After wildfires, ranchers face 2-year delay to graze cattle on federal land – is it doing more harm than good?

Cattle can help keep down invasive grasses that are prone to burning. AP Photo/Jeff Barnard

Lightning struck deep in the central Idaho mountains on July 24, 2024, igniting the Wapiti Fire that burned across 129,063 acres around Stanley, Idaho – a place known for its scenic vistas and idyllic rural landscape.

Local communities evacuated, then returned home when the danger had passed. But for ranchers who graze livestock here, evacuation doesn’t end when the smoke clears.

When federal land burns, livestock often cannot return to the area for two years, according to federal land use and forest management plans. Two years of lost income and the added cost of purchasing feed and repairing infrastructure can be as devastating to rural communities as the fires themselves.

I study the impacts of environmental policy on rural communities, particularly those that provide the food, fiber, timber and minerals that society relies on. Research and ranchers’ experiences, including in my home state of Idaho, raise questions about whether the two-year rule, implemented decades ago, is really necessary is really necessary and whether it’s actually doing more harm than good,

A tour of burned landscape after the 2024 Wapiti Fire near Stanley, Idaho.

2-year delay can tip ranchers into the red

Wildfires are burning more often and across more land in the West today than in the past with hotter, drier conditions. To make matters worse, many landscapes are threatened by invasive cheatgrass that burns easily and regrows faster after fires than native plants do.

Often, restoration efforts are focused on slowing the spread of cheatgrass. Herbicides and plant seeding are marshaled to slow the growth of cheatgrass after fires.

Buried in the multitude of federal land management plans that guide the Bureau of Land Management and Forest Service’s management actions is another restoration tool – a two-year grazing rest period after wildfires for land leased to ranchers. Some plans require a two-year break before cattle can return to the land, and some only recommend it.

A sheepherder stands with his horse and herding dog in the mountains of Hailey, Idaho, in 2022. While rangeland in the Plains is primarily private land, in the West, much of it is under federal management.
Matt Moyer/Getty Images

That two-year rest can tip the scales for ranchers’ finances into the red, forcing some to sell cattle herds that took decades to develop, lease other grazing lands – often at a financial loss – or close up shop altogether.

Few question that the land must have a chance to recover – ranchers’ livelihoods depend on healthy rangeland – but is it necessary to wait two years and sacrifice a rural community to do it?

Grazing after fires has pros and cons

Indigenous communities across the West used fire since time immemorial to manage these sprawling landscapes. Fire can clear underbrush and dead plant material. It can provide new growth for deer, elk and cattle to feed on.

Livestock graze on invasive grasses when native plants are dormant, which can help increase native species and reduce invasive grasses, including varieties that easily burn. Reducing invasive grasses reduces risk of future fire. Trampled plant material can increase soil moisture, a benefit to the arid soils of the West.

There is also evidence, however, that grazing after wildfires can increase soil erosion as hooves break up sensitive soils. And grazers also eat native plants that take longer to establish.

Grasses and other ground cover regrow after a fire in the Wasatch Mountains near Manti, Utah.
Jon G. Fuller/VW Pics /Universal Images Group via Getty Image

But there are caveats to some of the evidence used to underpin arguments for a two-year break.

A 2016 study documented increased soil erosion when grazing resumed two weeks after a fire. But cattle, deer and elk would not likely be on a fire scar within two weeks.

A 2019 study of post-fire impacts suggests that the steepness of the burned areas and grazing immediately following a fire can increase soil erosion, but it also acknowledges that “it is currently unknown how the impact of livestock changes over time after wildfires.”

Similarly, a 2014 study found that during the first growing season after a fire, grazing that removed up to 50% of the biomass did not affect recovery. It found “no evidence … to suggest complete rest from grazing was required to conserve plant productivity.” Instead, it found that recovery was more responsive to weather than grazing – a factor on burned and unburned areas alike.

Not all fires are the same. They vary in burn severity, a measure of the impact to plant and soil ecology. Plants and soils respond differently to fire depending on a host of factors, from weather and topography to fire-return intervals and human interaction.

Instead of a blanket two-year rest policy, the rule could be revised to demand a tailored decision-making process that accounts for variance in fire severity, plant communities and weather. In my view, allowing strategic and intentional grazing in post-fire landscapes benefits rural communities, while removing it can sound a death knell.

Recovery, or not

Rural ranching communities in the West hold their breath every fire season.

The fires can be devastating, but so can the recovery time. Fences and barns burn. Cattle herds are sold in lieu of purchasing expensive feed, and then must be rebuilt later. Lines of credit collapse, generational ranches are sold, and rural community traditions are lost.

Wildfires in Idaho can burn wide swaths of forest and rangeland.
Jared L. Talley/Boise State University

In Boise, residents are already looking forward to spring, when skis will be replaced with mountain bikes and hiking shoes. The foothills, where another 2024 fire burned nearly a quarter of the Boise River Wildlife Management Area, will be emerald green with invasive grasses, and thousands of deer and elk will graze through the burned area to their summer feeding grounds. No rules can stop them.

Near Stanley, where the Wapiti Fire burned, cattle ranchers are working hard to find unburned land to lease for their herds. They’re making plans to rebuild fences and working with the banks to keep their operations running until they can return to their grazing allotments in two years. Research suggests that the wait doesn’t always need to be so long.

Phoenix Willard, a student in environmental journalism at Boise State University, contributed to this article.

Jared L Talley is affiliated with the Idaho Environmental Forum, Boise State Hazard Climate Resilience Institute, Holistic Management International, the University of Idaho Range Center, and the Western Center.