On the dry side of the Wasatch Range in the northeast corner of Utah, you can still find big sweeps of sagebrush freckled with pockets of aspen, mountain mahogany and black timber. Clear, cold creeks glide through native grasses and forbs that have never felt the bite of the plow. There are ranches where it is possible to spot cattle, sheep, elk, mule deer and antelope all scattered across one long ridge. The Milky Way shines bright enough to throw the shadows of aspen across the sage. This is the home of the Birch Creek Ranch.<\/p>\n
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Physically and philosophically, the ranch lies closer to Lonetree, Wyoming, and Paris, Idaho, than Salt Lake City or Ogden or Logan, but the tentacles of those cities creep closer each year. Scott Walker, Habitat Program Manager for Utah Division of Wildlife Resources (DWR), lays out the dilemma.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe problems with that area are it\u2019s too close to the Wasatch Front and it\u2019s gorgeous,\u201d Walker says. \u201cThat\u2019s what makes it so stinking developable.\u201d<\/p>\n
Eighty percent of Utah\u2019s 3 million residents live along the 100-mile Wasatch Front, and the population there is growing twice as fast as the national average. RMEF life member Andrew Barber had recently moved from Montana to Logan to work as an ER doctor and be closer to his family. That move drove home just how precious their land along Birch Creek is. Bob Hammond, RMEF senior southwest land program manager, had never heard of Birch Creek before he met Andrew, but it didn\u2019t take him long to form an opinion.\u00a0 \u201cAndrew called me out of the blue and said his family had some property and would like to talk about doing an easement,\u201d Hammond says. \u201cHe described the place for about 60 seconds and I said, \u2018When can we set up a field trip?\u2019\u201d\u00a0 There is a very loud face and a very quiet face of the movement in Utah to give the state a bigger hand in the stewardship of natural resources. Allen Barber is as quiet as it gets. No talking, all action. While politicians and other zealots bellow, bloviate and blog about all that could be gained by transferring America\u2019s federal public lands to the state, Barber forever protected one of the jewels of Utah\u2019s elk country. He did it by working shoulder to shoulder with the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation and the Division of Wildlife Resources to place conservation easements on more than 8,600 acres of exceptional habitat for elk, mule deer, sage grouse, the state fish and a treasure house of other wildlife.<\/p>\n
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Make no mistake, Allen, his son Andrew and their ranching partner Dan Dygert still own every acre of the Birch Creek Ranch and retain full control over it. They simply gave up the right to subdivide, or develop, while retaining two 10-acre building envelopes to possibly build personal dwellings or structures necessary to support ranch operations. Along the way, they invited RMEF and DWR to join them as trusted advisors on the land\u2019s stewardship. \u201cI bought it with the idea of keeping it from being developed\u2014to protect the elk and deer and everything else that\u2019s on there,\u201d Barber says. And to savor it all for the time he\u2019s taking care of it. An RMEF life member, Barber joined in 2004, just a few years before buying Birch Creek. \u201cIt\u2019s nice to have a place where you can enjoy some wide open space,\u201d he says. \u201cMy son Andrew and his sons just like to get out and walk around. I do too.\u201d In the fall, they especially like to walk around with bows, rifles or shotguns in their hands. Barber also teamed up with DWR to give 20 public hunters free access to the ranch to chase elk, mule deer, moose and pronghorns each fall. All this without a single tweet or pseudo-humble back spun brag on Facebook. He didn\u2019t even want a plaque celebrating his generosity. He told RMEF to put the money toward conservation work instead. Dygert and Sheldon Atwood founded Carrus Land Systems as a ranch management company in 2007, the year they first spotted this land and saw the potential for what it might become. Barber agreed wholeheartedly with that vision and bought the place. Carrus owns a minority share in the ranch and acts as the managing partner, with Dygert (who is also an attorney specializing in lands work) overseeing daily operations. Carrus has also run yearlings in Wyoming and partnered on a ranch in Nebraska, practicing holistic ranch management for the past decade.<\/p>\n
