Earth Week Day 1: Organizations in Natural Resources In The Ruby Valley!
April 17, 2023
Hello everyone, and happy Earth Week! This week, we’ll be covering all sorts of fun topics surrounding natural resources and conservation right here on our website and on Facebook and Instagram. We hope you’ll keep coming back around to learn all about conservation practices in the valley, and that we’ll see you in person on this Saturday for our annual banquet! Today we’ll be going over all of the local resources available to you in the conservation field as provided by multiple organizations in Sheridan, Twin Bridges, Dillon and Ennis. While some of you may already be well acquainted with the organizations listed below, you may still be surprised how many resources every single one of these organizations can actually provide you with.
Ruby Valley Conservation District
In recent years, the Ruby Valley Conservation District (RVCD) has primarily been focused on repairing polluted reaches of the Ruby River and its tributaries, but we offer many other services both surrounding and unrelated to working with local water sources as well! Our river restoration projects are specifically focused on doing the aforementioned work to repairing riverways, and can involve engineering to significantly alter the land, or doing small-scale, manual work depending on the project. If you have any bodies of water on your property that you think should be looked at for potential project implementation, reach out to Audra at audra@rubyvalleycd.macdnet.org!
The RVCD is largely public-facing, with a major emphasis on community education and outreach in addition to accepting local 310 permits and talking with landowners about the best watershed management practices. We also provide a monthly newsletter and an article in The Madisonian every month, and are otherwise focused on acquiring and completing grants that allow us to complete projects that further amplify our abilities to restore parts of the Ruby Watershed and educate the local community.
The district also has several monitoring stations throughout the valley, in which data loggers constantly measures the temperature, surface level and discharge of each tributary. This data is helpful for us to monitor the overall health of the watershed, and provides other organizations across the state with useful information on the state of the things in our region. If you would like to help out with this project, you can volunteer with us and learn all about how to measure discharge data with data loggers. We’ll have a training day in June, and then you would be expected to come out with us 1-2 times a month!
Another major resource that we have available to the public is our Pollinator Initiative. Conservation districts across the state can provide you with free seed mixes for you to grow on your land, all of which are made to benefit local pollinators which are vital to the success of all our local plants. We’ll be talking more about pollinators and the Initiative later this week, so stay tuned!
Our final public resource is carcass composting. Carcasses can pile up quite a bit during the winter, which can impact the health of both livestock and land. This is why we have our carcass composting site. If you contact Audra at 406-842-5741 x 104 or info@rubyvalleycd.macdnet.org, we can set up a pick-up of your carcasses and bring them to the site, where they will break down into fertilizer to be used by some local landowners.
Other than that, the RVCD is focused on providing Education and Outreach to the community through a variety of public events like the Rancher Roundtable or Conservation Speaker Series, and some classroom events to teach students about the importance of rivers and water. We also have a board of local landowners who meet on the first Wednesday of every month, so come join us there to learn more about current happenings in the valley. We hope to see you around!
Website: rvcd.org
Phone: 406-842-5741 x 101
Email: info@rubyvalleycd.macdnet.org
Address: 402 S Main St Sheridan, MT 59749
Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS)
The NRCS is another statewide department that has a branch in Sheridan. Whereas Conservation Districts are primarily focused on monitoring and improving local water sources, the NRCS is centered around the health of local land and soil. They have a wide variety of programs available to assist local landowners with optimizing their land for environmental health and for their own personal or professional benefit. While we don’t have time to go over every single program, grant, easement and initiative in the NRCS- there’s a lot of them- I can give you a broad overview of what some of these programs are designed to accomplish.
Let’s focus on the programs that assist agricultural producers. The NRCS recognizes the importance of those who work to grow food crops and native plants that are essential to the health and biodiversity of our ecosystem. The Environmental Quality Incentive Program (EQIP) is focused on assisting ag producers with natural resource concerns and helping them integrate conservation into their working land, which will improve their water, air and soil quality. There is also Agricultural Management Assistance, which helps ag producers manage any financial risks that may arise from implementing new conservation practices on their property. Additionally, the NRCS has the Wetland Mitigation Banking Program, which offers ag producers competitive grants for bankline mitigation, and Conservation Stewardships and Reserve Programs, which help farmers take their conservation efforts further and provides a yearly rental payment to farmers who remove environmentally sensitive land from their agricultural production respectively.
The NRCS also has programs that center on opening up more private land to the public, protect the land for future generations, protect and enhance forests and wetlands, and assist with watershed operations for the betterment of the community. If any of that is of interest to you, you can learn much more on the NRCS website, or you can reach out to the local district in Sheridan. Their assistance may be just what you need to make your land healthier and more successful in helping you achieve your goals!
Website: https://www.nrcs.usda.gov/
Email: John.Wagoner@usda.gov
Phone: (406) 842-5741
Address: 402 S Main St Sheridan, MT 59749
MSU Extension
MSU Extension is a statewide program that aims to provide local Montana towns with research-based education and information to integrate learning and engagement into their communities. The department in the Madison-Jefferson counties has recently done three different educational activities, starting with field days. Field days bring locals out into agricultural land and teaches them how to grow and manage different types of plants for the betterment of the land. They also have a land stewardship workshop, which involves teaching small-acreage landowners about common land use practices and other lectures on how to responsibly work on wild land. MSU Extension’s 4-H program hosts fairs that showcase and reward well-raised livestock and encourage younger people to acquire a passion for animal care and land management. Finally, the program offers soil and hay testing which tests the soil and hay of landowners to ensure that they are healthy enough to sustain the livestock and the land. Keep an eye out for MSU Extension events across the state on their website!
Website: https://www.montana.edu/extension/
Email: madisonjefferson2@montana.edu
Phone: (406) 287-3282
Address: 103 West Legion Avenue Whitehall, MT 59759
Ruby Habitat Foundation
The Ruby Habitat is based on the land of the Woodson Ranch, which was initially owned by Craig and Martha Woodson. The land has shifted away from being used for traditional ranching and agricultural practices in an effort to implement and experiment with land practices that are more environmentally friendly. The habitat provides a variety of recreational and educational activities for the purpose of providing public access to wildlife and gorgeous natural environments, in addition to some properties available for rent and some conservation projects. The Ruby Habitat Foundation strives to support agricultural practices and work with other conservation-based landowners and institutions to protect and enhance open land and wildlife habitat.
When you visit the Ruby Habitat Foundation, you can enjoy a nature trail that can be walked, biked, run or rode on, in addition to some fishing and hunting. These activities are open to the public once you’ve filled out a Permissive Use form on the Ruby Habitat website. Many educational and entertaining events, such as the Wildlife Speaker Series, are also held there throughout the year. To learn more about the rules of recreation in the Ruby Habitat, visit their website or contact Dave Delisi.
Website: https://rubyhabitat.org/
Email: dave@rubyhabitat.org
Phone: (406) 842-5010
Address: 2597 Hwy 287 Sheridan, MT 59749
Jackson’s Garden
Become a member at Jackson’s Garden to help cultivate fruits, vegetables and other plants for your own plate and to help out the garden! In addition to the community garden, you can visit the garden whenever you want and rent it as a venue, and there are annual events that can be found on the Jackson’s Garden web page! You can also visit the website to learn more about what membership at the garden entails, how you can donate or volunteer to support the garden, and about any upcoming events being hosted at the garden.
Website: https://www.jacksonsgarden.org/
Phone: (406) 842-7956
Venue Rental: (406) 596-1005
Address: 125 Mill Creek Road Sheridan, MT 59749
Greenhouses And Farmer’s Markets
If you have some difficulty seeding your plants on your property, you can buy seedlings grown in one of our local greenhouses! Judy’s Greenhouse is located in Sheridan, and Countryside Greenhouse is in Twin Bridges. You can find them both on Facebook!
Farmer’s markets are a great resource to buy local fresh produce and support your community. There are four different markets that are held throughout the summer in Madison County: Sheridan, Twin Bridges, Ennis and Jeffers Garden (in Ennis) Farmer’s Markets are all great resources to explore. The Sheridan is open from July 7th to September 8th on Thursdays from 5-7 PM. Meanwhile, the Ennis and Twin Bridges markets run from May through September, and Jeffers is open in the late summer. Follow their Facebook pages to stay tuned on when each market is opening this year, and what resources will be available each week!
That’s a wrap on our first day of earth week, but please take a look at the image below before you leave. This graphic shows every single natural resource program and office available to you in this area, including many different departments that we didn’t include here. Also, don’t forget that our Annual Banquet is coming up this Saturday, and that you can buy tickets at this link on EventBrite! We hope you learned something new about the resources available to you in the area, and that you’re ready to have a great earth week!
