Fall colors at the Wind River Ranch (photo by Martin MacRoberts)

                                                                                                 Mission

• To conserve the wild landscapes through ecological restoration, research, and education.

Goals

• To develop careers of young conservationists through undergraduate and graduate education, particularly students from groups that are presently under-represented in science. We emphasize that students do not have to abandon their culture to be a scientist. We stress the interdisciplinary nature of problem-solving to address the full array of social and political factors influencing species and ecosystems.

• To provide an outdoor learning experience that blends nature, art, and writing for middle student and high school students, as well as adults. To provide close access to nature for people who lack such contact.

Wind River Ranch Foundation teaches environmental sciences in outdoor classrooms with hands-on participation in conjunction with the 23 school districts of the Northern New Mexico School Network, New Mexico Highlands University, Luna Community College, and the Jane Goodall Institute’s Roots and Shoots program. In April of 2008, we will hire a full-time teacher who can circulate through science classes to help with science curricula and coordinate outdoor labs at the 4,500 acre ranch with classroom lessons in schools. We hope to offer summer camps based in natural history (grant for this is still pending).

Wind River Ranch Foundation conducts workshops for teachers and students on topics like creating a wetland on a floodplain, controlling erosion by building one-rock dams and baffles in arroyos and canyons that feed the river, enhancing grasslands by thinning pion/juniper, the study of grazing interactions, and the role of interactive species in ecosystem function.

Wind River Ranch Foundation offers research opportunities for those graduate students seeking a suitable, fully functioning research area in which they can complete their projects. We receive grants for ecological restoration, and that funding provides students with free graduate projects. We presently have one graduate student working at the ranch, and she is from Cameroon.

• To engage in scientific programs that make meaningful, on-the-ground, contributions to the conservation of plants, animals, ecosystem function, and landscape permeability in the southwestern U.S. Because of the ranchs location, we will emphasize conservation activities on private lands. Given that public lands, Wilderness Areas, and National Parks are individually not large enough to hold viable populations of important keystone species, like large carnivores, or important ecological processes, like fire, nature will continue to decline if we limit conservation activities to such areas. Private lands provide the connection between those public reservoirs of nature, and they can offer the landscape permeability necessary to guarantee viable ecological function.

Wind River Ranch Foundation accepted a translocation of 300 Gunnisons prairie dogs from Santa Fe through People for Native Ecosystems; this translocation rescued the prairie dogs from poisoning.

Wind River Ranch Foundation grazes a herd of 36 bison, 32 of whom are owned by the Jicarilla Apache Cultural Affairs Office, which is also part of the Inter-Tribal Bison Cooperative. This is an effort to help the Jicarilla Apache begin their bison program, which has a base in cultural, ecological, and dietary issues. There are plans to increase the herd size and expand work with the Inter-Tribal Bison Cooperative. 

We will receive pronghorn from New Mexico Game and Fish. Game and Fish has already released a few turkeys and beavers at the ranch,

• To foster cooperation among private landowners, agencies, NGOs, tribes, universities, and local governments on issues important for the health of the land.

Wind River Ranch Foundation continues to work toward a cooperative watershed association that, at present, would cover approximately 300,000 acres of land in Mora and San Miguel Counties. We have a grant pending to provide a salary for a watershed manager.

• To provide creative writing workshops grounded in natural heritage.

New Mexico author, Jimmy Santiago Baca, holds creative writing workshops at the Wind River Ranch through his non-profit organization, Cedar Tree. These workshops benefit both local youth and accomplished writers. Mujeres Unidas, from Pueblo Colorado, also holds workshops at the ranch. About a dozen authors have used the ranch as a writing retreat.