Allen, Andrew, Dygert and Hammond spent a long summer day touring the ranch, stopping here and there to look at creek bottoms and stock ponds, the latest boundary fence they\u2019d rebuilt, stands of aspen and mahogany scarred by generations of rutting bulls. \u201cAllen made sure I sat in the front and he sat in the back. By the end, we were all covered with dust, but he looked like a mummy,\u201d Hammond says. \u201cWithin the first half hour, it became obvious how deeply committed they were to being good stewards and making this land as healthy as possible for everything there.\u201d<\/p>\n
Late in the afternoon, they pulled back up beside Highway 39, which follows Walton Canyon through the ranch, dividing the southern quarter from the rest. They sat and talked for a few moments about what, if any, their next steps might be. Andrew was at the wheel and he turned around and said, \u201cDad, you need to do this. You really need to do this.\u201d Allen gave a small nod and the men went their separate ways.<\/p>\n
Rare Birds and Fish<\/h6>\n
Hammond quickly enlisted Steve Hansen, land and water assets coordinator for DWR. They already had teamed up on three significant RMEF lands projects in the past 8 years. \u201cWe have a great partnership with DWR, and Steve Hansen is an outstanding man,\u201d Hammond says. \u201cHe has great values and he really knows how to thread through the challenges and get things done.\u201d<\/p>\n
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Hansen in turn recruited Walker and they went to have a look for themselves. They bumped into flock after flock of sage grouse. Signs of elk, moose, mule deer and pronghorns littered the landscape. \u201cWe realized immediately this was a conservation coup because sage grouse have become such an important species and issue,\u201d Hansen says. \u201cBut for so many other reasons too. It\u2019s just a prize piece of land.\u201d<\/p>\n
Over the past 200 years, the range of greater sage grouse has shrunk by half across the West. Worse by far, their population has declined by 97 percent. When the Sage Grouse Initiative mapped key remaining sage grouse habitat throughout the West in 2011, they identified this corner of Utah as core range and some of the state\u2019s finest. \u201cRich County is blessed with this robust sage grouse population,\u201d Hansen says. \u201cAnd it connects directly to the sage grouse habitat in southwest Wyoming, which is some of the best left in the world.\u201d<\/p>\n
Walker was equally impressed.\u00a0 \u201cFrom an ecological standpoint, we don\u2019t have a lot of systems left that haven\u2019t been changed by invasive plants or introduced perennials,\u201d he says. \u201cThis is a really intact native system, with a huge diversity of species.\u201d<\/p>\n
BLM rangeland borders the ranch to the north, east and south, with the Cache National Forest to the west, and wave after wave of rolling hills and hidden pockets in between. For a ranch that covers almost 14 square miles, there is surprisingly little variation between the lowest point at just over 7,200 feet along Sugar Pine Creek and where Strawberry Ridge tops out just over 8,200 feet. Winters and summers, elk are scarce. They are either lower or higher. For a couple months around calving time, though, and again through the fall, the ranch sits at the Goldilocks elevation: just right.<\/p>\n
Spotty clumps of water birch, the state\u2019s only native birch, grow along the ranch\u2019s namesake creek. In all likelihood, though, the name refers to aspen\u2014 commonly misidentified by early settlers and the signature tree species in this country. \u201cThere are some great aspen stands on the north-facing slopes in the knolls north of the highway, right at the zone where calving and fawning take place,\u201d Walker says. \u201cThen those ridgelines are all mountain mahogany. The moose stay up there all winter. They just stand there in the snow and eat mahogany. Tough old buggers.\u201d<\/p>\n
Birch Creek winds through the heart of the ranch and Sugar Pine Creek defines its southern boundary. According to Dygert, they are just big enough that those who didn\u2019t ![\"\"](\"https:\/\/swanlandco.com\/app\/uploads\/2016\/08\/wb-rmef_article_birch_creek_aug_2016_fish-300x204.jpg\")
