Colorado youth corps seeks funding to support two crews for a week-long project to foster job skills and develop leadership and teamwork capacities in colorado youth

This project provides opportunities for participants to learn about natural resource management while gaining practical experience with fence construction and removal. These skills and experiences can lead to future employment opportunities for participants in natural resource management. The BLM-crvfo supports this project where existing fencing has resulted in problems for wildlife movement and range management that can be effectively resolved or improved with assistance from the youth corps program. The bluebonnet fence is an 8-foot tall, woven wire fence north of gypsum, colorado that was constructed in the 1970S to direct big game migrations away from interstate 70 with the objective of reducing vehicle collisions with wildlife. While effective for keeping deer and ELK off the freeway, these herds were prevented from accessing large areas of important winter range forcing more animals to concentrate on less habitat, which has degraded the quality of winter range and resulted in DIE-offs in severe winters. In the meantime, wildlife exclusionary fencing has been installed parallel to i-70, so in addition to fragmented winter range and declines in habitat quality, the bluebonnet fence is redundant and unnecessary for meeting the objective of reducing collisions. Over the past few years, rmyc crews have removed portions of the original 30-plus mile fence incrementally, reconnecting habitats and restoring historic migration corridors. Over 20 miles of fence still exists that needs to either be completely removed or shortened to a height that will allow big game movement, depending on whether the fence segment is part of an allotment boundary or is otherwise needed for range management purposes. The fence removal crew would use hand tools such as fencing pliers and bolt cutters to dismantle existing fencing and remove materials that pose a threat to wildlife. Material removal would consist of dismantled wire and posts being hand carried to existing roads where BLM and volunteer vehicles can transport the refuse to staging areas and eventual RE-use or disposal. Camping for the rmyc crews is available near the project site and BLM will assist with providing water RE-supply and other logistical needs that may arise.