Climate data expands conservation horizons for Maine partnership

The Maine-based 12 Rivers Initiative -- a partnership of eight land trusts -- is developing a more inclusive vision for long-term conservation planning by considering regional climate data, and collaborating more with neighbors.  

After seeing a presentation by staff from the Open Space Institute on accessing climate data through the North Atlantic Landscape Conservation Cooperative's (LCC) Conservation Planning Atlas, 12 Rivers members Anna Fiedler and Ruth Indrick decided to give the partnership's priorities a second look.

“We already had a good plan in place, but we saw potential to reexamine it through the lens of climate data,” said Fiedler, who is the Director for Conservation for the Midcoast Conservancy, one of the eight land trusts that comprises the 12 Rivers partnership.

Learn how they did it in Won't you be my conservation neighbor? -- a new feature story on the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's Conserving the Nature of the Northeast blog. 

12 Rivers is just one example of how conservation groups working in a relatively small geography are having a meaningful impact on the larger landscape by incorporating climate change into long-term planning. Building on its partnership with the North Atlantic LCC, OSI is now offering support across the eastern United States for land trusts to integrate climate change into their conservation plans with workshops and circuit rider support available across the region in partnership with the Land Trust Alliance.