Besides eliminating understory, P/J invading into sage-steppe provide raptor perches and contribute to lower habitat quality for northern sage grouse year around. Sage grouse are present in this area (author has personally observed birds on numerous occasions during late summer typically around Rocky Res...see images attached) and are likely benefitting from adjacent similar habitat improvement on hundreds of acres of BLM lands by showing up more frequently and in new treated areas. There are no known leks on the Forest, as such, these birds are likely coming from the Dog Valley lek or others on adjacent BLM in Buckskin and/or Bear Valleys to the south and southeast. Based on the Forest Service Sage Grouse plan amendment, our Habitat Assessment Framework (HAF) monitoring suggests much of the area is satisfactory for shrub cover and vegetation height but P/J encroachment threatens entire area (see aerial imagery attached and DWR, Range Trend 20 year spread trend photos attached). This area is also high value big game winter range, and always in demand by populations at high levels based on plan objectives. Riparian areas and open lands are by far our best livestock grazing areas and improving uplands should reduce pressure in other areas by securing sage-steppe and halting conversion to P/J woodland. A final need would be to benefit Bonneville Cutthroat Trout, an endemic population in Birch Creek West, by removing P/J in the riparian area.

Remove invading Pinyon and Juniper to improve sage-steppe community health, quality and improve habitat conditions for sage grouse, i.e P/J cover less than 10% in open key sage-steppe bench areas. In riparian areas, especially Birch Creek west, improve habitat quality for remnant BCT by lowering the risk to inappropriate fire frequency and intensity. By leaving conifer carcasses in stream corridor we intend to encourage aspen and cottonwood recruitment by lowering competition with conifers and making access to young ramets for grazing ungulates more difficult. This will also reduce trampling of streambanks for a time. Removal of P/J to also enhance the big game and small fauna winter range forage and habitat quality. Lastly, reduce the risk of high severity wildfire by changing the amount and height of fuel available for wildfire. Through the contracting process we are targeting the highest value sage grouse habitat (non-mountainous) portions that are primarily Phase I P/J and will address heavier density P/J with other projects. Thus, little to no seeding is anticipated at this time with adequate understory in the targeted treatment areas. Also, areas for big game security cover and movement corridors will be left where appropriate, especially where they coincide with adjacent BLM habitat.

Primary threat is continual understory loss due to eventual and complete invasion by conifers and/or eventual catastrophic wildfire and loss of the preferred multi-age shrub-steppe community now in place. This has been dramatically characterized by DWR's Range Trend Crew in the Rocky re-seed site # 22-9 since collecting data in 1985 and taking photos since 1998...see images attached. We are progressing from Phase I to Phase II as chronicled in the Rocky Basin by DWR data and if not reversed, the cost for this treatment may double and time to bring it back to any level of plant and shrub diversity may triple. There are still shrub-steppe vegetative components in place but P/J invasion is the dominant trend. Threat to sage grouse of declining habitat quantity and quality due to community conversion through P/J invasion that may be hastened by eventual fire. Riparian communities are suffering from P/J invasion and are lacking aspen/cottonwood recruitment and poor bank stability...all could be improved by this treatment. Risks to mule deer and elk relate to declining winter forage quality and quantity as the P/J woodland increases and near total loss if eventual fire converts area to exotic invasives.

This project is consistent with the Fishlake National Forest Plan (1986 as amended) for wildlife habitat enhancement, and fuels management. More importantly, it is in concert with the Utah State Northern Sage Grouse Plan AND Forest Plan amendment process, across it's entire range, and decision of 2016. Its also supported by the Bonneville Cutthroat Trout range-wide Conservation Agreement and Strategy. This project is part of a larger effort by the Forest Service, Beaver District to improve sage grouse habitat, big game habitat, conserve sage-steppe, improve watershed condition, reduce fuel loading, and protect against catastrophic wildfire. Utah's WAP and other planning documents emphasize the importance of maintaining and improving current sage grouse and potential habitat. Both the Utah Statewide deer and elk plans identify conserving and improving available winter range through removal of P/J and the local DWR Unit #25. Beaver County's Draft Resource Mangament Plan, adopted June 2017, states "Land management agencies shall take actions to control and eradicate harmful and invasive noxious weeds and aggressively treat pinyon-juniper encroachment on habitats which benefit wildlife.", on page 128 under "Wildlife... Objectives".