excel at long jumping in high school will likely make a two-jump crossing, complete with midpoint splashdown. But they can be waded at will. \u201cThey\u2019re just little high mountain streams with small pools and beaver ponds,\u201d Dygert says. \u201cA foot-long fish would be a trophy.\u201d\u00a0 In truth, a fish of any size is a trophy because these are Bonneville cutthroats, native only to Utah and small corners of Idaho, Nevada and Wyoming. Biologists believed pure-strain Bonnevilles were extinct until they\u00a0discovered a few isolated populations in Utah in the 1970s. Thanks to an aggressive recovery effort by a multi-agency conservation team, pure Bonneville cutthroats now inhabit nearly 2,500 miles of stream.<\/p>\n
Because the ranch sits so high, it\u2019s often still covered in snow when grouse strut and carry on in April. There are no known leks on the place, but hens pour up to nest and raise chicks. Grasses, forbs and bugs all flourished here after Carrus and Barber modified cattle and sheep grazing, providing both cover and a buffet line for grouse chicks. \u201cIt\u2019s tough to estimate grouse, but we\u2019ve collared some of them and are confident the population is in the hundreds,\u201d Dygert says. \u201cOur primary goal has been to encourage diversity in the sagebrush stands and the overall plant community.\u201d<\/p>\n
Most of the West\u2019s basin big sagebrush fell to the plow long ago because the soils beneath it are deep, dark and fertile. But thriving stands of basin big sage up to 7 feet tall line Birch Creek. Sage thrashers and sagebrush sparrows buzz among them. So the ranch held outstanding populations of four species of big game, plus a bird and a fish that are poster species for how collaborative work can restore at-risk populations without the rancor and red tape of endangered species listing. Not to mention great public hunting opportunities. Hammond and his DWR partners practically salivated. Hansen began scouring for funds and building political goodwill. For his part, Barber says, \u201cBob liked what he saw and we liked him and we just went from there.\u201d<\/p>\n
That understates things a bit, a habit of Barber\u2019s. Hammond had left the original field trip hopeful, but figured if the landowners chose to protect the whole ranch, they might donate a conservation easement on the quarter of the ranch that lies south of the highway and seek a purchased easement on the rest. Instead, they did just the opposite, donating a 6,446-acre easement on everything north of the highway. This first phase rolled forward like destiny itself, no simple task in Utah. \u201cIf the state is going to receive a property or hold a conservation easement, we have to get the approval of the governor, the local state senator and representative, and the county commission,\u201d Hansen says.<\/p>\n
Dygert proved pivotal to winning that support at both the local and statewide level. \u201cIn Utah, there\u2019s a fair amount of opposition to doing conservation easements anywhere at any time,\u201d he notes. Ironically, his strongest ally with the Rich County commissioners was the steady advance of development from the Wasatch Front. Having watched new roads and buildings march across former ranchlands, the commission stands squarely behind the goal of preserving the agricultural character of their community. \u201cThose commissioners all come from families that have been ranching there for 100 years or more. So we wanted to be completely clear and upfront with them,\u201d Dygert says. \u201cThis keeps the property whole and it keeps it productive for livestock. Everything we\u2019re doing is good for cattle and sheep as well as elk and mule deer and sage grouse.\u201d<\/p>\n
Few tools are better suited to sustaining ranching and hunting traditions than conservation easements. Not only do they keep large pieces of land intact, they allow them to pass from one generation to the next by greatly diminishing the property and inheritance taxes so often fatal to working ranches. All while encouraging sound livestock grazing. \u201cWhen Dan showed up at the commission meeting, it was pretty apparent there had been some groundwork laid,\u201d Walker says. \u201cHe was like a rock star.\u201d The easement passed unanimously. Hansen forged ahead with winning approval from the governor\u2019s office and the legislature to support partnering with RMEF to conserve the whole ranch and to provide a relatively small amount of money to cover the costs of the baseline assessment required to secure the easement north of the highway. \u201cI got the last signature we needed at 6 p.m. on Christmas Eve,\u201d he says. The conservation easement protecting the northern three-quarters of the ranch closed on December 30, 2013.<\/p>\n
