A Riparian Restoration Field Day at Powers Ranch
🌍 What Was It?
At Powers Ranch in Rifle, Colorado, a living laboratory is quietly shaping the next generation of conservation leaders—and offering a model for what regenerative, place-based learning can look like.
Through Colorado State University’s Colorado Natural Heritage Program (CNHP), students and professionals alike are gaining a deeper understanding of what it means to steward land in partnership with community, history, and ecosystem health. The weeklong field course for Siegele Conservation Science Interns invites participants to immerse themselves in hands-on ecological restoration while learning directly from natural resource professionals, landowners, and one another.
This work is rooted in a long-term vision. Nearly a decade ago, CNHP led a BioBlitz at the ranch to catalog its biodiversity and identify restoration needs. The riparian area had been degraded by upstream erosion and ranching practices. Since then, over 9,000 native plants have been reintroduced, and restoration continues to be both a practice and a teaching tool.
The Alliance for Collective Action’s Director of Programs, Jolie Brawner, joined the cohort for one day of this year’s program. She witnessed firsthand how powerful this kind of experiential learning can be, where observation leads to inquiry, and inquiry leads to meaningful engagement with the land.
🔥 A Day on the Land
Visit day began at sunrise with a 5:00 AM bird walk, led by an ornithologist, to observe and identify avian species returning to restored riparian habitat. From there, interns spent the day walking Rifle Creek, collecting field samples, and engaging in conversations with experts from the Natural Resource Conservation Service, Ducks Unlimited, Eco-Point Restoration Services, Middle Colorado Watershed Council, Colorado Parks & Wildlife, and others. The day concluded with a campfire and s’mores, an informal space for reflection and connection, grounded in the day’s work.
✨ Key Takeaway: Restoration is a Relationship
Restoration is never just a technical process. It’s a relationship—between people and place, between science and story, between what is and what could be. Powers Ranch offers a vivid example of how learning rooted in land and lived experience can cultivate not just knowledge, but care, and a shared sense of responsibility for the future.
