Targeted grazing by sheep to control invasive species and reduce wildfire risk on western rangelands

Education and Outreach Objective 1: Increase knowledge of the ecological and economic impacts of invasive annual grass.

Field days and complementary outreach activities:

A field day was initially scheduled for November 2022 following the first round of targeted grazing treatments. Due to unfavorable late-season weather conditions and limited field accessibility, the event was initially postponed to ensure meaningful on-site engagement. Rather than delay outreach efforts, we expanded alternative education and media-based engagement strategies to reach a similar and broader audience in the first years of the project. 

Interviews with project team members resulted in feature articles in Western SARE News, the Western Integrated Pest Management newsletter, and the Idaho Mountain Express newspaper, which serves the Wood River Valley communities near the study area.  We also wrote articles for the Sun Valley Property News magazine (which also serves the Wood River Valley and Sun Valley region) and for the Trailing of the Sheep Festival newsletter, describing the problems associated with cheatgrass invasion, the ecological principles behind targeted grazing with livestock, and outlining our research objectives. The Trailing of the Sheep Festival is a regional nonprofit organization that "celebrates the history of sheep ranching in Idaho and the West," drawing both local stakeholders and visitors from across the region.  

These efforts provided direct engagement with community members and producers in the same geographic area originally targeted for the field day, while also reaching a substantially broader audience.  This approach maintained alignment with the project’s objective of increasing awareness and knowledge regarding invasive annual grasses and the role of targeted grazing in rangeland management.  

Conference presentations:

To disseminate research findings from all four of the project’s core research objectives to livestock producers, land managers, and scientists, project team members delivered a total of ten oral and poster presentations at national and international conferences. These included the Society for Range Management conference in 2023, 2024, and 2025, the Ecological Society of America conference in 2024 and 2025, the International Mountain Conference in 2025, and the Society for Ecological Restoration World Conference on Ecological Restoration in 2025. We reached over 400 audience members with these presentations, comprising mostly scientists and land management agency staff.

To engage directly with the sheep industry and producer community, graduate students and faculty also presented project findings at the West Central States Wool Growers Convention held in Boise, ID in November 2023, which attracted hundreds of sheep producers and other industry stakeholders from Idaho, Oregon, Nevada, Utah, and Wyoming.

Undergraduate students involved with the project shared results locally through three poster presentations and a lightning talk at Boise State University's Undergraduate Research Showcase in 2023 and 2024, and at Boise State’s Service Learning/Vertically Integrated Project Fall Expo in 2024, strengthening workforce development and regional engagement.

Workforce development and capacity building:

In addition to formal outreach activities, the project contributed substantially to workforce development across academic, producer, and agency communities. Over the course of the project, training and hands-on research experience were provided to:

• 22 undergraduate students
• 8 Master’s students
• 1 PhD student
• 2 K–12 teachers
• 7 agricultural producers
• 6 federal and state agency personnel
• 2 local private land managers
• 1 professional botanist

Undergraduate students gained field-based monitoring experience addressing real-world rangeland management challenges, including vegetation sampling, fuel characterization, and stakeholder engagement. Graduate students used project data to develop research design, statistical analysis, and science communication skills while interacting directly with producers and agency personnel. In two instances, graduate students from beyond our initial project team leveraged our experiment as part of their thesis and dissertation research on sheep utilization of plant functional groups and on cheatgrass pathogens, respectively.These experiences strengthened applied research capacity and fostered cross-sector collaboration essential for implementing targeted grazing strategies at operational scales.

Scholarly publications and data sharing:

Manuscripts describing the effects of sheep targeted grazing on vegetation dynamics, soil properties, and modeled wildfire behavior are in preparation for submission to peer-reviewed journals. Two graduate student theses focused on Research Objectives 1 and 2 have been accepted by Boise State University’s Graduate College and will be publicly available through ProQuest.

