Weed Warriors- Vegetation Management Volunteers

This opportunity is best suited for volunteer candidates local to the Albuquerque area. This volunteer opportunity is not eligible for on-site housing or RV pads.

The Refuge:

Valle de Oro is a flagship Urban National Wildlife Refuge and an ambitious community-led restoration project. The refuge occupies 570 acres of what once was a dairy and alfalfa farm next to the Rio Grande bosque that was intensively farmed for cattle feed for the last 100 years. 

After years of grassroots activism to preserve the farm from industrial development, in 2012 community members succeeded in having the US Fish and Wildlife Service take on the project of restoring this land to native wildlife habitat. Today the refuge is an exciting work in progress as staff, volunteers and youth conservation crews work together to build wetland and desert habitat for local wildlife. This urban refuge takes an innovative approach to balancing our habitat restoration work with community involvement- the refuge partners closely with youth employment Americorps programs to promote youth development and hiring pathways for local young people into stable careers in conservation job fields, we host meetings of organizations working to make positive change in our communities, we work with local schools to bring students to the refuge to learn about their local ecosystems, how to restore native habitat and support native species and about the history of community organizing that created Valle de Oro, we also host free events for families to connect with nature through art, naturalist observation and storytelling. 

The Position:

• As an urban refuge that is just recently transitioning from intensive farming, Valle de Oro is in this phase of its development a hotbed for invasive plants/weeds. Invasive plants proliferate faster than the native plant species that support local wildlife and take valuable resources from the native plants that refuge biologists are working to establish here. Our plant management volunteers, also known as Weed Warriors, help us keep those invasive plants in check by removing them. Most volunteers work around the visitor center grounds, the epicenter of weed growth at the refuge. As a plant management volunteer you can set your schedule based on your availability. Most of these volunteers commit to 1-2 hours per week on a specific recurring day. To start the process of becoming a plant management volunteer, reach out to Ranger Dakota (dakota_dominguez@fws.gov)