A new report details how Colorado is moving forward with protecting migration corridors. Migration corridors are crucial for wildlife across the west. As more and more humans move into wildlife habitat, the risks to the corridors are increases. Migration corridors in Colorado are no different. Likewise, it has been reported that 70,000 people move into Colorado each year. With the human populations continuing to grow, it is becoming even more crucial to protect these migration corridors.
The recent reports list several projects that Colorado is working on or has completed during the last few years. Recently, Colorado officials completed a project in Summit county. The project was to address the loss of roughly 2,000 animals each year.
The project included building overpasses, underpasses, and fencing to help prevent wildlife-vehicle collisions. This project has already seen a large success. In certain areas of the county, they have seen annual wildlife collisions drop from 97 down to 2.
Likewise, in 2019, Gov. Jared Polis signed an executive order to help protect Colorado wildlife. The order instructed the CPW to closely look for and track wildlife migration corridors. It also asked CDOT to incorporate big game migration into all planning processes of future projects.
They agree that this needs to happen, that it’s important for big-game migration conservation. And they want to do it consistently, where the state wildlife agencies are using their science and data to inform management on BLM land.” – Madeleine West, Director of the Center for Public Lands at the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership
Protecting Colorado wildlife isn’t just about conservation either, wildlife in Colorado is big business. Hunting, fishing, and wildlife viewing generate $5 billion in economic revenue for the state.