Treating the vegetation in these areas will result in multiple benefits, which include but are not limited to, improving and protecting current habitat for wildlife dependent upon these various ecosystems, improving native species diversity, reducing hazardous fuel accumulations and breaking up the continuous fuel bed of pinion/juniper that currently exists on the south west side of the Beaver Ranger District. This treatment will promote a more fire resilient environment that reduces the risk for large scale, intense unwanted wildland fires, with less risk to public and firefighter safety. Fire risk would be reduced to multiple watersheds including the Birch Creek West draining that contains Bonneville Cutthroat Trout. Existing wildfire risk index in the project area ranges from moderate-high to very-very low, however given the recent fire history in the area and looking at fire modeling results, an unwanted wildfire in this area at the 97th percentile weather would quickly spread into high risk areas and threaten multiple watersheds, private lands and numerous other values not only wildlife habitat, but structures, culinary water systems, utility corridors to name a few. The majority of this project is within fire regime III -- 35-100+ year frequency and mixed severity (less than 75% of the dominant overstory vegetation replaced); The Fire Regime Condition Class (FRCC) is estimated to be both moderate (FRCC 2) and high (FRCC 3) departure from the central tendency of the natural (historical) regime. The central tendency is a composite estimate of vegetation characteristics (species composition, structural stages, stand age, canopy closure, and mosaic pattern); fuel composition; fire frequency, severity, and pattern; and other associated natural disturbances. The majority of this project would be in FRCC 3. This project will improve the fire regime condition class to FRCC 1 and FRCC 2. The desire is to continue the beneficial work that has been completed on the BLM administered lands in this area and carry it forward onto the forest. This project will manipulate the vegetation in a manner that will modify fire behavior such that fire suppression personnel can safely initial attack unwanted wildfires in the area. These treatments will provide anchor points, safety zones, and buffer zones for values at risk such as powerlines, communities, range improvements. Instead of a crown fire that is wind driven with flame lengths of 30+ feet in Pinyon and Juniper requiring aerial resources to initial attach, this treatment will reduce the flame lengths to those that are easily managed with engines and hand crews.

South Creek, Big Twist, and Birch Creek west all drain into Minersville Reservoir which currently has a TMDL for Total Phosphorus loading and low dissolved oxygen (Utah Department of Environmental Quality, 2016). These impairments to beneficial uses are interrelated as elevations in nutrient levels result in increased algal biomass production and transport which increases biological oxygen demand (BOD) and decreases dissolved oxygen levels. The TMDL identifies that non-point sources are the primary cause for elevated total phosphorus levels including: cattle in riparian areas and stream channels and forest land management. The TMDL notes that overutilization of riparian areas can lead to increased erosion and sediment transport, which ultimately can cause and increased nutrient load and elevated nutrient transport. Similarly other management on NFS lands that increase erosion and runoff are implicated in elevating phosphorus levels in Minersville Reservoir. The TMDL calls for stabilizing slopes, installing vegetative buffer strips along stream channels, reestablishing vegetation in critical riparian areas and restricting cattle access to stream channels. It specifically calls out for projects to improve livestock distribution (Section 7.3.2.2.4), as well as pinyon and juniper removal to reduce runoff and erosion and promote better upland forage quality (Section 7.3.2.2.3). The benefits of healthy riparian vegetation and connected floodplains and wetlands to water quality, as well as water storage and release are well documented. Riparian vegetation buffers can trap sediment during overbank flow events and prevent sediment from overland runoff from reaching stream channels (Belt, O'Laughlin, & Merrill, 1992). Fine sediment input to streams can lead to an associated increase in nutrient loading, decreased dissolved oxygen and an increase in waterborne diseases. Stream bank stability is instrumental in preventing excessive erosion. Willow-sedge communities are among the best for maintaining stream bank stability (Winward, 2000). As mentioned earlier and prior to this project, approximately 1.3 miles of cattle proof fencing was constructed along South Creek to better manage livestock use in the area and reduce the potential for overutilization. As discussed elsewhere in this proposal improving uplands to have more grass, forbs, and shrubs in the understory can also improve water quality by leading to less generation of sediment during overland flow events and thereby delivering less sediment to a riparian area and stream. This project proposes to remove pinyon and juniper from sagebrush grass lands, mountain scrublands and riparian areas, which should result in immediate decreased sediment generation via lop and scatter from treatment covering bare ground (Cline et al. 2010). In the long-term mastication and lop and scatter treatments have been shown to increase the density and diversity of grasses and forbs reducing runoff and erosion (Ashcroft et al. 2017). Some research indicates that pinyon-juniper removal in mountain sagebrush can increase soil water availability (Roundy et al. 2014). The amount of soil water availability increases with the stage of PJ succession (i.e. Phase I removal results in the smallest increases, and Phase III removal results in the largest increases). This project proposes to remove Phase I-Phase II PJ from sagebrush grass lands, mountain scrublands and riparian areas over 4,577 acres. The PJ removal activities should have a net positive effect on increasing water yield/availability. Removal of Pinyon and Juniper trees will increase both water quality and quantity in the adjacent Birch Creek west, Big Twist, and South Creek watersheds. (Fewer evergreen trees using water year-round equals more ground water) Lop and scatter of conifers along the streams will secure stream-banks, reduce trampling of banks, and protect young aspen and cottonwood toward recruitment.

