LAND PROTECTION
for development. In 2004, he sold an adjacent 120 acres to the Missouri Department of Natural Resources (DNR). That property is now part of the state’s Coakley Hollow Fen, a natural area that now includes the Ozark Caverns cave system. “I have been very happy with that decision,” Williams said, praising the care the state has taken in protecting and restoring the entire area. He hoped to arrange the same fate for the 100 acres while holding onto an adjoining 20 acres where he and his wife have a house and plan to spend the rest of their lives. DNR was interested but couldn’t move forward as quickly as Williams needed with big bills on the horizon. So, he contacted The Nature Conservancy. TNC has a long history of conserving lands. The biodiverse Ozarks in particular have been a point of interest in recent years, where we’ve used our Ozarks Conservation Buyers Fund to buy more than 12,000 acres along the Current and Jacks Fork rivers and resell them with conservation easements—legal agreements that require purchasers to adhere to permanent, nature-protecting provisions, such as prohibitions on clear-cutting. “These areas are essential puzzle pieces in globally important ecosystems, and they’re under a lot of pressure,” says Sarah Powell, TNC land protection specialist in Missouri. “Our goal is to ensure they remain intact for future generations.” TNC is looking to expand those eorts beyond the Buyers Fund footprint as the Conservancy takes steps to protect the most biodiverse, most vulnerable portions of the karst system in the Interior Highlands region, which extends across large swaths of Missouri, Arkansas and part of eastern
Oklahoma. Karst systems are porous networks of caves, sinkholes and springs, formed by slightly acidic water that seeps down, carving holes in rocky layers below the surface. They support some of the world’s most biodiverse places, including a number of species that live only in the Ozarks. Water—and whatever nutrients it’s carrying—can move easily from the surface to groundwater within karst systems’ fissures and channels. That’s one of the reasons protecting those fragile systems plays a big role in TNC’s broader goals to safeguard freshwater in the Conservancy’s ten-state Great Plains Division. Williams’ property will contribute to those eorts. Thanks to a legacy of careful stewardship passed down from his great-grandfather, the land remains a pristine relic of Ozark landscapes, with karst features and a connection to the Coakley Hollow Fens Natural Area that borders the property on three sides. TNC has agreed to act TNC plans to then shift the money to fund more karst protection projects, working from a list created by a team of TNC staers from the primary states of the Interior Highlands. Without TNC’s intervention, Williams said he would have been forced to sell to developers. That would have made him more money but at the cost of a wild place his family has protected for more than 100 years. “It’s like a thousand pounds coming o my shoulders,” he said. And the critters that Pa loved will remain. They’ll have a home, a place to live. as a bridge, buying the 100 acres and then transferring it at cost to the state, ensuring it remains protected in perpetuity.
Why I Do This Work
“ I grew up on a farm in southwestern Illinois, in a place some call the Illinois Ozarks. It’s dominated by blus and valleys, rolling hills and sink holes. My family didn’t have much, but we had a lot of land. I spent much of my childhood exploring, learning to hunt, gather, navigate and identify the living things in the forests, ponds and pastures around me. By high school, I wasn’t sure what I wanted to ‘do,’ but I knew I wanted to be outside. I found a program at the University of Illinois where I could study natural resources and environmental science, focusing on human dimensions and restoration ecology. I never looked back. Now, I help protect landscapes across Missouri. My favorite part of the job is working with landowners to preserve what they love about their land. More than 93% of land in Missouri is privately owned, which means those landowners are critical to conservation. Each is unique. The places they’ve stewarded carry legacies of shared connections— homesteads and farms passed down through generations, memories of friends and families. These relationships help knit a landscape together, with lasting results for conservation and community. ” —Sarah Powell, TNC land protection specialist in Missouri
THIS PAGE Sarah Powell, land protection specialist for The Nature Conservancy in Missouri © Sarah Powell/TNC
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