Project is for conducting surveys on the nogales and sierra vista ranger districts of the coronado national forest and compiling reports of where bullfrogs occur on the landscape to fulfill the…

The Department of Agriculture Forest Service R3-Southwestern Region awarded a Cooperative Agreement to the Arizona Department of Game and Fish on August 18, 2026, for $221,838.11 under the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act Restoration/Revegetation program (CFDA 10.717).

The award funds surveys and early detection and rapid response efforts targeting invasive bullfrogs on the Nogales and Sierra Vista Ranger Districts of the Coronado National Forest in Arizona through August 15, 2031. The recipient will conduct annual surveys across 79 to 97 waterbodies and perform 401 to 564 surveys per year within three buffer zones where bullfrogs are known to occur: Cobre Ridge, Canelo Hills (including the Appleton-Whittell Research Ranch), and Las Cienegas. The work supports monitoring requirements in the Forest Plan and Chiricahua leopard frog recovery efforts in Recovery Units 1 and 2. Deliverables include bullfrog removal and eradication (ranging from 131 to 2,056 individual bullfrogs per year depending on dispersal and precipitation), habitat modification, monitoring of Chiricahua leopard frog response to bullfrog removals, post-eradication population monitoring to prevent reinvasion, assistance with Chiricahua leopard frog translocations as needed, and presentation of results at Chiricahua Leopard Frog Steering Committee meetings. Performance occurs in Arizona.

Project is for conducting surveys on the nogales and sierra vista ranger districts of the coronado national forest and compiling reports of where bullfrogs occur on the landscape to fulfill the monitoring requirements stated in the forest plan within the three buffer zones where bullfrogs are known to occur: cobre ridge, canelo hills (including the appleton-whittell research ranch), and LAS cienegas. The number of actual survey areas (waterbodies) within these buffer zones vary by year depending on precipitation.