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Alligator River National Wildlife Refuge: Going Big

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Alligator River
© Fred Annand
 

Sometimes a small tract grows into a huge project. Other times, a project just starts out big. Really big. That was the case in along the Alligator River on the Albemarle Peninsula in 1984, when the Conservancy arranged a donation of 118,000 acres from the Prudential Insurance Company to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Bill deBuys, who was the Chapter’s director during this time, struggled to describe the enormity of this tract of land: “Even from the air, the true extent of the property was difficult to appreciate, for from a moderate altitude at one end of the property the
land stretches away farther than the eye can see.”

In terms of acreage, the parcel of land that became the Alligator River National Wildlife Refuge is still by far the largest project the Conservancy has ever undertaken in North Carolina. It covers more than
100 miles of shoreline and contains excellent examples of nearly every wetland habitat type found on the Coastal Plain.

Getting involved in the Alligator River project meant jumping into uncharted waters: a huge amount of land, a huge amount of money, many moving parts and years of negotiations. North Carolina Chapter Associate Director Fred Annand, who worked extensively on the Alligator River project, says the deal taught him that “with persistence and the right vision, we realized we could achieve conservation on a scale far greater than we’d previously imagined.” He credits this project with helping to lay the groundwork for many large land transactions to come.

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