HighLighted Projects
Land Trust of Santa Cruz County
In 2009, we were asked to provide monitoring and supervision of grazing management at Glenwood Open Space Preserve in Scotts Valley, California for the Land Trust of Santa Cruz County. As part of this project we have provided quantitative, qualitative, and photo monitoring of RDM and herbaceous height by sampling and zone mapping of special habitats and all grazed lands.
The work expanded to advising about grazing-related infrastructure development, erosion, and leasing. We successfully met management plan objectives while supervising the grazing lease by aiding with decisions about rotations and deferrals.
To this day, this preserve has the best remaining population of Ohlone Tiger Beetle and quality habitat for several other listed species and has become the standard management practice for beetle habitats.
San Francisco Public Utilities Commission
In partnership with the Alameda County Resource Conservation District (2009-2021) and Applied Technology and Science (A-T-S)(2021-Current), we have been conducting monitoring in the 31,094-acre Alameda Watershed of the SFPUC since 2009. This work has included fall residual dry matter (RDM) sampling and zone mapping (with clipped reference sites), spring species composition monitoring, and herbaceous production monitoring in ungrazed exclosures and adjacent grazed areas. This work has included photo monitoring, assessments of historical weather effects, evaluations of grazing operational constraints and causes of below-standard observations, and recommendations for monitoring program improvements.
East Bay Regional Park District
Since 2017, we have worked on a variety of programmatic review, planning and monitoring projects for EBRPD. Past work included providing technical assistance on grazing management planning, performing a review of the EBRPD grazing program and developing a framework for planning and monitoring, monitoring grassland vegetation at Point Pinole Regional Park, and reviewing coastal prairie restoration practices at Point Pinole Regional Park. Since 2022, we have annually conducted grassland monitoring to evaluate effects of rangeland management and other park management activities on native grassland species in Pleasanton Ridge, Garin, Sibley Volcanic, and Wildcat Regional Parks.
San Diego Association of Governments and San Diego Management and Monitoring Program
As part of a UC Berkeley-led team, we provide project management and scientific support for this research project for the San Diego Association of Governments (SANDAG) and the San Diego Management and Monitoring Program (SDMMP). The goal of this study is to evaluate whether livestock grazing can benefit special-status species and vegetation communities, while simultaneously reducing herbaceous fuels on conserved lands in western San Diego County. We developed plot-based ecological site models to evaluate these questions. This was a critical strategy on the highly-diverse, environmentally-heterogenous preserves we're working on. In addition to evaluating the effect of grazing on conservation outcomes and fuel management, we are developing a grazing monitoring plan to guide conservation-oriented grazing management in San Diego County.
Since commencing in 2021, we have completed a scientific literature review and synthesis, conducted multiple years of field work, developed an ecological site model with associated state-and-transition models for preserves in the study, submitted a report on the impacts of grazing on target resources, submitted a report on adaptive management and monitoring recommendations for grazed San Diego County conserved lands, and given numerous presentations -- including organizing a symposium about this study at the February 2026 Society for Range Management conference in Monterey, CA.
Point Reyes National Seashore Association
We have been working with the University of California Berkeley, Point Reyes National Seashore, and the Point Reyes National Seashore Association to develop Ecological Site Descriptions (ESDs) and State-and-Transition models (STMs) for the Seashore. The grasslands of PORE are a hotspot for native biodiversity and rare plant species. This area also faces a growing number of management challenges, including infestations of non-native plants, altered fire regimes, and shrub encroachment. Livestock grazing has long been used as a management tool in addressing some of these challenges, but the effects of grazing management are difficult to predict on landscapes with strong ecological gradients. Ecological site models have long been used in rangeland ecology as a tool to help managers achieve predictable outcomes on environmentally heterogeneous landscapes, however these models are under-developed in California rangelands. This project addresses land management, plant biodiversity and community dynamics, fire fuel loads, and climate change. The ESDs and STMs will facilitate adaption of current rangeland management as well as further research on these topics. Stay tuned for more on this project!
Mendocino County Resource Conservation District
We began working with the Mendocino County Resource Conservation District (MCRCD) in 2014, when we wrote a grazing management plan to guide grazing on the 2087-acre Willits Bypass Mitigation Project. This seasonally-flooded wet meadow is managed for a variety of conservation objectives, and livestock grazing is a critical tool for habitat management on the Bypass. In 2020, we performed a review of their grazing management and monitoring program and have continued to advise MCRCD annually on the implementation of their grazing plan and interpretation of monitoring results.
County of San Mateo Parks Department
Since 2018 we have provided scientific and practical grazing management support directly to the County of San Mateo Parks Department (SMCPD) to develop a pilot grazing program on conserved habitat at San Bruno Mountain State and County Park, per the San Bruno Mountain Habitat Conservation Plan. We participate in the Pilot Grazing Program Technical Advisory Committee (TAC), work closely with SMCPD staff and the TAC to develop and refine management goals, objectives, and performance standards to guide the grazing strategy and monitoring in the pilot grazing areas. With a regionally recognized butterfly expert, Dr. Stuart Weiss, we developed a grazing treatment strategy to guide management in the San Bruno Mountain Grazing Pilot Study Area.