The Tonto National Forest has received funding to pay for replacing dozens of miles of fencing damaged or destroyed in grazing areas by a massive wildfire in east-central Arizona last summer.
Forest officials announced Tuesday that the funding for fencing repairs needed because of the Telegraph Fire near the town of Superior comes from a program that normally focuses on mitigating post-wildfire flooding on federal lands.
According to forest officials, the fencing work will be performed under a pilot program authorizing repairs of minor facilities and infrastructure damaged or destroyed by wildfires.
Range workers identified 66 miles of grazing allotment boundary fencing damaged and over 61 miles of interior pasture fencing destroyed, forest officials said in a statement.
The Telegraph Fire began on June 4 about 5 miles southeast of Superior. It burned more than 281 square miles of land managed by the Forest Service, the federal Bureau of Land Management and the state Land Department.
The fire also destroyed numerous homes and other structures and its cause is still under investigation.
