2021-Wildlife Habitat Restoration @ Vail

Start Date-End Date: 06/19/2021-06/19/2021 Land Manager Office: USFS - Eagle-Holy Cross Ranger District Land Manager Contact: Jennifer Prusse Funding Partner: National Forest Foundation Programmatic Partner: Summary: Optional camping the night before! Remove fencing to protect wildlife just west of Vail. Description: Project photo by Trudy Burri 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 may only register yourself. Every volunteer must sign our digital COVID-specific forms ahead of time to be able to attend. You must provide your own food. VOC will not be providing meals at this time. You must bring work gloves. Please click here for 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. 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: Just over 2 hours from Denver, Vail is a popular mountain getaway for Colorado residents and tourists alike. Year-round, visitors flock to Vail for world-class skiing and access to 350,000 acres of National Forest lands full of hiking trails and other outdoor recreation opportunities. Wildlife such as mule deer, black bears, red foxes and moose also populate the area. On this project, you'll be working to help these critters by removing fencing in West Vail. What You'll Do: Celebrate the first weekend of Summer by clearing the way for wildlife in West Vail! On this Saturday project, you'll join volunteers ages 14+ in removing an 8-foot-tall highway fence. The fence currently has holes in it and is directing mule deer toward the highway, where they can be hit by motorists. Your participation on this project will make an immediate difference for these deer - as well as for the safety of drivers! Camping is available on Friday if you wish to arrive the night before the project; please note that VOC will not be providing any meals or camping equipment on this project. Why It Matters: In an effort to increase the deer population in the area, the U.S. Forest Service is prioritizing this fence removal to improve the mule deer habitat. By removing this fence, you will help the deer migrate more easily and safely, promoting further population growth. 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 125,000 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: 39.621718, -106.428582 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 provide your own food.VOC will not be providing meals at this time. 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 Friday if you wish to arrive the night before the project. Please note that VOC will not be providing any meals or camping equipment on this project. More information about camping will be sent via email approximately two weeks before the project. Camping Available: Yes Physical Difficulty: Moderate High Altitude Project: Yes Desired Number of Volunteers: 10 Total Adult Volunteers Attended: 15 Total Youth Volunteers Attended: 1 Total Volunteer Days: 16 Total Unique Volunteers: 16 Total Volunteer Hours: 132.5 Staff Hours: 29.5 Stipend Hours: 0 Project Summary: VOC partnered with the USFS Eagle-Holy Cross Ranger District to remove an old barbed wire fence that was built by CDOT in order to keep large ungulates off the highway. This fence sits over a mile north of the highway, and cuts across a large migration corridor for the elk and deer in the Vail area. The fence not only fragments the movement of these ungulate populations, but it also has lead to entrapment of wildlife. In 2010, a secondary fence was build, much closer to I-70 therefore removing the need for the old fence. On this single day project, camping was available on Friday on USFS property just south of Minturn. Volunteers met on Saturday morning at the Eagle Holy-Cross Ranger Station for morning registration. From there, we carpooled to the site location, just off Davos Trailhead. Volunteers completed their safety talk with their crew leaders, and hiked the 0.5 mi stretch along Davos Trail to the location of the fence. Crews were stationed in the most difficult section at the beginning of the day, which included hauling material a few hundred feet up a steep and shrubby ravine. Fire was difficult to remove in sections where the plant cover has grown into the fence, and required delicate untangling in order to prevent damage to the plants. We had quite a few 1st time volunteers, whom claimed to have an awesome experience and were interested in learning about more projects VOC is hosting this season. Storms were forecast to hit our area after 1pm, however, we were lucky enough to dodge every incoming cloud. There was a gentle breeze that provided a cooler working environment, and allowed crews a break in what was an abnormally hot day for the vail area. Overall, we accomplished 1,100 feet of fence removed from the area, a large portion for the difficulty of transporting the metal and small crew sizes. Successes and Challenges: Successes: All volunteers were kept safe, no injuries were reported. Also, we accomplished the priority area agreed upon with the Jen Prusse during the site visit. Volunteers were all kept busy, and no one was sitting around waiting to continue work. Challenges: The fence was very entangled, and the lower strand of barbed wire was hidden in the duff which slowed us down tremendously. The parking lot was very limited in size, but it would have been nice to have larger crews. Lessons Learned: I separated the tools per crew into separate buckets prior to arriving on site. This helped speed the morning up quite substantially, and was very helpful as there were many small hand tools involved on this project. Special Notes: Stewardship Education: Key Concerns or Comments from Staff or Volunteers: Hard hats were required on this project, as we were on Forrest Service land, but since the fence was so tall the hard hats were definitely necessary at times. Description of Accidents/Incidents: No accidents or incidents. Description of Work Completed: