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More than 1,100 acres of land in Somerset County have been protected as part of an effort to preserve critical habitat along the Allegheny Front.
On May 16, The Nature Conservancy announced that it acquired 1,158 acres of land and transferred ownership to the Pennsylvania Game Commission. The land is now part of State Game Lands 82.
“This is our first land protection project of this size on the Allegheny Front in Pennsylvania,” said Nicole Wooten, Appalachian land protection manager with The Nature Conservancy. “It fills a large unprotected gap in a critical habitat bridge that plants and animals use to move through the Allegheny Front.”
The Allegheny Front, a 200-mile escarpment stretching from central Pennsylvania through Maryland into West Virginia, plays a vital role in connecting ecosystems throughout the Appalachian region, known for its biodiversity and carbon-storing forests.
“It serves as what we call a habitat bridge between the vast conserved lands in the southern and northern Appalachians, so it plays a vital role keeping the full continental scale Appalachian ecosystem connected,” she said.
Wooten also said the newly protected land has resources including the water and underlying bedrock to support a variety of wildlife. “On this property, that’s everything from white-tailed deer and black bear and turkey, to less common species like the federally endangered Indiana bat, to migrating songbirds,” she said.
Travis Anderson, the Game Commission’s regional land manager for Somerset County, said they are surveying the land and anticipate opening it for hunting this fall.
“People will be able to have an even better opportunity when they go out there, not only for potentially hunting and trapping, but also just for wildlife viewing and seeing a diverse type of songbirds and wildlife species,” he said.
Future improvements are planned for the property, including creating parking areas and habitat enhancements, according to Anderson. “We’re going to work and convert [former agricultural fields] into a better grassland type habitat for grassland birds, songbirds, and also game birds,” he said.
The acquisition was made possible through a partnership between The Nature Conservancy and the Game Commission, with the Open Space Institute’s Appalachian Landscapes Protection Fund, supported by the Doris Duke Foundation and Richard King Mellon Foundation, which has also supported The Allegheny Front.
