Desert Defender Program

About the Program

Category: Parks and Recreation (Best in Category)

Year: 2022

In January 2019, the Maricopa County Parks and Recreation Department rolled out the Desert Defenders program which was developed to address several flora invasive species residing in the County’s regional park system. These invasive species are not only detrimental to the health of the parks’ ecosystem but also greatly increase fire fuels in the parks. The program was developed in conjunction with invasive species experts from the Central Arizona Conservation Alliance, White Tank Mountains Conservancy, and McDowell Sonoran Conservancy. The goals of the program were to help raise public awareness of invasive species, encourage the public to get involved, and create good stewards of the land to help manage the invasive species problems. To ensure staff and volunteers had the necessary resources to be successful, the agencies created an invasives species flyer and booklet to help with identification; developed a GIS-based smartphone app for mapping, and offered a training program to help show volunteers how to map the invasive species within the regional park system. In 2021, the department introduced Native Seed Harvest events as part of the program to collect native seeds that would be used to revegetate areas within the parks where invasive treatment had occurred and/or were impacted by wildfires.