Game and Parks, partner agencies, to receive $500,000 for prairie restoration

LINCOLN – The Nebraska Game and Parks Commission, in partnership with the Kansas Department of Wildlife, Parks and Tourism, and the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, has received a $500,000 for prairie restoration.

The grant, awarded through the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service State and Tribal Wildlife Grant program, will be used for restoration projects that benefit migratory birds, reptiles and invertebrates.

“This is an exciting opportunity to work at a regional scale between two states,” said Kristal Stoner, Wildlife Diversity Program

Manager for Nebraska Game and Parks Commission.

In Nebraska, the grant funds will be used primarily in the Loess Canyons, a biologically unique landscape consisting steep loess hills and canyons south of the Platte River in Lincoln, Dawson and northern Frontier counties, as well as in the Loess Hills, a biologically unique landscape in Custer and Sherman County. Game and Parks and partner agencies will work with landowners to remove cedar trees and restore grasslands.

“We have been working in cooperation with Pheasants Forever, Inc. and Quail Forever, Inc. in these areas already, but our efforts haven’t yet matched the need,” said Stoner. “This grant is going to help us do just that.”

A total of $5.7 million in grants will be distributed to 11 states through the federal grant program. The grants focus on large-scale conservation projects to conserve and recover species of greatest conservation need and their habitats. They will be matched by more than $2.9 million in non-federal funds from states and their partners.  A list of the projects that were received funding in 2015 is available online at www.fws.gov.

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