Ecological Restoration Institute at NAU

Just another short virtual trip over to NAU for a visit to the Ecological Restoration Institute (ERI). The ERI is on a mission that is directly affecting Flagstaff and the surrounding forest. You'll find lots of information about the contribution these dedicated people are making to the restoration and protection of our forests and our people.

This is how the ERI introduces itself, "The Ecological Restoration Institute (ERI) at Northern Arizona University (NAU) is nationally recognized for mobilizing the unique assets of a University to help solve the problem of unnaturally severe wildfire and degraded forest health. Focusing principally on landscapes where unprecedented wildfires threaten ecological and community sustainability, the ERI works to help cooperative efforts led by land management agencies and communities by providing comprehensive focused studies and monitoring and evaluation research and technical support.

Realizing that wildland and community health problems are interdisciplinary by nature, we seek to engage the university community across disciplinary boundaries—not just foresters, ecologists, and environmental scientists, but also engineers, economists, social scientists, educators, and beyond. In addition to the standard university functions of knowledge discovery, synthesis, and transfer, the ERI stresses a learning-by-doing approach—one that helps faculty, staff, and students gain real life experience working with land management agencies, nongovernmental organizations, and policy makers at the local to national level. Our goal is not just discovery of knowledge, but meaningful work that makes a difference for western forests.

The ERI was formally established by the Arizona Board of Regents in 1997 and by federal legislation in 2004. The ERI is funded by a combination of programmatic state and federal funding and through competitive grants programs."

You'll want to follow all the links on this site, to really understand how important their mission is. Don't miss this article, Thinning the fear from The Arizona Republic, June 30, 2008, if you want to find out about the progress and effects of forest land thinning in and around Flagstaff.

The Peaks District

If you want to plan recreational activities in the Coconino National Forest, here's the place to start. This is the Recreation on the Coconino Forest section of the Forest website. Before you go further, be sure to check out the yellow box with updates about road work and such. For safety's sake read the do's and don'ts under the heading The Coconino National Forest Welcomes Visitors.

After getting the basics out of the way, go down the page to So Much To Do & See. If you click on the "Peaks District" you'll be taken to a page all about the Volcanic Highlands area around the San Francisco Peaks.

Here' you'll find information on all the recreational activities available, including camping, hiking, scenic drives and more. There is a list giving the overview information and then a link to the detail page for each activity.

For instance, if you choose Fatmans Loop Trail #25, you then see a description of the trail, its length, its rating (easy, difficult), when its open, hiking time, elevation, where to access it and more. At the bottom of the page is a great map of the surrounding area and highlighted in red is Fatmans Loop.

You'll find similar information for each activity. There you have it. Just by visiting this website, you can get all the basic information you need, in a nutshell and from a very reliable source. Have fun exploring, the website and the area.