USDA Blog

Just outside of Coronado National Forest in southeastern Arizona, the mountaintop village of Summerhaven can breathe a sigh of relief. Thanks to the cooperation of the Forest Service, the Bureau of Indian Affairs and the State of Arizona through shared stewardship, Summerhaven was able to avoid the...

Amid the COVID-19 outbreak, long-standing USDA Rural Development partners Pine Telephone and Pine Cellular in southeastern Oklahoma answered the call to serve their communities.

Domestic livestock have been grazing on western landscapes for centuries. The USDA Forest Service has worked alongside farmers and ranchers to manage those landscapes, which were rapidly degrading from overuse by the time the agency was formed in 1905.

Drought can be a serious game changer for rangeland, wildlife and wildland fire managers. America’s 662 million acres of public rangelands support wildlife like sage grouse, game species like deer and elk, and support rural communities by providing forage for livestock and places to enjoy the great...

The USDA Forest Service manages 193 million acres of forests and grasslands, 58 million of which are in need of restoration. Forest Service scientist are doing this by thinning and conducting prescribed burning that restores natural tree density, improves forest health and mitigates wildfire risk.

Across the United States, farmers are taking innovative approaches to foster environmental stewardship and economic viability through a common conservation practice called the riparian forest buffer. Supporting production while enhancing conservation is an important goal of both US Department of...

Wisconsin students across the state adapted to the new normal with e-Learning studies since the Badger State entered the “Safer at Home” status in late March. If you live in a metro area, you probably didn’t struggle with lack of service or low bandwidth. But in the rural areas, it was a big...

As our country sets out on the monumental task of conducting the U.S. census, the USDA Forest Service is conducting a census of its own – the Forest Inventory and Analysis (FIA).

In April 1986, the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in Ukraine exploded and heavily contaminated nearly 40,000 square miles with radioisotopes. The contaminated area became known as the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone in Ukraine and the Polesie Radioecological Reserve in Belarus. Today, the site remains...

Mount St. Helens, in Washington State, erupted 40 years ago today. The largest landslide in recorded history filled valleys below with debris, and ash fell from the sky for weeks, blanketing the nearby area and affecting regions as far away as the Rocky Mountains. Within just two weeks, ash from the...