BAILEYS HARBOR – The Door County Land Trust recently acquired a total of 96 acres of property to add to the property it is protecting in its ecologically significant Hibbard Creek Natural Area between Fish Creek and Jacksonport.
Hibbard Creek and the surrounding watershed have been a focus of conservation efforts by the land trust since 1998 because of the area’s importance to water quality and its impact on the survival of wildlife, a press release from the organization said. With these two new acquisitions, along with 77 acres acquired last December, the trust is now protecting more than 250 acres of land along the creek, 173 of those added in the past nine months.
Wetlands around the creek are filled with cedar trees that filter ground water. The creek is also a natural fishery where salmon, trout and longnose suckers spawn. The forested land following the creek offers wildlife free-roaming habitat and fresh water. Birds, fish and wildlife can feed on abundant food sources like insects in the protected area.
“These projects help us complete a full mile-and-a-half corridor of protection around Hibbard Creek,” land trust executive director Emily Wood said in the press release. “The land provides a buffer for water filtration that provides positive outcomes for water quality before the creek makes its way into Lake Michigan. Protecting that corridor is an intentional strategy because we know protecting linear habitats around water is extremely valuable to wildlife.”
The newly acquired properties don’t adjoin but are near each other in Baileys Harbor. One is a 78-acre parcel purchased from the Universities of Wisconsin; the other, an 18-acre parcel from Mike Bacsi and Patti Seger.
The process to purchase the Bacsi/Seger property began when Bacsi was walking his dogs along his normally deserted dead-end road and saw Door County Land Trust stickers on parked cars, the press release said.
Bacsi said he and Seger, his wife, never intended to develop those 18 acres and thought that they would eventually contact the land trust about it, but seeing the cars sparked him and Seger into action. He said the property includes natural features like artesian springs that flow in the winter, an old growth forest of beech and maple, and daily visits in April and May of bald eagles looking to fish the creek during spawning season.
“I put two and two together and thought the land trust folks were looking at the 80 acres for sale to the south of our property,” Bacsi said in the release. “I then thought they would be interested in our 18 acres that adjoin it because there’s a really nice natural spring in there that feeds into Hibbard Creek.”
When Bacsi and Seger first visited the land about 20 years ago, the former owners told the couple a story of a bald eagle flying overhead that they took as a sign to buy the property. When a great blue heron flew above Bacsi and Seger, they also felt their destiny was to purchase and protect the land.
“We made a commitment to make sure that the land was preserved and not built on.” Seger said. “It’s kind of magical.”
“We have always enjoyed the properties the land trust preserves,” Bacsi said. “This is a way to pay forward something in terms of future generations being able to enjoy more land.”
To protect lands within the Hibbard Creek project area, the trust expects to employ a variety of land protection tools that include accepting donated lands, purchasing land or working with private landowners to create conservation easement agreements.
Funds to purchase the new properties came from land trust membership contributions, Knowles-Nelson Stewardship Program funds from the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, the Fox River and Green Bay Natural Resources Trustees grant, and the North American Wetlands Conservation Act grant. Membership donations to the trust provide for the long-term care of the property and costs for land acquisition including surveys, appraisal, environmental assessments and stewardship, which involves invasive species removal and other duties in the field.
For more on the Door County Land Trust and the properties it protects, call 920-746-1359 or visit doorcountylandtrust.org. The trust currently is conducting a matching fundraising challenge for its 2024 Conservation and Stewardship Campaign; donations may be made online at doorcountylandtrust.org/donate.
Contact Christopher Clough at 920-562-8900 or cclough@gannett.com.
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This article originally appeared on Green Bay Press-Gazette: Door County Land Trust acquires property in Hibbard Creek watershed
