Meet second-generation Oregon land manager, Robin Laakso, who is personally responsible for restoring hundreds of acres of sagebrush. For centuries, wildfire regularly swept across the sage, keeping juniper trees in check and maintaining a natural balance.

However, decades of overgrazing and wildfire suppression have let juniper trees grow large and spread far across sagebrush country, reducing habitat for sage grouse and other wildlife, and creating conditions for catastrophic wildfires.

In areas where fire is no longer a safe treatment, many land managers are stepping up to fill the role once played by wildfire. One such land manager is Robin Laakso, who helps her parents manage the Cornelia B. Ranch near the rural community of Paulina, Oregon.  The ranch includes private land as well as adjacent sections owned by the Bureau of Land Management.

“In a way, we're doing the same work as a wildfire. Modern rangelands operate in a controlled environment, where we no longer have naturally-occurring, low-burning wildfires that would keep the juniper in check.”-Robin Laakso

Robin's parents purchased the ranch in the late ‘70s and named it after Robin’s mother who was viscerally attracted to the landscape and open spaces. “Our conservation ethic all started with my mom,” Robin said. “She is very attached to this land and to this ranch. She wants it to remain as natural as possible.”

Robin’s parents are no strangers to voluntary conservation. They worked with NRCS to implement conservation activities on the property, such as installing some of the first sage grouse-friendly fencing in the state, and had a positive experience.

Robin is following in her parents' footsteps. During the last eight years, Robin and her neighbors in the Paulina / 12 Mile focal area, located on the eastern side of Crook County in Central Oregon, have treated a combined 100,000 acres of core sage grouse habitat.

Robin, along with her friend and business partner, Oleg Katsitadze, started working with NRCS a few years ago through Sage Grouse Initiative to address invasive conifer encroachment on the land. Robin and Oleg took training on juniper removal techniques and have cut nearly 1,000 acres of juniper themselves. They wanted to do the work themselves to learn more about range conservation practices and to deepen their connection to the land.

“When we’re walking the land and cutting the trees, we really get to know the property in an intimate way,” Robin said. She and Oleg have observed a wide array of wildlife on the property, including sage grouse, mule deer, coyotes, owls, badgers, snakes and much more.

In total, Robin’s family has completed 3,610 acres of conifer removal for sage grouse habitat on their property since 2011. Their neighbors have completed an additional 30,000 acres of habitat restoration that connect to the Cornelia B. Ranch.

It’s important to Robin and Cornelia to leave some juniper trees intact and not to clear cut everything, especially trees that have a historic value to the land and to the family. NRCS worked closely with the Cornelia B. to develop a cutting prescription that achieved the agency’s goals for sage grouse habitat while also satisfying the owner’s desire to maintain aesthetics and cultural value.

Encroachment of conifer trees, primarily western juniper, into sagebrush ecosystems has been identified as a threat to every sage grouse population in the state. Since the late 1800’s, western juniper has slowly been expanding its range across Eastern Oregon into sites previously dominated by grasses, forbs and shrubs.

Although juniper is a native plant, a combination of conditions, including fire suppression and historic overgrazing, allowed this species to spread dramatically beyond the fuel-limited sites it historically occupied.

By removing invasive conifers, landowners like the Laakso family are allowing the landscape to regenerate back to a native sagebrush ecosystem. They are even seeing an increase in sage grouse counts at the leks on their property. The latest count in 2018 by the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife (ODFW) documented 25 male sage grouse on the site, the highest recorded in the last 9 years since the Sage Grouse Initiative began.

“This program is a win-win,” Robin said. “It’s good for sage grouse and for many other native species. It’s good for bunch grasses and native grasses, restoring the steppe to what it used to look like.”