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    People conserve their land for many reasons.

    But they all have one thing in common — they love their land.

    Whether your family has been farming or ranching for generations, your land is home to endangered wildlife, or it has important water resources, land trusts are here to partner with landowners who desire to see their land protected forever.

    Conserving private land is the key to addressing society’s most challenging issues — from habitat loss and the climate crisis to social inequities and rising health problems.

    It strengthens local communities and is our nation’s best and perhaps only hope for securing the critical public benefits provided by natural and working lands, such as clean water and air, habitat for plants and animals and healthy, local food.

    Landowners are at the heart of making it all possible.

    Protecting your land matters.

    When you conserve your land, you are:

    • Providing fresh, local food for your community.

    • Saving the rivers, streams and aquifers for irrigation and drinking water.

    • Storing carbon in the soil and in forests.

    • Protecting climate-resilient habitat plants and animals need to survive.

    • Strengthening community health and wellness.

    • Ensuring the land will remain open, beautiful and productive for future generations.

    Considerations for landowners

    • Conservation easements are permanent and present a personal decision for any landowner.

    • Land trusts provide voluntary, landowner-driven, and market-based conservation tools to help you achieve your unique conservation goals.

    • It’s also a major financial decision. When landowners donate a conservation easement, they give up part of the value of their property — often their family’s biggest asset. Tax incentives offset some of that loss in property value, making conservation a viable option for more landowners.

    • Your local land trust may encourage you to talk with your family, friends, advisors and neighbors who have conserved their land for insightful perspectives on whether conservation is right for you.

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    Success stories

    Read inspiring stories about why landowners choose to conserve their land.

    Next steps

    If you believe conservation is right for you and your land, there is a local land trust in your area that can help.

    “ There are few things that a person can do in his or her lifetime that can have a lasting and permanent effect on the world. This is one of them.”
    — Celia Hulett, on conserving her family land with the accredited Southern Oregon Land Conservancy.