Linda and I are about to sign the documents that will put a US Fish and Wildlife Grasslands Easement on about 200 acres of the farm where I grew up. About 140 acres of that is previously cropped land that I have seeded down to prairie restorations (the other 60 acres are native prairie). There are already 110 acres under easement on the farm, all either native grass or acres that were farmed for a while and then seeded back to grass because they are terrible farmground. There was no angst in that decision; those 110 acres will do more for the world as pasture than they ever could raising crops. Some of the land that is going to be put under easement this time is different, however. While no one would call it prime land, it can and has raised profitable crops. Now we are going to preclude that option, theoretically forever. It is a bit overwhelming, and a decision that many farmers cannot bring themselves to make. To get there I had to “gnaw on the bone” for a while.

First, what are we giving up? We are giving up the rights to ever raise any crop but the grass and forbs that are there now. No corn or soybeans, no wheat or oats, no barley or rye, no flax or alfalfa; all of which are crops that have been raised there in my memory. We are also giving up the rights to build, drain, mine or alter the landscape on those acres. One aspect of these limitations is obviously monetary. The value of the land is decreased by a significant amount, perhaps by half. We will be reimbursed for a majority of that by FWS in payment for the easement, but our balance sheet will decrease the minute we sign the papers. That will be reflected in future income from renting the ground. We will be receiving at least $10,000 less income per year from crop rent, starting five years from now (the CRP payments we get now on most of those acres will make up that difference until 2028). That decrease in income is balanced by the payment we will get from FWS for the easement which will come later this year. It is impossible to know how this all comes out in the long run, but I think it is fair to say that the easement payment is a conservative estimate of the loss in value of the land and future income. Thus, if one were only looking at this as a business transaction we would pass. Even if the easement payment is an accurate estimate of the loss in value, any transaction that precludes future possibilities has opportunity costs, costs that I can’t begin to calculate.

Another way to look at the opportunity cost is that it is not a very humble action, to take decisions out of the hands of all future caretakers and to assume that I and my wife can make this decision for them. We certainly consulted our daughters and discussed this with them, but what about two or three or ten generations down the road? Might they make other decisions that are wise and thoughtful, that add to our societal good? For me, this was the most difficult question to answer, and I am still pondering it.

That leads to the other side of the equation, the benefit side. First, out of the 200 acres, 60 acres is native grass and has mostly been native grass since the glaciers. We will agree with my ancestors decision and leave those acres in prairie. Out of the remaining 140 acres, perhaps 80 acres are gravelly hills that should never been taken out of native grass. We humans are an optimistic lot, thinking we can create wonders out of smoke and dreams. After 100 years of being farmed several of the ridges have no soil left and the plants are growing out of undifferentiated gravel. There is actually an old gravel pit (mine) on 2-3 acres in the corner that indicates one of the other potential uses of the land. Much like the decision on the first easement I took several years ago, there is no angst in putting the 80 acres of gravel into an easement. I have little doubt that the best use of the land is for the ecosystem services that a restored prairie will provide, and take some pleasure in the memory of my mother putting a halt to the gravel pit 50 years ago because, in her words, “It will never be anything else but a gravel pit forever, Lester. We don’t want that on our conscience.” My mother was a perceptive person and may have saved 10-20 acres from mining, at the cost of much needed income. This leaves the last 60 acres, average farmground on the east and south side of the main restoration. When I first investigated the easement three years ago I had left those acres off the application, not yet comfortable with taking away the option of cropping them. My offer was not accepted at that time, partially because preference is given to larger blocks of land, and I was given time to reconsider. Why am I now willing to make this choice?