NEPA decision signed 2018. This project area is just 11% of a much larger analysis area documented in South Beaver EA, Kathy Johnson deciding official, Beaver District, Fishlake NF.

Hand cutting methods are anticipated, the trees cut with a chainsaw will be left on-site to decompose naturally and provide seed source protection and ground litter. Preferred method will be utilizing contract crews to lop and scatter tree material. This project is focusing on primarily Phase I P/J invasion with those areas of higher density (Phase I-2) to be addressed by other means, thus seeding is not anticipated for the lop and scatter.

Monitoring work is already in progress and being evaluated. In and around the project area are located approximately 10 DWR long term trend studies (22-11, 22-15, 22R-23, 22R-20, 22R-11, 22R-22, 22R-14, 22-9, 22R-25, and 22-16), only site 22-9 is on the Forest. Google Earth imagry already shows stark contrast between BLM and Forest lands in this vicinity due to P/J establishment. Known Sage grouse leks are monitored annually, and radio telemetry studies of grouse on BLM west of I-15 are adding to habitat use patterns in this part of the State. We conduct annual Migratory Bird surveys (Coyote Bench and Rocky Basin) and assist with deer and elk census and classification that DWR oversees and will continue in this area; thus documenting any changes in seasonal use patterns. Big game pellet group transects in area (Coyote Bench and Rocky Basin) estimate general days used per acre on these winter range areas and have been collected the past 6 years. Pre/Post treatment photos will be taken and analyzed to determine if the project objectives are met in 1,3,5,and 10 years.

The Utah Division of Wildlife has helped in the long term planning for treatments on the Beaver District. Our NEPA workload is aimed at proposing projects in the DWR's WRI Focus Areas to promote the tenets of the program. Dave Smedley and prior biologist have toured the area and understand the need. Beaver County Commissioners are aware of the project and the need to treat these areas for the reasons discussed above and fully support the work being done. Discussions with local DWR biologists and SFW Beaver Chapter Chair resulted in their verbal support for removing P/J mechanically verses burning, to conserve bitter brush on site. The BLM treated adjacent lands 5-7 years ago and the range has dramatically improved. The BLM is making us look like poor range managers here! For the last five years, approximately one mile of South Creek was fenced to exclude cattle while providing a water lane, and has been co-managed with grazing permittees and discussions about treating P/J on uplands are frequent and their approval unanimous.

Future management in this area will largely be dictated by the northern sage grouse livestock grazing parameters in maintaining sage brush and vegetation according to the guidelines. Also the BCT conservation agreement contains pertinent objectives for the fish bearing streams. Motorized travel is somewhat limited here due to big game winter range and prescribed fire will be minimized in these important sage-steppe areas to conserve sagebrush and cliffrose. Should our monitoring detect unforeseen impacts such as over grazing or increased unauthorized vehicle use, the District plans to utilize parameters of grazing AMP's and enforcement of the travel plan to remedy. As of now, we see no reason to totally rest from grazing given recent past patterns of utilization and the assumption that an increase in woody debris from this project should contribute to grass and forb/seed protection and more favorable rowing conditions.

The entire project area is currently part of the Forest livestock grazing program, i.e. the south creek cattle allotment, with an amalgam of members. With both low and high elevation pastures, use typically begins in the project area on June 15 if conditions permit. This planned work should soon provide both a higher density and more biomass for grazing cattle and eventually allow more time in these pastures rather than force cattle to move or be moved to higher pastures as utilization levels are met, thus spreading out use more evenly across the allotment. Any improvement in understory vegetation condition by removing P/J will directly benefit and contribute to forage available to livestock. This will promote livestock use in uplands and in turn will help alleviate pressure on adjacent riparian areas. For big game and sage grouse ,the value of healthy sage-steppe cannot be overstated. This is also a popular big game hunting area for general and late season big game hunts that will benefit from increased big game use related to higher habitat quality. Lastly, the sustainability of the remnant BCT population in Birch Creek is priceless as we see other populations suffer, even be lost to deleterious fire impacts, e.g. Briggs Creek in 2018.