Ajo, Arizona Celebrates Community Wildlife Habitat Certification

The former copper mining town of Ajo, Arizona took a big step towards helping local wildlife when they registered their Community Wildlife Habitat® project with the National Wildlife Federation four years ago. After a lot of hard work and educational outreach on the part of their volunteer team, Ajo is now the 65th certified Community Wildlife Habitat in the nation and is the second community in Arizona to receive this distinction.

Ajo is located in the heart of the Sonoran desert in southwestern Arizona and is the gateway community to Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument. As part of their outreach, the Community Wildlife Habitat team helped create a Certified Wildlife Habitat® garden at the monument’s Kris Eggle Visitor Center. They also worked to create habitat gardens at Ajo Elementary School and Triangle Park, as well as the Curley School artisan center.

This was truly a community-wide effort. All over town, one can find the NWF Certified Wildlife Habitat signs displayed by proud homeowners on their front fences.

A certification ceremony was held at the city’s annual Sonoran Shindig and Pima County Commissioner Sharon Bronson traveled from Tucson for the ceremony.  Team leader Vivian Sartori accepted the certificate for the town and it will be on display in the Ajo Library.

Congratulations to Ajo and the Community Wildlife Habitat team!