This message announces the call to prepare and submit proposals for funding research and management support projects through the Western Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies (WAFWA) and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) Inter-Landscape Conservation Cooperative (LCC) Greater Sage-Grouse Initiative. The FWS Mountain Prairie Region Science Application Program applied for and acquired the funding to support collaborative research and data gathering efforts that support the science needs of 4 LCCs within the range of greater sage-grouse. The research projects will enhance greater sage-grouse conservation at landscape scales.

Fish Wildlife Service developed an agreement with WAFWA to collaboratively deliver two specific prongs of this initiative:

1. Funding support for priority greater sage-grouse research and management projects.

2. Supporting the identification and incorporation of existing datasets on sage-grouse and sagebrush ecosystems important to greater sage-grouse into the Landscape Conservation Management and Analysis Portal (LC MAP).

This RFP solicits proposals for both aspects of this initiative. Proposals are due no later than 5 pm MDT on 8 May, 2013.

>> View full RFP

Download as PDF (1.87MB)

In this report, steering committee co-chairs Tom Melius, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Midwest Regional Director, and Terry Steinwand, North Dakota Game and Fish Department Director, provide a breakdown on spending, steering committee and technical committee membership, progress on 27 ongoing research projects, communications efforts and future direction.

Since 2010, the LCC has provided nearly $3.5 million in funding to bolster the conservation community’s scientific foundation for management of natural resources and the development of tools and frameworks to improve collaboration within the conservation community. LCC partners are working in collaboration to deliver the contemporary science needed to address natural resources challenges within the plains and prairie potholes landscape.

The Plains and Prairie Potholes LCC has capitalized on pre-existing conservation communities and networks to engage with federal, state, non-governmental and tribal groups to ensure an open, two-way dialogue surrounding LCC activities. This annual report offers continued transparency and accountability on behalf of the partnership as the LCC forges ahead in 2013.

Voluntary landowners that are part of the Missouri/Mississippi Rivers Confluence Conservation Partnership replace native prairie cordgrass on private properties restoring historic wet prairies. Photo by USFWS.

The Plains and Prairie Potholes LCC and Eastern Tallgrass Prairie and Big Rivers LCC, charged with identifying priority science needs to combat landscape scale natural resources threats, joined forces this year to support the Lower Missouri River Hydro-geomorphic Restoration and Management Project. This project will inform more effective conservation and management across 670 miles of the Missouri River from Decatur, Nebraska to St. Louis, Missouri.

The lower Missouri River, the largest free-flowing river reach in the United States, encompasses nearly 1.5 million acres of bottomland habitat for fish, wildlife and plants, while providing commercial transportation and recreation opportunities. Since European settlement, the Missouri River has been highly altered due to upstream reservoirs, water control and flooding events.

“We are gathering the data in layers, piecing together the geology, soil structure, topography, and finally, the hydrology of the river. What was the nature of the river before it was altered, including its dynamics, and seasonal and long-term patterns?” said Mickey Heitmeyer, lead researcher for the LCC project. “Once we have that data, we map it, layer over layer, and compare it to current day conditions.”

During the extended flood of 2011, flood waters seeped into farmlands which were once historic channels of the Missouri River. Results of this hydrogeomorphic research will help land managers identify areas readily connected to the river that could provide critical shallow water habitat for a diverse range of aquatic animals from freshwater mussels to the federally endangered pallid sturgeon. Photo by USFWS.

On-the-ground private landowners and natural resource managers, like those representing the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s Partners for Fish and Wildlife Program and Missouri River Recovery Program, national wildlife refuges, state parks, and many others, will be able to use the data generated by this research to inform strategic land acquisition, land protection and restoration.

“For landowners who participate in the Partners for Fish and Wildlife Program, we try to explain that we are trying to restore historic habitats which have been lost to benefit migratory birds and resident wildlife,” said Kelly Srigley-Werner, program coordinator in Missouri.  “The hydrogeomorphic restoration project will really help us target strategic areas to get back what used to be on the landscape and will be a powerful tool we can use to effectively demonstrate and communicate with landowners.”

The lower Missouri River contains countless conservation properties and efforts maintained by local, state and federal agencies, nonprofit groups and private entities. National wildlife refuges, state parks, conservation areas and other publicly owned properties can use the maps that are developed through the hydro-geomorphic analysis to guide land acquisitions, and restoration efforts in the face of evolving natural resources challenges like climate change, energy development and shifts in agricultural practices.

This year the Missouri/Mississippi Rivers Confluence Conservation Partnership – a Partners for Fish and Wildlife collaboration- was recognized by the Department of the Interior as a signature demonstration of partnering for America’s Great Outdoors Rivers Initiative, bringing together private landowners, conservation organizations, and public natural resources agencies to promote a balance between fish and wildlife habitat and agriculture and community development. The hydro-geomorphic analysis can also assist with guiding future efforts recognized and supported by America’s Great Outdoors.

Since 2004, the Missouri/Mississippi Rivers Confluence Conservation Partnership has restored and enhanced more than 21,000 acres of private land, and protected more than 8,000 acres of wetland habitat on private land across Pike, Lincoln, St. Charles and St. Louis counties.

“Our property has great interest in habitat conservation for waterfowl and other wildlife.  We have been fortunate to have a trusting relationship with Ducks Unlimited, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and other partners to help design and improve our lands through the Partners for Fish and Wildlife Program,” said private landowner Warren Hager. “The support this partnership provides has enabled our habitats to be more diverse, and our relationships have allowed us to rely on expertise when we need it.”

Leaning on the results of this cutting edge LCC research will improve scientific understanding about the lower Missouri River and provide a tool for the conservation community to put the right conservation efforts in the right places, for the right reasons, ultimately allowing for maximum return on conservation investments.

