The Lesser Prairie Chicken habitat in southeastern Colorado is a swath of prairie that begins in Cheyenne and far-southeastern Lincoln counties and moves south and east into Kiowa, Prowers and Baca counties. This is cattle country where the short grass is nutrient dense, and a little bit of rain makes the prairie explode. A little less rain, though, and it returns to being hard, dry country, but beautiful all the same.

The Chicken, or LPC, is declining in population and has been listed (and unlisted) as threatened under the Endangered Species Act (ESA). It is thought only about 35,000 birds exist across five prairie states with Colorado Parks and Wildlife estimating Colorado is home to fewer than 100 breeding males.

The State Land Board will meet in Lamar this week and the LPC Stewardship Action Plan is on the agenda. According to the materials in the board packet, the SLB has 114 agricultural leases involving about 84,300 acres of surface trust lands in LPC habitat, about 3% of the state’s LPC habitat. Other leases within LPC habitat include planning and production leases for wind development and rights-of-way, three private recreation leases, and 6,490 acres leased under the CPW Hunting and Fishing Access Program. The SLB also holds 170,300 acres of state trust mineral estate in LPC habitat areas.

The Stewardship Action Plan for approval at the upcoming meeting has several changes from the previous plan, the most interesting include new direction for staff to provide information to grazing lessees on the use of regenerative grazing practices that vary the seasonal timing, intensity and duration of grazing, followed by long recovery periods as a grazing management tool that can improve LPC habitat; new direction for staff to provide information to grazing and cropland lessees on the potential for grassland carbon and cropland practices than increase the sequestration of soil organic carbon and provide a revenue-share mechanism for lessees; new goal for staff to assess the quality of LPC habitat on state trust lands in focal areas and connectivity zones across different seasons of growth starting in late spring and summer of 2026; New goal for staff will work to increase LPC habitat quality assessment scores by at least 10%, in the aggregate, across all state trust lands, with particular focus on LPC focal areas and connectivity zones, new goal for staff exploration of a State Land Board deferred grazing or incentive program; new goal for staff to initiate development of a State Land Board LPC species conservation bank project in the SSGG to be phased in over several years starting in 2027, and stronger protections against new oil and gas, solid mineral, rights of ways, and renewable energy development on state trust lands in the SSGG and within 2.2 miles of active LPC leks (mating grounds), including: no new oil and gas, solid mineral, and renewable energy development within 2.2 miles of active LPC leks, in the SSGG, focal areas, and connectivity zones, no surface occupancy (NSO) for oil and gas development within 2.2 miles of active LPC leks in Estimated Occupied Range, and no new renewable energy leasing for wind or solar development within 2.2 miles of active LPC leks, in the SSGG, focal areas, and connectivity zones.

All of this reinforces the value of good grazing and the value of land management by people and demonstrates the quality of work done by SLB staff. It also harkens a reminder the overriding goal of the SLB is to manage trust lands for the greatest economic return for schools, which staff said they believe can be accomplished.

It also is nearly overshadowed by the enormous swath of land designated for a transmission project of some sort by the NIETC. You’ll recall this is a huge federal project involving a 5-to-15-mile-wide, 640-mile-long corridor encompassing 1.9 million acres in New Mexico and 325,000 acres in Colorado of mostly private land. Within this corridor, Federal Energy Regulatory Commission could give power to corporations to use imminent domain for speculative transmission and renewable projects, multiple transmission lines and “energy storage solutions” or open-ended “other solutions,” making the corridor a 2.2-million-acre zone open for speculation by private for-profit companies.

Ranchers in this area are doing good work and are creating habitat not only for LPC, but scads of other species in the area. If the Polis administration or the feds are interested in reaching their renewable energy goals, it would be wise for them to summon the ways of former Govs. Roy Romer and Bill Owens. Both recognized taking something by force creates an equal opposing force. I’m told it’s physics. If you want to see it in action, release wolves in the state and watch agriculture and hunting interests push back.

Those with an even minimal level of consciousness recognize cooperating with landowners will result in greater returns than attempting to take by force. This state will need wild things and wild places long after this administration leaves. This state will need ranchers and farmers and agriculture long after this administration leaves. Cooperation with landowners can be a win-win situation across the board if cooperation results in paying mitigation for projects where the effects are located and recognizing the value of the generational work at play.

Rachel Gabel writes about agriculture and rural issues. She is assistant editor of The Fence Post Magazine, the region’s preeminent agriculture publication.