alaska wildlife alliance

grant award: $300,000; year awarded: 2022

The Kenai Lowlands on Alaska’s western Kenai Peninsula contain approximately 290,000 acres of peatlands. These peatlands depend on groundwater recharge to remain inundated and serve as carbon sinks, but climate change is lowering water tables and drying peatlands at a rate of 6-11% of surface area per decade. This drying also reduces ecosystem services for plants, wildlife, and people, including nearly 5,000 Alaskan Natives. Alaska Wildlife Alliance aims to restore 30,000 acres of peatlands by 2035. Their project will pilot three demonstration plots using beaver and beaver dam analogs from which they will assess hydrological changes. Their results will be the catalyst for the 30,000-acre restoration and they plan to share their results with state and federal land managers.