For more information:
Missouri/Mississippi Rivers Confluence Conservation Partnership
Hydrogeomorphic Restoration and Management project
Plains and Prairie Potholes LCC
Eastern Tallgrass Prairie and Big Rivers LCC

Managing Director Martha Kauffman invites you to read the WWF Northern Great Plains Program December 2012 Newsletter to learn how WWF’s work with partners made these and other developments possible.

With the recent Presidential and Congressional elections behind us, what can we now expect with regard to energy and climate change policy in the US? Will President Obama’s reelection result in movement in either climate or clean energy legislation in Congress, despite a “status quo” Congress? What role will EPA play in formulating future climate policy through new regulations? Could a carbon tax play a role in a future budget deal to close the large Federal deficit? How does the implementation of the current regulations on automobiles and utilities along with the emergence of large shale gas supplies affect President Obama’s Copenhagen commitments for a 17% reduction in greenhouse gases by 2020?

This webinar will provide a perspective on:
- potential future energy and climate change policies in the US
- the effect of economic concerns on climate policy
- the role of government agencies in new approaches to the problem

The webinar is free. To register click here. Once registered, you will receive a confirmation email with log-in information. Visit changingclimate.osu.edu to view previous webinars and other climate resources. 

Restoration features at Glacial Ridge: (a) ditches filled (brown), reconfigured (violet), and unaltered (blue) (wide lines indicate reaches requiring county approval); (b) reconstructed or restored wetlands (green); (c) sequence of Wetland Reserve Program (WRP) contracts 1–9; (d) yearly progression of restoration and seeding (“Not Seeded” areas were existing grassland, active sand and gravel leases, or otherwise developed and not restored).

LCC partners can view additional project information through the Google site listed below: https://sites.google.com/site/largescaleresto/home

Climate scientists often develop models to predict how climate may change in an effort to inform other models that predict how these changes may impact conservation targets. However, these models are not often translated into information that is accessible and useful for land managers and conservation decision-makers. 

Climate scientists need better information about what climate information is desired by decision-makers so that their outputs will more effectively meet decision-maker information needs; and conversely, decision-makers need better information about how a changing climate may affect their management alternatives and conservation objectives.  Land managers within the Plains and Prairie Potholes Landscape Conservation Cooperative (LCC)  make complex decisions that impact multiple conservation objectives in the face of considerable uncertainty.  Thus, members of the LCC require decision-relevant information about how climate will change and how these changes will affect their conservation objectives, management alternatives, and consequences of their management actions.  These needs can be met by the North Central Climate Science Center (CSC) and the NOAA Climate Prediction and Projection Pilot Platform (NCPP).

The objectives of this project are to (1) build connections between the LCC, the CSC, and the NCPP to facilitate a link between the end users and the producers of climate information, as well as to identify gaps between available and desired information, and (2) develop an understandable and transportable framework that will enable the LCC to prioritize climate science needs and articulate those needs to the NC CSC and the NCPP.

This project will use a decision analysis process to bring together members of the LCC and climate experts from the NC CSC and the NCPP to develop an integrated conceptual model of the interactions between climate change, land use change, and conservation and adaptation in the Plains and Prairie Potholes (PPR) region of the LCC. Quantifying aspects of this conceptual model will allow estimation of the value of climate information, thus enabling the LCC to prioritize their climate science needs. 

By relating climate uncertainties to the prevailing land use and socioeconomic issues in the region, the value of information analysis will produce a framework that will enable climate scientists to (1) guide the LCC toward currently available climate information and present this information in a way that will be useful to decision makers within the LCC, and (2) design future research to address remaining key uncertainties affecting conservation decisions in the region.

Ashley Spratt, Communications Coordinator
572-234-2132 ext. 104 ashley_spratt@fws.gov

Bismarck, North Dakota – Conservation experts from federal, state and non-governmental conservation groups represented by the Plains and Prairie Potholes Landscape Conservation Cooperative (LCC) today announced 2013 funding opportunities for research proposals that examine land-use and invasive species to inform on-the-ground conservation and natural resources management.

“Impacts of climate change, energy development, and shifting agricultural practices augment pre-existing and growing natural resources challenges like invasive species, urban expansion, and land conversion across the northern great plains and prairie pothole region,” said LCC Coordinator Rick Nelson. “As representatives of the broader conservation community, we are investing in research that examines the interactions of multiple stressors on our unique natural resources.”

The Plains and Prairie Potholes LCC is responsible for identifying, prioritizing, and supporting research that addresses scientific uncertainties related to landscape-scale natural resources challenges. The geography associated with LCC partners covers parts the northern great plains, prairie potholes and river systems of Minnesota, Iowa, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota, Montana and Wyoming, and the Canadian provinces of Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba.

“By building the research that supports answers to these questions, we can better prepare ourselves for future conservation efforts to protect fish, wildlife, plants and other key resources that contribute to the social, economic and intrinsic value of the northern great plains and prairie potholes region,” Nelson said.

Research proposals must be received by December 7, 2012. Available funds up to $500,000 will be awarded by March 2013. Individual projects in past funding cycles have ranged from $10,000 to $500,000. Proposal requirements are detailed here: 2013 PPP LCC Request for Proposals (pdf).

For additional information on the mission, vision and activities of the Plains and Prairie Potholes LCC visit http://www.plainsandprairiepotholeslcc.org/.

Landscape Conservation Cooperatives (LCCs) address large scale natural resource challenges that transcend political and jurisdictional boundaries and require a networked approach to conservation— holistic, collaborative, and grounded in science – to ensure the sustainability of America’s land, water, wildlife and cultural resources. For more information about LCCs, visit http://www.fws.gov/landscape-conservation/lcc.html