A Family of Passionate Hunters<\/h6>\n
\u201cI like big elk,\u201d Barber says. \u201cI\u2019ve shot several and we\u2019ve killed some big ones off the property. I won\u2019t forget the first hunt with Andrew up there when he got his fi rst bull. But big mule deer bucks are always just so elusive. Big is relative, of course. Andrew killed a 30-inch deer there last fall, and we\u2019ve taken a number in that range. But I\u2019d still like to catch that 32-, 33-inch, just-outstanding-in-every-way buck. I believe it\u2019s possible any day I hunt there.\u201d<\/p>\n
For all that, he has not lost sight of the pleasures of sharing the fi eld with the up and coming generation of hunters. \u201cSome of the most rewarding hunts have been with Andrew and his sons out after pronghorn,\u201d he says. \u201cThose hunts with the grandkids are probably my favorites. And Andrew and his boys had never harvested sage grouse, so we put in for sage grouse permits last year and took our one grouse apiece. The weather was gorgeous and we had the dogs out and everybody had a great time.\u201d<\/p>\n
Barber is willing to share the land\u2019s hunting opportunities with the public as well. Birch Creek Ranch lies at the heart of the Strawberry Ridge Cooperative Wildlife Management Unit (CWMU), a contiguous block of five ranches spanning 24,000 acres of great elk country. \u201cThis piece of ground we hold is the bridge,\u201d Barber says. \u201cIt ties everything together.\u201d Dygert agrees, and notes that \u201ceverything\u201d amounts to some pretty top-shelf hunting opportunities.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen we bought the property it was being run as a CWMU, but was barely over 10,000 acres, just this ranch and one other fairly small piece,\u201d Dygert says. \u201cWe opted for a different outfitter and management strategy. Now the acreage has more than doubled and the average size of the bulls and bucks has jumped up, too.\u201d<\/p>\n
Launched by the Division of Wildlife Resources in 1996, the CWMU program aims to recognize the contributions private landowners make in providing big game habitat while also offering excellent opportunities to the hunting public. It is a straight-up incentive proposition. In exchange for allowing public hunters on their land, each landowner in the CWMU gets a guaranteed share of the available tags based on how many acres they enroll. Participating landowners can use or sell the tags however they please. In the case of Birch Creek Ranch, that means passing up the chance to make more money in favor of a potential encounter with an exceptional animal. \u201cWe never use all the private elk and deer tags we\u2019re allotted,\u201d Barber says. \u201cWe keep the harvest low and focused on mature animals.\u201d<\/p>\n
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With landowners receiving the lion\u2019s share of the CWMU\u2019s bull elk and buck deer tags, it is clearly a good deal for them. But public hunters who draw these tags feel the same way. They tend to arrive happy and leave happier. In 2015, there were 22 tags available to the public by drawing at no charge on the Strawberry Ridge CWMU: three bull elk, three pronghorn buck, two mule deer buck, one bull moose, 10 cow elk and three pronghorn doe. Success rates last fall ran 96 percent on bull elk (27 out of 28 tags) and 80 percent for buck deer. The average bull killed was 6\u00bd years old. Not surprisingly, when DWR conducts annual hunter satisfaction surveys, Strawberry Ridge scores high marks. That, in turn, brings Barber real satisfaction.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs you well know, public access is becoming more and more limited,\u201d he says. \u201cUp until probably 2000, my family and I were basically public hunters. We understand what they\u2019re up against, and what it means to have places to go, especially ones with high-quality hunting that don\u2019t just get hammered.\u201d<\/p>\n
The ranch also allows public walk-in access for those who want to fish Birch Creek and 100-acre Birch Creek Reservoir. It\u2019s strictly catch-and-release flyfishing in the creek, but the reservoir holds tiger trout (hybrids between brook and brown trout) reaching up to two feet. All tackle is fair game there, as is catch-and-eat.<\/p>\n
Bringing it Back<\/h6>\n
