The Nature Conservancy. Protecting nature. Preserving life.™

What’s so special about the Finch lands?

In 2007, the Nature Conservancy purchased 161,000 acres of ecologically and economically significant forest land once owned by Finch, Pruyn & Company in the Adirondacks. The land provides essential habitat for wildlife and features 16,000 acres of wetlands, 300 lakes and ponds, 90 mountain peaks, and 415 miles of rivers and streams.

What is the path forward for conserving them?

The Nature Conservancy’s local Adirondack Chapter and New York State Department of Environmental Conservation, in consultation with a variety of interest groups and community leaders, have agreed to conserve and protect these lands as follows:

• 92,000 acres will continue to be working forests with sustainable logging;
• 65,000 acres will be transferred to the state to become part of the Forest Preserve; and
• 1,100 acres will be set aside for community purposes in three towns.

Where are these lands located?

The lands touch six counties and 27 towns in the Adirondacks, with more than 80% of the property in these five towns: North Hudson, Minerva, Newcomb, Indian Lake and Long Lake.

Why protect these forests?

Through this project we are conserving forest lands that are vital to our health and quality of life. Our local forests in general provide natural filters for our air and water, helping to ensure that we have clean air to breathe and clean water to drink. Protecting these forests helps to ensure that future generations can enjoy them and reap the same benefits we do.

Who will benefit from this conservation effort?

This plan reflects a balanced and thoughtful approach that meets the needs of loggers, wildlife, local businesses, and the tens of thousands of local residents and millions of visitors who use our forests for recreation.

Does the project bolster forestry-related jobs?

The carefully considered plan meets the needs of loggers and other forest professionals by ensuring that more than half of the land will continue to be available for sustainable timber harvest operations.

Will any of the property become available for me to use?

All of the property to be transferred to the state in the coming years has been closed to the public, but will become open and available to everyone for hunting, hiking, fishing and other recreational uses, and some new snowmobile trails will be created.

What are some of the places I can look forward to visiting?

• OK Slip Falls, in Indian Lake
• Essex Chain of Lakes, in Minerva and Newcomb
• Thousand Acre Swamp, in Edinburg
• Wild upper reaches of our state’s longest river, the Hudson, and key tributaries like the Cedar and Indian Rivers
• Boreas Ponds, at the southern edge of the High Peaks Wilderness in North Hudson

Have any stages of the plan been completed yet?

Yes, as of December 2010, the 92,000 acres of commercial timberlands have been protected by a land preservation agreement called a conservation easement. The easement keeps the land in sustainable forestry, allows for continued recreational leasing, and secures some public access to places identified as important to local communities, including snowmobile connector trails in nearly a dozen towns.

When will the rest of the project be completed?

We anticipate key properties to transfer to NYSDEC in the coming years and would add that they are well worth the wait. In the meantime most of the land will continue to be leased for exclusive use by about two dozen private hunt clubs. Though they will have to relocate to privately owned forests, the plan ensures they will still have these lands to hunt on and offers new recreational opportunities for local residents and visitors currently shut out of the forest.

Is this the same thing as the Heart of the Adirondacks project?

Yes, in part. The former Finch lands, combined with the 14,600-acre Follensby Pond property, make up The Nature Conservancy’s Heart of the Adirondacks project.