Stewards of the Sandhills: Restoring the Longleaf Legacy
Photo Credit: Gretchen Coil
Dedicated to bringing landowners and other stakeholders together to conserve the vanishing longleaf pine ecosystem and recover imperiled plants, animals and fungi in the North Carolina Sandhills.
Stewards of the Sandhills
The North Carolina Sandhills Conservation Partnership (NCSCP) is a collaborative effort formed in 2000 that brings together various federal, state, and non-profit conservation groups with the mission of protecting, enhancing, and restoring the unique Sandhills environment.
About 5% of original longleaf pine forest remains throughout its historic range of 90 million acres. The NCSCP was the first of 18 Local Implementation Teams (LITs) across nine states dedicated to achieving the 15-year-goal of America’s Longleaf Restoration Initiative: to increase longleaf acreage from 3.4 to 8.0 million acres. LITs actively support range-wide efforts to restore and conserve functional, viable longleaf pine ecosystems on both public and private lands.
Private landowners have been an integral part of NCSCP’s achievements. Over 140 private landowners are enrolled in the nation’s first Safe Harbor Program to protect federally listed red-cockaded woodpeckers. The Sandhills Prescribed Burn Association has played a pivotal role in training landowners and providing resources to implement prescribed fire on their properties. Thousands of acres of private land have been restored to longleaf with support of programs such as the US Fish and Wildlife Service’s Partners for Fish and Wildlife Program and the Natural Resources Conservation Service’s Environmental Quality Incentives Program. Over 10,000 acres of private lands are permanently protected from development under conservation easements.
The NCSCP has accomplished many other goals, including the development of a conservation plan and prioritization map; collaboration to leverage state, federal, and private funds to protect over 40,000 acres that support wildlife, ecological, and recreational benefits; the establishment of the first Army Compatible Use Buffer programs in the nation; and the recovery of the North Carolina Sandhills population of the now Threatened red-cockaded woodpecker.
