|
Pioneering Solutions
One of the legacies of Aldo Leopold’s writing was the direct connection he made between landowner conservation effectiveness and the selection and preparation of the right ‘tools.’ While he made the connection literally, in some cases, his writing also encouraged a fresh sense of creativity and effectiveness that responsible, empowered landowners could bring to improve land health.
Sand County Foundation uses its Pioneering Solutions arena to construct, test, improve, and replicate new approaches (tools) to improve health of the land. We seek means that are within the grasp of landholders’ financial capacity –not overly expensive management, as well as those that will provide reward to landholders who build upon Aldo Leopold’s call for a land ethic.
In many situations, landholders have been hindered by bad policy. In other cases, new practices need to be developed. So, for Sand County Foundation, improvements to both policies and practices are fair game in our Pioneering Solutions. In either case, we believe responsible solutions will stand up to independent review and be tested in the real world. If we are successful in Pioneering Solutions, it will be so because our work is useful to others on lands and waters for which they are responsible.
Examples of Pioneering Solutions the Foundation has currently underway include:
- Agricultural Incentives: Incentives through a market-based approach to assist farmers in lowering nutrient discharge from their working lands while improving profitability. This is supported by a number of funding and agency partners and is being deployed throughout the upper Midwest.
- Floodplain Rehabilitation: Rehabilitation of river floodplains by exercise of private rights to property. For instance on the Baraboo River in Wisconsin removal of unsafe dams lead to a model approach in water quality improvement, cost reduction, and fishery enhancement.
- WHISE: The Wildllife Highway Institute for Safety and Economy is a partnership innovation with the aim of reducing the human deaths and injuries, and needless economic losses, from deer-vehicle crashes that are a consequence of too many deer on lands surrounding roadways.
|