First, I think I have learned much about the benefits that the land can provide as restored prairie. From the beginning of this blog I have gone on about ecosystem services; such things as wildlife habitat, water purification, pollinator habitat, carbon sequestration and erosion control. Over the past few years I have come to realize that this restoration can actually be much more, It can be a refuge, an expansion of territory, for many prairie wildflower species that are still occurring naturally on my relict prairies. It can be surprisingly valuable as pasture in conjunction with the farmed acres adjacent to it. It can be valuable as an example of the possibilities of restoration and a teaching tool for others, allowing it to be a bit of a “bully pulpit” for the practice. There are other benefits I am surely missing, but some of these benefits, from habitat to wildflower refuge to its use as an educational tool are more powerful with scale. Thirty percent more acres doesn’t just add thirty percent more benefits, but much more. In that sense, size matters here., and the extra 60 acres is significant. There is a very intuitive concept I have alluded to in several other blog posts, the “island effect”, that simply says that isolated populations are more likely to survive if they are large and in a bigger territory. A larger island will have more species than a smaller island, primarily because smaller populations on smaller islands are more likely to be lost to various threats, while a larger geography allows more possibilities for some to find refuge, and even if no refuge is found there is more room for recolonization. My prairies are less likely to lose prairie larkspur or standing milkvetch or early figwort, to use three examples of forbs with small populations in my relict prairies, if I augment those populations in my restoration. Three hundred plants spread over 300 acres are more likely to survive than 200 plants spread over 200 acres. More acres means more species survive if I do a good job establishing all the species on those extra acres.

Second, more productive land is, well, more productive. It will sequester more carbon, raise more grassland birds, support more pollinating insects and grazes more cattle. I need to consider that productivity, not the average productivity of the restoration, when adding up benefits in my mind. Biomass production on that 60 acres is at least twice the average production on the 80 acres of poorer ground, and perhaps three times that on the worst 20-30 acres.

Third, I need to factor in border effects, especially in the value as a buffer against harmful activities occurring on the adjacent farmground. The border effect simply states that many perils lie beyond my boundaries, whether natural or manmade., and most problems will occur at the edge of a tract of land. A larger block of land has a smaller proportion of its area in its border. Activities that occur on nearby cropped acres provide very obvious and specific perils on the borders of my restoration. A primary impetus for this project was the discovery of the Dakota skipper butterfly, a federally listed threatened species. on my relict prairies. While they have never been found on restored prairie, most prairie restorations are young, and that may not be true 20 or 40 or 100 years down the road. The restoration may become colonized eventually. In order for that to happen, and for the restoration to increase the potential for the long term survival of Dakota skippers, that relict population would need to survive until then. I may be able to help that survival if there is more distance between farmed acres that could get an insecticide treatment that could drift in an untoward wind and harm the butterflies in the relict prairies. Also, while insecticide treatments only happen sporadically on crops in this area, herbicide treatments occur once or twice a year. Some drift is inevitable, and is a especially a danger to the forbs/wildflowers that are the source of nectar and pollen for the insects. In recognition of that I tend to concentrate my most valuable wildflower plantings away from the edge of the restoration. I am fortunate that both of the farmers that I work with and who farm acres adjacent to most of my restoration are aware of this issue and responsive to my needs. While my aims and goals may be perplexing to them, they are happy to help in any way they can. There is a quarter mile border, however, on the 20 acre restoration on the north side of the farm that adjoins a different farmer, not one I could expect to be responsive to my entreaties to show restraint in spraying when it is windy, and I don’t plan to invest many extra resources on the acres bordering that neighbor.

Finally, those acres of richer, mesic soil are habitat for a suite of plants, and likely their insect, fungal and microbial partners, that I don’t have represented in the poorer, xeric soils. If I am going to provide a place for more rough gayfeather, early figwort, downy gentian, porcupine grass and all the other plant species that need better dirt, I need to have that better dirt represented in the restoration for them to thrive. Though I make much of my tough little plants hanging on in the harsh environment of the outwash gravel hills, the restoration isn’t complete without the better soils.

And now we go back to the title of the post, “How long is perpetual?” I don’t believe that anything I might do will be perpetual; that is a concept beyond contemplating. You might even say that I comfort myself with the idea that we are not truly placing a perpetual easement on our land, we are placing an easement whose terms will hold as long as our society and governmental structures hold. How long will that be, I wonder? For the sake of argument lets say 300 years. If the inhabitants of 2323AD need this land for another purpose I assume it will be used for that other purpose, and I am very much at peace with that. While I love the image of native wildflowers blowing in the prairie wind forever, and I am very pleased with the easement allowing the restoration to develop into a mature prairie landscape, I am also humble enough to doubt my ability to know what is best for our far off descendants. I am not so humble, however, that I don’t feel a thrill that perhaps a descendant will gaze in wonder at what the prairie has become in 300 years. All of us simply do the best we can with what we have, and this is the best I know to do. I am content.