When Barber and Carrus bought the land, the boundary fences were dilapidated or flattened altogether. Every spring, cattle flooded in from leases on adjoining BLM and national forest land. There were probably as many trespass cattle on the ranch as elk, pounding forage willy-nilly. The new owners set about building solid fence on all perimeters. For the most part, they used laydown fencing, which can be lowered once livestock are moved off in the fall. It kills far fewer sage grouse, antelope, deer and elk\u2014and makes for fewer fence repairs, too. Inside the ranch, they built fencing to protect riparian areas along Birch and Sugar Pine creeks, and also built dozens of small ponds to catch runoff and supplement springs. The ranch continues to lease cattle and sheep grazing rights to neighbors who have traditionally run livestock there, but they reined in both the time<\/p>\n
and places where they allow animals. For years, cattle grazed here from May through October. Now grazing is spring-only, with the animals off the ranch by June 30. Sheep move through for two to three weeks in spring and again in late summer or early fall, never lingering in one place long enough to take too much forage. There is no plowing, cultivating, haying or irrigating either. All grazing occurs on native rangeland. \u201cThe biggest thing we\u2019ve done to benefit the riparian areas was just getting the trespass cows out,\u201d<\/p>\n
Barber says. Then he adds, \u201cAndrew and I did go up there a year ago and planted a whole bunch of willows, chokecherries, serviceberries and red osier dogwoods all along both banks of Birch Creek. That should help the stream itself and hopefully provide more habitat for moose.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dygert says surrounding landowners and land managers are setting high standards for stewardship as well.<\/p>\n
\u201cEcologically, it\u2019s tough to manage effectively if you don\u2019t have scale,\u201d Dygert says. \u201cSo the ranchers north of here actually joined forces and formed a huge grazing block with the BLM, which they\u2019d never done before. Now instead of six different operations grazing little patches all over, it\u2019s just one giant herd rotating through all these pastures. Things like that make a big difference.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf you look at the BLM to our north, it\u2019s in excellent shape,\u201d Dygert adds. \u201cThe same goes with the Forest Service. The people in the local offices here do a great job and they\u2019re very good to work with.\u201d<\/p>\n
He is equally complimentary of RMEF. \u201cI\u2019ve represented clients and worked with everyone from the Nature Conservancy to the Natural Resource Conservation Service (NRCS) to protect land,\u201d Dygert says. \u201cEventually we\u2019d get there, but boy, it was an arduous process. With the Elk Foundation, they had the track greased up and we whistled right through.\u201d<\/p>\n
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Unfortunately, phase two came off the rails.\u00a0 \u201cHowever smooth Birch Creek North went in 2013, that\u2019s how rough Birch Creek South went,\u201d Hammond says. \u201cWe thought we had our matching grant money all lined up and at the 11th hour, NRCS said our application was completed incorrectly. We were disqualified and denied funding, with no hope of getting it until at least the next budget cycle a year out.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hansen flew into action. \u201cI told Bob, \u2018Hold on a few days and let me get back to you.\u2019 I knew we had some Pittman-Robertson money that might be available and I thought we might be able to convince the Quality Growth Commission that this would be an excellent use of the LeRay McCallister Critical Lands Conservation Fund.\u201d<\/p>\n
Established by the legislature in 1999, the Quality Growth Commission works to help Utah grow more sustainably. One of its roles is overseeing this incentive program, providing grants to encourage communities and landowners to work together to conserve their critical lands. Hansen swiftly persuaded the commission to visit the ranch to see what was at stake. As with the county commissioners, local ties won the day with this group as well. \u201cDan Dygert was our ace,\u201d Hansen says. \u201cIf a landowner is there and they\u2019re making a strong case for what they want to conserve, it\u2019s best to just shut up and let them do their thing.\u201d<\/p>\n
