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The Northwoods Land Trust works with private landowners
who wish to protect their natural lake and river shorelines.
Thanks
to a Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources’ Lake Protection program project,
owners of large stretches of natural shorelines on lakes and flowages in Iron
County are now being encouraged to consider lasting, voluntary protection of
their lake properties. According to Northwoods Land Trust (NWLT) executive
director Bryan Pierce, the lake project is based on highly-successful private
lake shoreland protection projects conducted over the last ten years by NWLT in
Vilas, Oneida, Forest, Florence and Price Counties.
“The
DNR’s Wisconsin Lakes publication
indicates that there are a total of 494 lakes in Iron County,” said Pierce.
“These include 217 named and 277 unnamed lakes. The grant project is utilizing
NWLT’s geographic information system (GIS) computer technology to identify all
remaining privately-owned lake parcels with a minimum of about 500 feet of
natural shoreline frontage.”
Pierce
explained that the project uses tax parcel maps and other data developed
through the Iron County GIS Office. Digital parcel maps and aerial orthophotos
are overlaid where needed to determine the extent of natural versus developed
frontage.
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| Naturalist John Bates conducts an ecological assessment for Meta Reigel Brandt for her 215-acre conservation agreement granted to Northwoods Land Trust. |
“The
parcels are then linked with the Iron County tax roll database to generate a
mailing list of these landowners,” Pierce stated. “Copies of NWLT’s Landowner’s
Conservation Guide will be mailed this spring to each of these identified lake
property owners. As with our previous projects, volunteers are assisting us
with assembling all of the landowner packets to prepare them for bulk mailing.”
Pierce
noted that the lake protection project runs through the end of 2020. NWLT
provides on-site technical assistance to any of those lake property owners who
wish to permanently protect their land along these natural shorelines.
“We
have already been successful in completing six conservation easement donations
with interested property owners in Iron County. Those projects have included
permanent protection of over 27,000 feet (5 miles) of natural lake, river and stream shorelines and
680 acres of shoreland, woodland and wetland habitats. These
successful projects have already leveraged well over $1 million of charitable
contribution values through those conservation easement donations.
“With
a conservation easement, the natural shorelines are protected in perpetuity,
but the land remains privately owned and managed and it is still subject to
property taxes,” said Pierce. “The lands can be sold or passed on to heirs, but
whoever owns the land in the future must retain its conservation values. Any
access to the property for outdoor recreation is still up to the consent of the
individual property owners.”
The Northwoods Land Trust also
purchased the 38-acre Interstate Falls property just west of the intersection
of U.S. Highways 2 and 51. That scenic property was then gifted to the Town of
Kimball to remain a valuable scenic tourism attraction and conservation area in
perpetuity.
The
Northwoods Land Trust is a volunteer and member-supported nonprofit
conservation organization. For more information on the Iron County lakes
project, contact the NWLT office at (715) 479-2490.
Springstead Lake.jpg – About
3,800 feet of natural shoreline on Springstead Lake was protected in perpetuity
by Meta Reigel Brandt through the Northwoods Land Trust.
The
Northwoods Land Trust works with private landowners who wish to protect their
natural lake and river shorelines.
