This blog is part of a series on the Sand Creek Desert in Idaho. If you haven’t had a chance, check out Part I: The Past and Part II: The Present. 

The land management issues currently facing the Sand Creek Desert area are complex and sometimes interconnected. The many thousands of acres that make up this area are owned by several different agencies and individuals, including state agencies like Idaho Fish and Game and federal agencies like the Bureau of Land Management. This creates a patchwork of private land, public state land, and public federal land, which can make coordinated management of the Sand Creek Desert extremely difficult. As a direct result of this disjointed configuration, threats like more frequent and larger-scale wildfires and unbridled motorized recreation present real obstacles to the continued integrity of this important place.  

In 2018, the Grassy Ridge Fire struck the Sand Creek Desert area, burning more than 100,000 acres of vital brush and grassland habitat for wildlife. The fire forced ranchers to load up their livestock and evacuate the area, threatened the neighboring town of Dubois, Idaho. Livestock were killed in the fire, and it is likely that some of the area’s native wildlife suffered the same fate. 

A collaborative working group formed from the ashes of the Grassy Ridge Fire to better address the threat of large-scale wildfire to the Sand Creek Desert area. Today, the collaborative, of which the Greater Yellowstone Coalition is a member, continues to work on the threats presented to this area by wildfire as well as issues facing this landscape like habitat fragmentation. One of the tools we could utilize to better conserve this landscape includes the development of a new, comprehensive habitat management plan that takes a holistic approach to land management in Sand Creek using the newest data on wildlife movement and habitat conservation. Another conservation tool we could use is to bolster the existing seasonal closure for this area, which has been instrumental in bringing back healthy elk herds. You can read more about the current seasonal closures in Part I and Part II of this series. 

Finally, one of the most comprehensive tools that the collaborative could use to address the needs of this complicated and significant landscape is the creation of a travel management plan that allows for high-quality recreation while conserving important wildlife habitat and working lands. An updated travel management plan would reduce wildlife-disturbing noise, decrease damage to the environment from illegal road creation, and lessen the spread of harmful invasive species, such as cheat grass.  

GYC will encourage the collaborative to further develop these tools and implement the respective plans in the next few years. The hope is that the current land management challenges facing the Sand Creek Desert area can become opportunities for the Greater Yellowstone Coalition and other stakeholders to find and implement durable conservation solutions on this vital Idaho landscape. The future of Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Park’s wildlife depends on it. 

The Greater Yellowstone Coalition is and will continue to be an integral part of this collaborative work to conserve and protect the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem’s lands, waters, and wildlife, now and for future generations. If you have questions about the Sand Creek Desert area, concerns about its management, or stories about how you enjoy these wild places, please  reach out to me via email at  amichalski@greateryellowstone.org  

- Allison Michalski, Idaho Conservation Associate