New Hampshire’s Teneriffe Mountain Forest project shows the power of collaboration

The views, thoughts and opinions expressed in this blog are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Land Trust Alliance, its staff, its board of directors or any other individuals associated with the organization.

Conservation is never a one-person operation. Protecting a special place always demands a total team effort, be it staffers, funders, private donors and, of course, landowners. And sometimes, when a place is just that special, it takes a few more hands to pull off a conservation-heavy lift. The Teneriffe Mountain Forest is a prime example.

Southeast Land Trust of New Hampshire teamed up with Moose Mountains Regional Greenways, a land trust serving ten communities in New Hampshire, including Milton, home to Teneriffe Mountain. The mountain anchors the proposed Teneriffe Mountain Forest project, a 240+ acre property that boasts a wealth of natural resources, provides contiguous open space adjacent to surrounding conserved areas, and features many outdoor recreational opportunities, including a route to an overlook on Mt. Teneriffe with an eyeful of views.

“This is a really special project,” said Jill Eldredge, executive director of Moose Mountains Regional Greenways. “Within the region, Teneriffe Mountain is the highest point in Milton and is really part of the local culture.”

The Teneriffe Mountain Forest was owned by a local development company that at one time had planned a 78-lot residential development with an interior road system. The scope and scale of development on a property with such rich resource values would have severely degraded sensitive habitats and scenic views. With a rising real estate and housing market, the landowner offered Southeast Land Trust of New Hampshire a final opportunity to purchase the property, or development would be pursued again.

In discussing a shared goal of seeing this land conserved, the two land trusts agreed to partner on its protection and executed a sales agreement with the developer, with a July 2022 closing date. As the contract’s closing date approached, it became evident that the final approvals from funding partners would not be ready, requiring creative thinking and a third-party partner to step in and purchase the land.

Fortunately, the Carl Siemon Family Charitable Trust, a long-time conservation leader in northern Strafford County, was such a partner.

The interim acquisition gave Southeast Land Trust of New Hampshire and Moose Mountains Regional Greenways additional time to raise the funds to permanently conserve the land. In addition to private contributions from generous community members, public funding partners included the Milton Conservation Commission, the New Hampshire Aquatic Resource Mitigation Program, the Moose Plate program and the U.S. Natural Resources Conservation Service’s Regional Conservation Partnership Program.

RCPP funds were allocated to the Teneriffe Mountain Forest project from another partnership effort, the New Hampshire Source Water Protection Partnership, which received a $6.8 million award to execute multi-faceted projects ranging from land conservation to habitat restoration in at least 25 targeted watersheds. The Merrimack River Watershed Council serves as the lead organization of the New Hampshire Partnership, joined by Southeast Land Trust of New Hampshire, the Society for Protection of New Hampshire Forests, Trout Unlimited, Connecticut River Conservancy and The Nature Conservancy in New Hampshire.

In fact, the Teneriffe Mountain Forest may be the first conservation project completed in the United States under this newly implemented program.

“It has some neat and diverse natural resource features,” Eldredge said. “You can find plenty of valuable habitat, which is the focus of a restoration project for wild brook trout.”

This opportunity attracted an additional partner, Trout Unlimited, which already had an active project to replace a culvert in Lyman Brook. The protection of the Teneriffe Mountain tract allows Trout Unlimited to extend the impact of its work by removing additional obstacles to fish passage — all to improve this treasured angling species’ habitat in Lyman Brook.

What makes this property even more interesting are the rare plant communities that can be found as you explore the forest. The property hosts what may be the most northerly known chestnut oak forest community, which is ranked critically imperiled in New Hampshire, with most occurrences found in the far southern portions of the state. With many seedlings amongst the mature forest canopy, this system appears to be healthy and in great condition.

At the top of a ridge on Mt. Teneriffe is another critically imperiled forest system, a pitch pine rocky ridge that occurs in the dry, tough environs of exposed bedrock ledge whipped by winter winds and the hot sun of the summer. Amongst the pitch pines are low bush blueberry, bearberry and lichens.

“Collaboration within the regional conservation field is absolutely essential,” Eldredge noted, reflecting on the four partnerships that enabled the conservation of Teneriffe Mountain. “We are lucky to have a regional ‘landscape’ where camaraderie and collaboration are prized. We learn from each other, work together and share projects for the best possible conservation outcomes. Only the result matters: that valuable resources and special places are protected forever.”

And when the sky is clear and the sun is shining, there are few local places as peaceful and restorative as the natural clearings near the peak of the mountain.