In addition, we have shared data from our project to support national- and global-scale efforts, which will in turn support future research and management decisionmaking. First, we contributed soil temperature data from our experiment plots to the global microclimate database. This initiative is being led by researchers at the University of Antwerp, Belgium, and will be published as an open-access dataset. Second, we shared the vegetation cover data from our plots with the US Geological Survey’s (USGS) Earth Observation and Science (EROS) Center team that produces annual fractional vegetation cover maps (RCMAP) and early detection maps of exotic annual grasses, including cheatgrass, for the western United States. Our vegetation data are now being used alongside other monitoring data in their vegetation cover models, which generate outputs used widely by rangeland scientists and managers. This collaboration arose, in part, through our joint appearance with USGS scientists on an episode of the USGS EROS podcast, Eyes on Earth, in which we discussed cheatgrass ecology and mapping, and the potential of targeted grazing with sheep as a cheatgrass management tool. This episode was streamed by over 4,300 listeners, greatly increasing our project’s reach.

Economic decision tool:

The project initiated development of an economic framework to compare targeted sheep grazing with alternative cheatgrass management strategies. Preliminary data compilation and conceptual model development were completed; however, personnel transitions within the economic team and few generalizable costs associated with our approach to implementing targeted grazing limited progress toward development of the proposed web-based decision tool during the project period. As a result, a fully integrated economic model was not completed.

The ecological and fire behavior analyses conducted through this project provide essential inputs for future economic modeling. Continued development of a comprehensive decision-support framework will require dedicated economic expertise and additional integration of probabilistic fire risk and cost data.

Education and Outreach Objective 2: Increase knowledge of the potential for adopting sheep grazing as a management tool to minimize invasive annual grass and reduce wildfire risk.

Field days and complementary outreach activities:

We planned to host a field day in the spring of 2025 to present project results and lessons learned, but these plans were affected by funding disruptions beyond our control. However, we still managed to accomplish many of the intended objectives of the field day by taking advantage of other outreach opportunities. Ultimately, through these activities, we reached a far wider audience than a single field day could have accomplished.

In June 2024, we participated in the Idaho Section of the Society for Range Management’s (SRM) Summer Field Tour. One of our team members led a session that presented our research design and preliminary findings to an audience of livestock producers, scientists and other rangeland stakeholders. She also facilitated a panel discussion with SRM professionals and livestock producers focused on practical applications, operational constraints, and implementation considerations for targeted grazing in working rangelands.

In October 2024, sheep from one of the producers on our team were used in the National Qualifying Sheep Dog Trials in association with the Trailing of the Sheep Festival held near our study area. Each year, this extremely well-attended event draws local visitors as well as tourists from around the country and beyond. We used this opportunity to post signs informing attendees that “These sheep eat cheatgrass!” The signs included information about cheatgrass and the efficacy of our targeted grazing treatments, a QR code to connect to our education materials online, and a copy of our magazine article in Sun Valley Property News.

Our outreach efforts drew the attention of reporters with the local National Public Radio (NPR) station and a Boise television station who were each interested in how targeted grazing could be used to mitigate wildfire risk in cheatgrass-invaded areas. A reporter from Boise State Public Radio News, which is the NPR station serving central and southern Idaho and northern Nevada, joined our team during the fall targeted grazing treatments to interview scientists, students, a sheep producer, and a sheep herder from our team. Her story ran on the radio and online in December 2024. In January 2025, a television reporter featured our project for the “Inside Ag” segment of the nightly KTVB news. Each of these outlets reaches thousands of listeners and viewers throughout the region, again greatly helping to build awareness of the potential to use sheep targeted grazing as a tool to manage cheatgrass and wildfire fuels.

Workshops and applied training:

Rather than hosting stand-alone field days, outreach efforts were integrated into existing Extension and producer-led programming to enhance participation and logistical feasibility. In collaboration with the University of Idaho Extension and industry partners, sheep utilization monitoring and targeted grazing principles were incorporated into regional workshops and producer meetings. These efforts focused on practical application of monitoring tools, including the Landscape Appearance method, and were designed to serve livestock producers, agency personnel, and land managers.  

