Standing Cedars Community Land Conservancy

Land Management: The Land Management Committee and its many volunteers put in more than 800 hours. The largest efforts this year included removal of invasive buckthorn on the Tewksbury property, brush removal and prairie seed collection on the Engelwood property, preparing for a prescribed burn of the very rare goat prairie on Engelwood, and planting woody shrubs beneficial to migrating birds on the Brown property. Maintenance of public hiking and skiing trails was a significant effort on all the properties. Administratively, a formal tracking system was implemented and a series of potential 2024 projects was reviewed. These included prescribed burns, and experimenting with goats or mechanical removal to address the continuing challenge of invasive buckthorn.

Land Protection: We are in the process of purchasing a property which is surrounded by Standing Cedars land on 3 sides, and is completely surrounded by protected land - it is a vital parcel to protect. We will close on the land in 2024. We continue to monitor the local area for conservation easements and purchase of vulnerable land.

Public Relations: We had over 80 volunteers contribute over 1,000 hours this year. The local high school Eco Club members participated in some of the work days. We provided free public access on over 1500 acres for hiking, hunting, cross country skiing, birding and other outdoor based activities. Our trails and parking lots were well maintained. Mailed over 500 newsletters. We have a Facebook page and website. We gave out two high school Ecology scholarship awards. We participated in the local annual River Road Farm Crawl. We co-sponsored a WildFlower hike and a First Day hike with Wild Rivers Conservancy. A graduate student is doing geologic research on our land. A group of college students came out to do a forest mapping project using drones. A nature educator mentioned us in a Public Radio story on favorite areas to go exploring, and we will be highlighted in her upcoming book. We were included in a newsletter for local woodland owners in an article about winter hiking trails.