Fire Fuel Management at Arroyo Hondo Preserve

In June of 2021, the Land Trust of Santa Barbara received a grant of $23,588 from the Coastal Conservancy for a targeted prescribed grazing project at the Arroyo Hondo Preserve, a project that the RPP team had identified through their outreach efforts to the Land Trust and helped facilitate funding for.

We're happy to report that the project was implemented this summer and that it had an immediate and profound impact as the photos above and the report below illustrate. Arroyo Hondo Preserve Manager John Turner had this to say to the Coastal Conservancy just after the Alisal Fire:

"The grazing that you funded definitely helped to save the Adobe and Barn at Arroyo Hondo. These photos are on the west side grazing area that is on the side of the Adobe, looking up slope along the property boundary with the neighboring ranch to the west. Our neighbors on the west side of the fence had dry mustard about 2 to 3 feet high on the west side of the fence which fully burned. As you can see, the Arroyo Hondo side of the fence, because it was grazed very low, did not burn and created a buffer for the firefighters not to have to worry about above the Adobe. I have also enclosed a photo from up canyon looking down towards the ocean. As you can see the upper portion of the canyon burned fully, but the west side near the ocean where it was grazed, did not."

This small project is a great testament to the power of prescribed grazing to create fuel breaks and safely defensible space around critical infrastructure like the ranch headquarters. The project was designed to remove 70% of the fine fuels and flammable material from targeted areas to create fuel breaks and defensible space to prevent wildfire from jumping to the eastern slopes of the Preserve and protect the historic ranch headquarters area and critical infrastructure. The Preserve is at high wildfire risk due to the prominence of fine fuels such as mustard and grasses coupled with the steep terrain and canyons that exacerbate fire risk. Prescribed grazing (or prescribed herbivory) is a land management practice that deploys livestock (i.e., cattle, sheep, goats, or a combination) to graze designated areas of land to remove vegetation at the appropriate times of year to reduce fuel loads, reduce wildfire risk and/or address invasive species issues. With the grant funding from the Coastal Conservancy, 400-600 sheep from Cuyama Lamb, LLC intensively grazed both the western and eastern slopes within the canyon in the Preserve until 60-70% of standing vegetation was removed or trampled. The Cuyama Lamb team utilized temporary fences in each targeted grazing area to manage the sheep, rotating them to a new pasture once they hit the targeted grazing level.

To learn more about this project, please view the report written by Coastal Conservancy here.

To view more images of before and during grazing, click here.

Status: In Progress (Completed Pilot Stage. A CalFire grant was received for the front country of Santa Barbara to identify areas suitable for prescribed grazing treatments. Arroyo Hondo was included as a part of this grant award. They are in the final stages of CEQA as of February 2024 and then will begin with implementation.)

Cost:

Partners: Land Trust for Santa Barbara County, Coastal Conservancy, Santa Barbara County Fire Department, Wildfire Resilience Collaborative, Cuyama Lamb, LLC

Permitting: CEQA required and in progress - in final stages as of February 2024

Funding Sources: California Coastal Conservancy, Cal Fire, Santa Barbara Foundation

Images during grazing mitigation