What is the Healthy Forest Initiative? The Healthy Forest Initiative is a joint effort between the Fort Collins Conservation District, the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS), and numerous local partners to bring the knowledge, technical experience, and funding to private landowners for forest restoration activities on their land. This collaborative approach to private land management addresses multiple resource concerns on the Front Range including wildfire hazards, water quality, erosion control, wildlife diversity, and many more. Through the NRCS and The Farm Bill, the Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP) helps subsidize the costs of restorative efforts on private land. Even though many restoration projects already occur on federal land, approximately 30% of forested acreage is privately owned, requiring additional effort and focus on private lands to achieve broad-scale effects.
The philosophy of the Conservation District and NRCS is to restore forests to their historical state prior to human influence. Since the mid-1800s, human influence on forestland has resulted in forests that are very different than those prior to settlement. In general, tree densities have increased and forests have become more uniform in age, species type, and structure (less variety in meadows, streams, etc.). As a result, diversity in our forest habitats has declined over time. Since wildlife species require a variety of habitat types to thrive, forest diversity is critical to the success of wildlife populations. Insects and diseases can kill an entire forest when the trees do not reflect historical conditions. In addition, our highly dense forests lead to intense and far-reaching wildfires that impact human lives.
By restoring our forests to a state that is more representative of how they were structured over 100 years ago, our forest land will have higher a degree of resilience to wildfire, bugs and diseases, and droughts or floods. When creating a forest improvement plan, we consider all of these ecosystem impacts to ensure we’re providing an all-inclusive and ecology-based management plan.
The Fort Collins Conservation District has a dedicated Conservation Forester that can help you determine if you are a good candidate for the program. Additional information can be found on FCCD’s website: http://fortcollinscd.or