Land conservation takes many forms, and as Warner College rangeland ecology major Jon Byerly is finding out this summer, can be pretty complex.

Byerly is interning this summer with the Colorado Cattleman’s Agricultural Land Trust, a private land conservation nonprofit that works with willing landowners to place conservation easements on their properties.

Conservation easements transfer the development rights from the property owner to a land trust or local government, which holds them, to ensure the land remains open space. This preserves both the land’s agricultural heritage with grazing and cattle operations and protects its ecological and asthenic values.

At Agate Fossil Beds National Monument (Harrison, NE), the beautiful, yet exotic and invasive, yellow flag iris (Iris pseudacorus) is taking over riverine wetlands, becoming a concern for the park’s ecosystem. The plant, originally from Europe, arrived in 1906 with a family of settlers 25 miles south of Harrison. The settlers planted seeds of the iris around the family pond, and slowly over the years the flower has spread along the waterways, traveling east into the park. The plant has out-competed many native plant species, and currently covers nine river miles, causing the river to narrow and deepen in areas of dense growth.

Kyle Heller, a Warner College alum from the Forest and Rangeland Stewardship Department, is one of the Salt Lake Unified Authority fire crew featured in National Geographic’s wildland firefighter portrait special. Scroll down in the article to find Kyle’s portrait.
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