This story by Aaron Calvin was first published by the News & Citizen on May 30.
The acquisition and conservation of a 356-acre portion of woodlands in Eden will expand a broader 5,720-acre tract that has been conserved since 2010.
Greatwoods LLC and the Trust for Public Land are partners in the deal.
Greatwoods — a timber investor company with property located in New Hampshire, Vermont, New Hampshire, Oregon and Washington — approaches resource extraction in a conservation-minded way. It has been logging and sugaring the Eden tract surrounding its newest acquisition for over a decade but were unable to make it a truly intact forest until now.
“That property was kind of the doughnut hole, it was the only piece we didn’t own around us that we tried to pursue,” Greatwoods forester Adam Taschreau said. “That’s kind of the way we’re looking at acquisitions now with the real estate market as crazy as it is. We’re basically looking to expand our core land base, and that property is one of our core properties.”
The Greatwoods Eden property, now over 6,000 acres, abuts the Long Trail to the northwest and even dips into Johnson where it adjoins Butternut Mountain. It was originally conserved with funding from the U.S. Forest Service Forest Legacy Program, and this most recently conserved tract was done so with a $271,000 grant from the Vermont Housing and Conservation Board.
Along with requiring a more rigorous management plan, the easement guarantees the property is open to the public for recreation, according to Trust for Public Lands senior project manager Kate Wanner. Vermont Association of Snow Travelers trails cross through the property and, though there are no hiking trails specifically cut through the area, there are plenty of forest roads to allow access.
Wanner also pointed out that water quality benefits were something the trust kept in mind when pursuing conservation of the property. A third of the property is made-up of wetlands, and two-thirds of the property is considered riparian.
“Keeping this as forest and keeping it with strong protections are really going to help downstream to decrease flooding and increase water quality,” Wanner said.
Plugging the hole that lingered and fractured the forest block was a crucial step to ensure the integrity of the project, according to Wanner.
“If that piece had been developed, it would definitely have larger implications on the conserved land around it,” she said.
Greatwoods has reserved a 2-acre piece of the newly conserved portion of its forest from conservation, with no immediate plans to develop but with an interest in keeping its options open, potentially installing low-impact infrastructure if the need arises, such as a sugarhouse or collection site for the sap collected on the property, according to Taschreau.
Read the story on VTDigger here: Acquisition, conservation makes ‘Greatwoods’ forest whole.