Description
Start Date-End Date: 10/09/2021-10/10/2021
Land Manager Office: Southern Plains Land Trust
Land Manager Contact: Jay Tuchton
Funding Partner:
Programmatic Partner:
Summary: Restore valuable streambank habitat on this prairie preserve near Lamar.
Description: Read Before You Register! Need-to-Know Details:
We greatly appreciate you volunteering your time and energy to care for Colorado's outdoor places during COVID-19. To help provide a fun and safe experience for all, there are a few temporary changes to be prepared for:
You must sign up for all days of this project.
You may only register yourself. Every volunteer must sign our digital COVID-specific forms ahead of time to be able to attend.
You must pack your own lunches. Please see below for more information on meals.
You must bring a face mask and work gloves. Please click here for our full packing list of required and recommended items.
All volunteers must keep a mask within reach at all times.We will ask you to wear a mask when working closely together (within arm's reach) on a task, such as moving a large rock.
If you are not vaccinated,we encourage you to reconsider your participation at this time due to the spread of the highly contagious Delta variant. People who are unvaccinated are more at risk of serious illness, hospitalization, and death. If you choose to volunteer while unvaccinated, you must wear a mask for the duration of the project.
Cancellation & Waitlists: Due to limited spots on this year's projects, we expect projects to fill quickly with waitlists. If you need to cancel, please email outreach@voc.org as soon as possible so we can free your spot for another volunteer and have a full workforce. If you are waitlisted for multiple projects, please call us at 303-715-1010 ext. 116 and we can help you find an open project, if available.
Where You'll Be:
The Southern Plains Land Trust creates and protects a network of shortgrass prairie preserves, including Heartland Ranch near Lamar. This preserve spans approximately 25,000 acres, an area larger than any of Colorado's state parks as well as several national parks! The rolling grassland terrain supports black-tailed prairie dogs, pronghorn, and a large herd of reintroduced bison. Several rare plants, a variety of native vegetation, and dozens of miles of seasonal streams can be found throughout the ranch.
Public visitation at the preserves is extremely limited, and volunteer projects such as this one offer the unique opportunity to visit for free and learn about this remarkable area!
What You'll Do:
Join us for a fall weekend in the southeast corner of Colorado. There are many sites throughout Heartland Ranch in need of TLC to restore the important streambank habitat. Working alongside volunteers ages 12+, you'll help install structures such as rock dams, Zuni bowls, and media lunas to help control erosion on streambanks and, if possible, plant cottonwoods and coyote willows to further improve the habitat.
PLEASE NOTE:Volunteers are required to stay for the entire duration of the project anda4WD or high-clearance vehicle is required to access the work site
Camping is available Friday and Saturday night; VOC's volunteer Crew Chefs will provide breakfast on Saturday and Sunday as well as dinner on Saturday night.
Why It Matters:
This work is vital to improving watershed health in the Arkansas River Basin, the largest basin in Colorado by area. By installing these erosion control structures and adding native plants to the landscape, you'll help slow water movement and improve stream health within these large and important preserves.
About Volunteers for Outdoor Colorado (VOC)
Volunteers for Outdoor Colorado (VOC) is the state's oldest, largest, and leading outdoor stewardship nonprofit organization. Founded in 1984 to motivate and enable people to become active stewards of Colorado's natural resources, VOC has engaged nearly 126,000 people in more than 1,000 volunteer projects for a donated labor value of $25 million. Through award-winning youth and volunteer programs, leadership training, capacity-building programs, and collaborative efforts with nonprofits and land management agencies, VOC is an invaluable resource in Colorado, especially as our outdoor stewardship needs are approaching near-crisis levels. For more information, visit www.voc.org or call 303-715-1010.
Latitude/Longitude: 37.684476, -102.896861
Additional Information: We greatly appreciate you volunteering your time and energy to care for Colorado's outdoor places during COVID-19. To help provide a fun and safe experience for all, there are a few temporary changes to be prepared for:
You must pack your own lunches.Please see below for more information on meals.
You must bring work gloves.Pleaseclick herefor our full packing list of required and recommended items.
If you are fully vaccinated,you may work without a mask. If you are not yet fully vaccinated or if you prefer to wear a mask for any reason, please continue to wear a mask on VOC projects. We will have spare masks available if needed.
Camping is available on both Friday and Saturday night. Please note that VOC doesnotprovide any camping equipment (tents, sleeping bags, etc.) but will providebreakfast on Saturday and Sunday as well as dinner on Saturday night. More information about camping will be sent via email approximately two weeks before the project.
Please note a4WD or high-clearance vehicle is required to access the work site and volunteers must stay for the entire duration of the project.
Camping Available: Yes
Physical Difficulty: Easy, Moderate
High Altitude Project: No
Desired Number of Volunteers: 35
Total Adult Volunteers Attended: 42
Total Youth Volunteers Attended: 2
Total Volunteer Days: 44
Total Unique Volunteers: 24
Total Volunteer Hours: 375
Staff Hours: 52
Stipend Hours: 0
Project Summary: End of season fatigue may have contributed to lower than expected registration numbers on this project, but the group size ended up being perfect for the task at hand and crews were able to complete all structures called for and then some. Each crew leader took 3-4 volunteers with them and leap frogged each other as they built log mat dams, one rock dams, and log wattle dams in areas where soil was eroding into headcuts. Volunteers worked a full day on Saturday and enjoyed beer and veggie stew from VOC's crew chefs along with wine donated by SPLT. High winds took down the crew chef tent during the day, but Rose and Jess made quick work to move all the kitchen gear to a more sheltered spot next to the SPLT Headquarters Yurt and made do without the cover of the tent. Sunday saw cooler weather and a short respite from the wind, however it kicked back up as a storm started to come in. Volunteers finished all structures by noon, luckily, and were able to head home before the weather turned bad. All in all a great project! Volunteers completed 20 log mat structures and 12 wattle dams with t-posts.
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Details
| 12 and older |
