Continental Divide Land Trust

Leigh’s Blog – New on CDLT’s Website – Posted June 25, 2009

Most of my adult life I’ve been called a "tree hugger." While I love trees, they are a part of the whole. What I love most is the land and all the plants, birds, bugs, and animals that go with it. If I could hug the planet, I’d really be called an Earth Hugger.

So often we are called to save some part of what we love – a threatened trail, an endangered animal, a trampled plant. But land conservation allows us to embrace the whole. Without the land, we would have no trails to enjoy, no animals to cherish, no birds to watch, no flowers to sniff.

The Earth’s population is projected to reach 9 billion people by 2050. What is the hope for the land and all it supports on a planet with 9 billion people? Private land conservation is our best hope for the future. Private landowners are often the best stewards of the land. Conservation easements allow landowners to continue to own their land, manage and take care of it as they have done. Continental Divide Land Trust is here to work with landowners interested in land protection and conservation easements.

But you don’t need hundreds of acres to be a good land steward. In your own back yard or in planters on your deck you can create wildlife habitat to help support small critters, birds, and pollinators such as bees and butterflies that are so critical to the web of life.

In our mountain environment, it is easy to be a land steward by protecting the native vegetation already on your property, avoiding expanses of lawn, and planting native species that are both beautiful to you and beneficial to pollinators, such as penstemon and columbine. For more information, visit your locally operated garden supply store, or visit www.pollinator.org.

 Posted May 10, 2009

My job as CDLT’s executive director provides me with many rich and unique opportunities. I’ve had the opportunity to hold baby goats at the Giberson Ranch, hike on properties that few people ever visit, and other experiences that I’d like to share with you.

Upon occasion, I’ll post my observations on the home page of CDLT’s website. I hope you’ll be a frequent visitor. Here is something to get us started:

Joni Mitchell’s song "Big Yellow Taxi" is a banner for the environmental movement, with the phrase "they paved paradise and put up a parking lot." But to me, the most significant lyric is the reminder: "you don’t know what you got ‘til it’s gone."

I’ve lived in Summit County for over 37 years, since I was a child, and I have seen a lot of changes. I’ve learned to appreciate the natural beauty of our community because I’ve seen first hand how quickly it can disappear, how threatened and fragile it is. But one aspect of our natural environment that I failed to appreciate until recently, because it was so ubiquitous, is our Lodgepole Pine forests. But you don’t know what you’ve got until you don’t have it anymore, so lately I have been especially appreciative of the underdog Lodgepole Pine tree.

For so many years, developers have justified cutting the forests by calling the unloved trees "dog hair lodgepole." Who cares about protecting these scrawny, boring trees? Well, me. Two of my favorite Lodgepole Pines are near Harris Street in Breckenridge. Actually one is no longer with us and the other is hanging in there.

Through most of the last century, a slender Lodgepole arched over old Harris Street at the intersection with Washington, like a graceful head gate announcing the entrance to a special place. It made it seem like this particular block of Breckenridge was protected and almost secret. Probably because it was feared that the tree would fall, it was cut down years ago. I still miss that tree. If anyone has a photo of it, I’d be happy to see it.

The other is located on Town of Breckenridge property behind an old barn. It is the only sizeable Lodgepole around and is a critical stopping off point for birds moving through the neighborhood from feeder to feeder.

Like any Lodgepole that is given room to grown, it is luscious and full, with branches reaching every which way. So far, it has escaped invasion by the pine beetle. It’s location near a drainage way giving it extra moisture, may save it from the pine beetle. I’ve got my fingers crossed.

I’m sure I’ll write more on lodgepoles. I’ve been a great admirer lately.

Posted May 10, 2009