In 2012, high winds drove the Mustang Fire out of the Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness and toward Gibbonsville, Idaho. When the fire hit the Hughes Creek drainage, it encountered an open stand of large Ponderosa pine that had been recently thinned. The treated area provided safe access to the fireline, helped protect structures, and provided an opportunity for back burning and aerial ignitions. The fire dropped to the ground and no structures were harmed.

The Hughes Creek restoration project was the first commercial timber project in the area that had not been appealed in over a decade. A local collaborative group, the Lemhi Forest Restoration Collaborative Group, played a key role in developing this project. Since then, this collaborative has helped craft several other landscape scale projects, including one in an Inventoried Roadless Area. 

This is not an isolated story. Several other collaborative groups have formed in Idaho to develop forest restoration projects and shepherd them through implementation. The Idaho Forest Restoration Partnership (IFRP) is an umbrella group which supports these different collaboratives and helps them tell their stories. 

John Robison is a member of both the Lemhi group and the IFRP and will discuss the trends in forest restoration in Idaho.