Sometimes, Mother Nature needs a helping hand because she just can’t keep up.
That’s exactly the case in southwest Washington where the 1980 eruption of Mt. St. Helens loaded up the Toutle River Valley with a landslide of debris. And that led to long-lasting erosion that only continues today.
Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation volunteers worked alongside other folks to plant more than 5,400 broadleaf trees on the banks of the North Fork of the Toutle River to help stabilize erosion.
That vegetation will also improve forage for elk in an area home to the largest elk herd in that part of the state numbering from 500 to more than 1,000.
Plus stabilizing the bank and fighting off erosion benefits fish and other critters along that important stretch of riparian habitat.
Work crews also applied lime, fertilizer, supplemental seed, shrubs and trees to maintain existing forage stands and sites cleared of noxious weeds.
More than 95 percent of RMEF’s 227,000 members are hunters.
Funded and supported by hunters, projects like this one highlight how Hunting Is Conservation.