To strengthen communication with Spanish-speaking herders and improve alignment between research objectives and on-the-ground implementation, the project translated the Landscape Appearance method into Spanish. The Landscape Appearance method provides a rapid visual assessment of forage utilization by comparing grazed plants to reference conditions, allowing managers to estimate grazing intensity in real time. Translating this tool was intended to facilitate clearer communication of target utilization levels and support adaptive management decisions during grazing events. Distribution and field application of the translated materials will occur as ongoing grazing activities continue under related project support.

To support producer education, bilingual (English and Spanish) instructional videos and worksheets were developed to demonstrate ewe body condition scoring and its relevance to targeted grazing management. This material was further disseminated through a presentation at the West Central States Wool Growers Convention (November 2023), by Dr. Sergio Arispe, extending reach to regional sheep producers and industry representatives. 

In addition to our proposed outreach and education activities, the project contributed to complementary initiatives that expanded its educational reach and increased awareness of the potential for adopting sheep grazing as a management tool for invasive annual grass management. A graduate-level course titled "Sheepscape Ecology" was offered at Boise State University, structured around discussions of The Art and Science of Shepherding, edited by Michel Meuret and Fred Provenza (2014). The course examined ecological, behavioral, and management dimensions of sheep grazing systems and directly inspired two students to pursue new research avenues related to sheep grazing and management. We also developed a new collaboration with researchers at Marshall University, who are focusing on improving methods to quantify sheep utilization estimates under real-world targeted grazing scenarios. This work is ongoing beyond the timeframe of this project. 

Industry and agency presentations:

To directly engage key sheep producers and industry stakeholders, we organized a half-day breakout session titled "Sheep Management and Targeted Grazing on Rangelands" at the 2023 West Central States Wool Growers Convention held in Boise, ID. More than 120 producers from Idaho, Utah, Nevada, and Wyoming participated in our session. 

The program brought together a diverse panel of experts, including sheep producers; university faculty, postdoctoral researchers, and graduate and undergraduate students (Boise State University, Brigham Young University, Cal Poly Humboldt); Extension specialists (Oregon State University, Utah State University, University of Idaho); and federal agency representatives (U.S. Forest Service, Agricultural Research Service). Presentations addressed applied management strategies, ecological responses to targeted grazing, monitoring approaches, and implementation challenges. 

A post-session evaluation was distributed to assess knowledge gains and interest in adopting targeted grazing practices. Although survey response rates were limited, in-session discussion and subsequent feedback indicated strong engagement and interest among participants.  The session fostered cross-sector dialogue and strengthened connections among producers, researchers, and agency personnel regarding the practical application of targeted sheep grazing.

We also presented our research findings to U.S. Forest Service staff interested in learning more about targeted grazing with sheep for cheatgrass management. In 2024, we shared our findings at the "Range All Hands Meeting" for Region 6 (Pacific Northwest Region) of the U.S. Forest Service in Pendleton, OR. This venue provided an opportunity to engage range specialists representing more than a dozen National Forests and Grasslands and facilitated dialogue on the application of sheep grazing for cheatgrass management and wildfire fuel reduction at operational scales. In 2025, we were invited to present our work at the U.S. Forest Service’s “All Hands Interregional Meeting,” which was held virtually. Our presentation was attended by 104 staff, representing one-third of all range staff in the Forest Service at the time.

Podcasts:

A scientist and sheep producer from our team were interviewed about our project’s approach and findings for two podcasts: The Art of Range and Sheep Stuff Ewe Should Know. While the former covers rangeland issues broadly, the latter is more narrowly focused on the sheep industry. These podcasts are each hosted by knowledgeable rangeland professionals who elicited both scientific and practical information about targeted grazing for cheatgrass management.  Importantly, they also provided an opportunity to feature the perspective of a producer participating in our project, who highlighted the operational dimensions of targeted grazing and drew upon his decades of experience raising sheep in cheatgrass-invaded ecosystems. Our episode on the Art of Range reached 884 unique listeners in its first year, and the episode on Sheep Stuff Ewe Should Know reached 156 listeners after several months, thus greatly expanding our outreach to those interested in rangelands in general and sheep in particular.

