A 25-hectare slice of a rapidly disappearing ecosystem is set to be preserved in southwestern Saskatchewan.
The Nature Conservancy of Canada announced last week that they've partnered with a local couple in a conservation agreement to support a landscape vital for flood mitigation, carbon sequestration, and home to countless species of fauna and flora.
Kristen Simonson, educator and owner of Sage Creek Prairie, shared that she and her husband, Garry Koebel, purchased the land around nine years ago, which borders Cave Pasture, a 286-hectare conservation project under an agreement with the Nature Conservancy.
"I think this has been on our minds since we purchased the property," said Simonson. "I remember first standing there before it was developed at all and just realizing the value of the land that was there for native plants, a wildlife corridor down to the creek, and just a really special place that's endangered these days."
A few notable species that wander through or reside on the property include pronghorn, eagles, moose, and threatened wildlife such as the loggerhead shrike and long-billed curlew.
"I think we were up to 50 or 60 some native species," she said. "Everything from grasses to shrubs to trees, a ridiculous number of birds, snakes, all sorts of mammals."
The Sage Creek Prairie project is a part of the Land Resiliency Program, a partnership between the federal government and the Nature Conservancy to preserve resilient areas by conserving up to 30,000 hectares of land near other protected areas.
"A lot of people with land might hesitate in entering an agreement where you can't do anything with the land, but that's not completely accurate," Simonson added. "We have livestock, we have pasture, it just means that we can't develop it further than that, like build a house on it, which isn't something we were going to do anyway.
"What it means is that this agreement travels with the land after we're done and we sell it or our kids inherit it, it just means that the land stays intact."
Anyone interested in more about the Nature Conservancy of Canada's projects can head to natureconservancy.ca/sk or visit them on social media. For more information about opportunities at Sage Creek Prairie, visit Sage Creek Prairie School's website.