The elk threw in on it, too. \u201cOur tour couldn\u2019t have been set up better,\u201d Walker says. \u201cWe pulled off the highway and started up there and out of the trees busts this huge group of elk. Like someone was just standing in the trees waiting to open the gate.\u201d The QGC believed, literally giving everything they had\u2014the whole $330,000 allocation. After all this, though, RMEF and DWR still fell short of the sale price on the easement. ![\"\"](\"https:\/\/swanlandco.com\/app\/uploads\/2015\/03\/ww-larevalo_birchcreek_0616_0141-ed-1024x595.jpg\")
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\u201cThat\u2019s when Allen\u2019s commitment truly showed,\u201d Hammond says. \u201cHe wanted to protect it all, the whole ranch, and he was patient and hung in there while we scrambled for funds. In the end, when he knew that was all the money we could possibly bring to the table, he was willing to make a bargain sale. That was really the crux. And that was after donating the easement on all the rest of it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Barber already had protected the other land he owns 100 miles north along Mink Creek in southeast Idaho through a conservation easement with the Sagebrush Steppe Land Trust. Despite widespread misunderstanding and mistrust of easements, Barber is a believer.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs long as you\u2019re selective in your partners, a conservation easement doesn\u2019t change anything that you do for livestock or wildlife,\u201d he says. \u201cIn my opinion, it only improves it. When you have the annual monitoring inspections, you\u2019ve got another partner there who wants to see that land be as productive as possible giving you good advice, and often helping fund the projects. I think it\u2019s a good thing.\u201d As for the idea of the national forest and BLM lands that flank Birch Creek becoming state land,<\/p>\n
Barber takes a measured but decisive tone. \u201cI think transferring federal public land to the state is a mistake. I have a high suspicion that the people who are behind this want to get their hands on that land and develop it,\u201d Barber says. \u201cI\u2019m not a fan of the federal government doing much, but Utah has a long history of selling off state lands. I think in this case the public would lose out big-time.\u201d![\"\"](\"https:\/\/swanlandco.com\/app\/uploads\/2016\/08\/rmef_article_birch_creek_aug_2016_sage_view-rmef-1024x416.jpg\")
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The Shadow to the West<\/h6>\n
\u201cThe risk of development pushing up from the Wasatch Front is pretty high,\u201d Walker says. \u201cThere is national forest up there, but not huge blocks. So any of this private land that we can conserve is just huge for our elk and deer and grouse.\u201d The Barbers, Dygert, Hansen, Walker and Hammond share a unanimous vision of what they hope the place will look like in 2066: a mirror of how it is today.<\/p>\n
\u201cI have a feeling, though, that in 50 years it could wind up surrounded by development,\u201d Barber says.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe way Utah looks at property, they\u2019re pretty anxious to develop about anything that is developable. I have to think over the long term a lot of it will change. We have cabin development creeping up over the hill toward us. Not developments, per se, but the 20-acre type deals. I don\u2019t blame anybody for wanting to have their 20 acres, but it sure does cut up a landscape and change the feel of it, the health of it and the way wildlife use it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hammond is blunter. \u201cElk country can withstand some development if they\u2019re clustering the homes and the animals still have some gaps they can move through,\u201d he says. \u201cBut when you start busting it up into 40s and building them out, it\u2019s the kiss of the death.\u201d Hansen is nothing if not realistic about the inexorable pressures of development, but still takes a sanguine view. \u201cThat land along Birch Creek will always be whole. If it looks exactly like it does right now in 50 years, I\u2019d be tickled to death,\u201d he says. \u201cAnd if there\u2019s anything we can do to snag the adjoining properties and do that kind of landscape conservation\u2026wow.\u201d\u00a0 Asked if there is any hope of that, he replies, \u201cWhat is it that Gandalf said in Lord of the Rings<\/em>? \u2018There\u2019s always hope. It may be a fool\u2019s hope, but there is always hope.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n BIRCH CREEK HUNTING RESERVE LISTING<\/a>\u00a0 |\u00a0 <\/span>ROCKY MOUNTAIN ELK FOUNDATION<\/a>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n