Newsletters and other media:

Our project was featured by 8 local and regional media outlets, including newsletters (Western Integrated Pest Management, Trailing of the Sheep), newspapers (Idaho Mountain Express, Idaho Press, Skagit Valley Herald), a magazine (Sun Valley Property News), radio (Boise State Public Radio), and television (“Inside Ag” segment of KTVB News). Many of these articles were further disseminated by the Idaho Wool Growers Association and the Idaho Rangeland Resources Commission, further expanding their reach among producers, land managers, and the broader public.

Practical materials for targeted grazing implementation:

Our team was invited to contribute to a targeted grazing guidebook (Targeted Grazing 101: Starting & Sustaining a Grazing Service Enterprise) published by the American Sheep Industry Association as a supplement to its 2006 Targeted Grazing Handbook. A chapter describing our study design and collaborative implementation approach was developed following interviews with project partners, including a university faculty member, a sheep producer, and a U.S. Forest Service representative. Other chapters cover practical topics ranging from monitoring, to animal husbandry, logistics, and business basics. Within its first year of publication (2026), it sold 289 copies.

Two fact sheets were proposed to communicate findings to producers and land managers: (1) economic considerations associated with targeted sheep grazing, and (2) implementation and rangeland health implications of sheep grazing for invasive annual grass management. Completion of final data processing is ongoing, and outreach materials are being refined to reflect finalized ecological and fire behavior results. The rangeland health and implementation fact sheet will be completed following peer-reviewed manuscript publications. Economic considerations will be incorporated into outreach materials in a manner consistent with available data and documented assumptions.

Education and Outreach Objective 3: Achieve wider public acceptance of active land management in rangelands.

Curriculum development and pilot implementation:

The project developed three structured curriculum modules designed to increase understanding of sheep-based land management among middle and high school students:

• Unlocking the Power of Targeted Grazing (middle school; includes the interactive “AGRAZING Race” activity)

• Woolly Wonders: Exploring Sheep, Wool, and Micron Counts Across the Globe (middle school; includes the Global Wool Map: Common Sheep Breeds and Their Journeys) 

• Fleece to Feast: Sheep Through Time–Cultural Heritage and Modern Innovations (high school; includes the interactive “Barter in the Barnyard” activity)

These modules move beyond traditional lecture-based instruction and incorporate interactive, systems-based learning tools. Across modules, students engage with sheep production as a multifaceted system linking agriculture, ecology, economics, and cultural history.  

The “Unlocking the Power of Targeted Grazing” module introduces students to targeted grazing as an applied land management strategy through an interactive board game, “The AGRAZING Race.” In this simulation-based activity, students navigate sheep across a rangeland landscape while encountering real-world ecological challenges, including invasive species, wildfire, drought, predators, soil compaction, and disease.  On-the-ground knowledge from sheep producers and herders helped inform which challenges and realistic responses were incorporated into the game. Game mechanics reinforce ecological cause-and-effect relationships: students advance when sheep reduce cheatgrass and invasive forbs, improving biodiversity and decreasing wildfire fuels, and must adapt to stochastic events such as extreme weather or predator encounters.  The visually designed game board and custom cards incorporate professional artwork and structured decision points, making abstract concepts such as fuel reduction, integrated weed management, and ecosystem resilience tangible and memorable for middle school learners.  

The “Woolly Wonders” module focuses on the biological and physical properties of wool, including micron counts, fiber characteristics, and industrial applications.  Students examine how biogeography influences sheep breeds and wool traits, and how these factors shape global wool markets. The module incorporates an interactive ArcGIS-based Global Wool Map (https://arcg.is/11fbTa1) that allows students to explore geographic variation in wool production and connect climate, environment, and agricultural specialization. 

