.

6)	Utah County Coordinated Resources Management Plan:
a)	Fire Management
i)	4. Policies
(1)	B. Wildland fire should be utilized to protect, maintain, and enhance resources and, when possible, will be allowed to function in its natural ecological role.
ii)	5. Desired Management Practices
(1)	A. Use pre-planned prescribed fire resulting from planned or unplanned ignitions to accomplish resource management objectives, such as reducing fuel load build-up, range or wildlife habitat improvement, etc.
b)	Forestry
i)	4. Policies
(1)	B. Utah County encourages federal and state agencies to adopt and maintain scientifically sound forest management policies based on high quality, recently acquired data and to pursue multiple use of public forest resources to provide sustainable and continuous yield of timber, forage, firewood, wildlife, fisheries, recreation, and water.
(2)	C. The county supports prescribed burns as a fuels reduction management tool for resource enhancement when used in conjunction with forest thinning and post treatment salvage or in areas that physically cannot be mechanically thinned when such burns comply with air quality regulations.

7)	The Utah Smoke Management Plan (1999, 2006 revision): 
a)	By using mechanical mastication this plan will accomplish Goal #5, Use of alternative methods to burning for disposing of or reducing the amount of wildland fuels on lands in the State (p3).

8)	State of Utah Hazard Mitigation Plan (March 2011): 
a)	This plan accomplishes statewide goals including, 1) Protection of natural resources and the environment, when considering mitigation measures and 2) Minimize the risk of wildfire (p12).

9)	A Collaborative Approach for Reducing Wildland Fire Risks to Communities and the Environment 10-Year Comprehensive Strategy Implementation Plan (U.S. Department of the Interior and the U.S. Department of Agriculture Forest Service 2002): 
a)	1) Improve fire prevention and suppression; 2) Reduce hazardous fuels; and 3) Maintain and restore fire adapted ecosystems.

10)	Secretarial Order 3336 -- Implementation Plan: Rangeland, Fire Prevention, Management and Restoration.
a)	Section 7b(iii) -- Expand the focus on fuels reduction opportunities and implementation
b)	Section 7b(iv) -- Fully integrate the emerging science of ecological resiliency into design of habitat management, fuels management, and restoration projects.
11) 	Utah Forest Action Plan 2016
- Use all available management tools, including forest industry, to restore and maintain healthy ecosystems. 
- Utah's forested resources are used to meet public need while being appropriately managed to provide sustainability for future generations. 
Utah State Coordinated Implementation Plan for bird Conservation in Utah: (a) aspen is identified as a Priority B habitat as importance to birds and (b) 19 species of birds in Utah are found in aspen habitats.

12) DEER HERD UNIT MANAGEMENT PLAN
Deer Herd Unit # 19
West Desert

HABITAT MANAGEMENT OBJECTIVES
 -Maintain mule deer habitat throughout the unit by protecting and enhancing existing
crucial habitats and mitigating for losses due to natural and human impacts.
 -Seek cooperative projects to improve the quality and quantity of deer habitat.
- Promote enhancement of habitat security and escapement areas for deer.
Habitat Protection and Maintenance
- Work with public land management agencies to develop specific vegetative objectives to maintain
the quality of important deer use areas.
- Continue to coordinate with land management agencies in planning and evaluating resource uses
and developments that could impact habitat quality.
- Work toward long-term habitat protection and preservation through the use of agreements with
land management agencies and local governments, and through the use of conservation
easements on private lands.

Habitat Improvement
- Cooperate with federal land management agencies and private landowners in carrying out habitat
improvement projects.

List management plans where this project will address an objective or strategy in the plan. Describe how the project area overlaps the objective or strategy in the plan and the relevance of the project to the successful implementation of those plans. It is best to provide this information in a list format with the description immediately following the plan objective or strategy.

If applicable, detail how the proposed project will significantly reduce the risk of fuel loading and/or continuity of hazardous fuels including the use of fire-wise species in re-seeding operations. Describe the value of any features being protected by reducing the risk of fire. Values may include; communities at risk, permanent infrastructure, municipal watersheds, campgrounds, critical wildlife habitat, etc. Include the size of the area where fuels are being reduced and the distance from the feature(s) at risk.

Describe how the project has the potential to improve water quality and/or increase water quantity, both over the short and long term. Address run-off, erosion, soil infiltration, and flooding, if applicable.

Description of efforts, both completed and planned, to bring the proposed action into compliance with any and all cultural resource, NEPA, ESA, etc. requirements. If compliance is not required enter "not applicable" and explain why not it is not required.

Describe the actions, activities, tasks to be implemented as part of the proposed project; how these activities will be carried out, equipment to be used, when, and by whom.

Describe plans to monitor for project success and achievement of stated objectives. Include details on type of monitoring (vegetation, wildlife, etc.), schedule, assignments and how the results of these monitoring efforts will be reported and/or uploaded to this project page. If needed, upload detailed plans in the "attachments" section.

List any and all partners (agencies, organizations, NGO's, private landowners) that support the proposal and/or have been contacted and included in the planning and design of the proposed project. Describe efforts to gather input and include these agencies, landowners, permitees, sportsman groups, researchers, etc. that may be interested/affected by the proposed project. Partners do not have to provide funding or in-kind services to a project to be listed.

Detail future methods or techniques (including administrative actions) that will be implemented to help in accomplishing the stated objectives and to insure the long term success/stability of the proposed project. This may include: post-treatment grazing rest and/or management plans/changes, wildlife herd/species management plan changes, ranch plans, conservation easements or other permanent protection plans, resource management plans, forest plans, etc.

Potential for the proposed action to improve quality or quantity of sustainable uses such as grazing, timber harvest, biomass utilization, recreation, etc. Grazing improvements may include actions to improve forage availability and/or distribution of livestock.