California

Land trusts across the country are setting new and bigger goals as part of a global movement to increase the pace of conservation and address challenges such as climate change, loss of habitat and agricultural lands, and to ensure equitable access to the land.

Forty acres of California forestland overlooking the North Fork American River and Sierra Nevada mountains have been protected by the accredited Placer Land Trust and returned to the tribe that considers the land its ancestral home.

The Big Sur Land Trust and The Nature Conservancy secured the view from one of the most famous sections of California’s scenic coastal Highway 1 and linked 13 parks and preserves with their $37 million purchase in May of the 9,898-acre Palo Corona Ranch.

At the heart of one of California’s most scenic stretches of coastline in Big Sur, the Esselen Tribe of Monterey County has regained its first ancestral homelands since it was displaced by the Spanish four centuries ago. In a landmark conservation transaction completed last summer, the Esselen Tribe and the accredited Western Rivers Conservancy (OR) finalized a project that places the 1,199-acre Adler Ranch south of Monterey into Esselen ownership.

In July 2020, the Esselen Tribe of Monterey County regained a piece of their ancestral homeland in Big Sur, California. Led by the Western Rivers Conservancy , this rare and significant land deal conserved 1,199 acres along the Little Sur River, linking protected lands on the coast to the Santa Lucia mountain range.

The remote camera that Land Trust of Napa County volunteers Paula Peterson and Penny Proteau visit every few months in California suggests at least one conclusion: an abundance of curious bears.

"This right here is the closest you can get to magic," said Sherman Dean, who was part of a group of diverse people invited to be the first to walk in the newly discovered stand of redwoods that was long-rumored to be nestled in the hills above California's Sonoma Coast. Now the forest is protected by the accredited Save the Redwoods League.