The “Fleece to Feast” module situates sheep within historical and modern systems, culminating in the “Barter in the Barnyard” activity. In this activity, students trade sheep-derived commodities to fulfill historically grounded civilization objectives, integrating concepts of resource allocation, trade, technological innovation, and cultural development.  The curriculum includes professionally developed custom artwork and structured game mechanics that reinforce applied decision-making.

Materials include structured lesson plans, PowerPoint presentations, student activities, and reference lists to support classroom implementation. The curriculum has been piloted through BYU STEM Camp (2024 and 2025; 90 total youth participants) and the BYU Range and Wildlife Camp (2025; 35 participants), providing direct engagement with students ages 14-17. Feedback from these implementations informed refinement of lesson pacing, activity structure, and clarity of key concepts.  

Curriculum materials are housed within the BYU Rangeland Restoration lab website (https://pws.byu.edu/rangeland-restoration-lab/sheep-discovery-zone) and are being prepared for broader dissemination through partnerships with Wool Growers Associations and state-level rangeland education organizations. Current efforts are focused on aligning materials with state science standards, expanding distribution networks, and developing pre- and post-assessment tools to evaluate learning outcomes.  

K-12 outreach:

The proposed Science Journal for Kids article was not developed because the journal requires adaptation of a published, peer-reviewed manuscript. As manuscripts describing vegetation, soil, and fire behavior outcomes are currently in preparation, development of a youth-adapted article will follow formal publication. However, given the potential interest in invasive species, wildfire, and sheep-based management among younger audiences, we pursued other opportunities to engage K-12 students. In addition to the curriculum development and piloting described above, we gave a presentation to a sixth-grade class at a Boise elementary school as part of their year-long inquiry project about the impacts of wildfire on Idaho ecosystems. Drawing on curriculum materials described above, we shared how our research is testing if targeted grazing can reduce cheatgrass invasion and thereby mitigate wildfire danger in sagebrush ecosystems. We brought vegetation samples from our experiment to give the students hands-on experience with the differences between very dry and highly flammable cheatgrass in comparison to native plants, which their teacher reported was a highlight.

Life on the Range video:

Working in close collaboration with the Idaho Rangeland Resources Commission, we created a video and accompanying article about our project for their “Life on the Range” educational series that showcases stories about rangeland issues in Idaho. The video included interviews with scientists, students, a sheep producer, a sheep herder, and Forest Service staff working on the project. It described the problems associated with cheatgrass, our collaborative efforts, and the findings from each of the interviewees’ perspectives. The video was viewed 745 times in its first year and led to newspaper articles published by the Idaho Press and Skagit Valley Herald (Washington). The video was also shown at a meeting of the Idaho Rangeland Resources Commission, reaching an audience of livestock producers and natural resource management agency staff from throughout the state.

Outreach through non-traditional venues:

We had proposed to present our findings at a “Science Pub” event in Blaine County, ID near the end of our project, but we discovered that this public event series had gone on hiatus in our final project year. Despite this opportunity no longer being possible, we still managed to participate in alternative means of engagement with the general public.

An undergraduate research assistant who had worked on the project since its inception was awarded a fellowship in Fall 2023 that supported him to conduct an independent study project on sheep forage nutrition, using samples from our experiment, while also writing an original five movement flute composition about his experience conducting field work for the targeted grazing study.  His composition received a great deal of attention locally. He gave five public performances across a range of venues and audiences, including Boise's Treefort Music Fest (a music festival that attracted over 47,000 attendees) and Boise State University's SPARC mixer (Showcasing Projects And Research Creativity), where his performance was accompanied by a mixed digital media film using video and images from our experiment.  At each of these venues, he had a chance to introduce the music by first explaining the threat of cheatgrass invasion to western rangelands and how we are investigating the use of targeted grazing with sheep to mitigate it. While many people in the western U.S. seem to be well aware of cheatgrass and the challenges it poses, we found that these performances reached segments of the population who told us that they were not previously aware of cheatgrass, much less targeted grazing. The integration of art and science therefore helped us break through to new audiences with our outreach.