Factors Influencing Land Management Practices on Conservation Easement Protected Landscapes

The goal of this article is to investigate factors influencing conservation-oriented land management practices on land holdings with conservation easements. We report the results of a mail survey that produced responses from 251 out of a total of 518 landowners with a permanent conservation easement on their property. We predicted that landowner satisfaction with their easement and good relationships between landowners and easement holders would be positively correlated with the amount of conservation-oriented land management practices. However, we found landownership motivations to be a stronger predictor of active land management. We also found significant management differences between landowners with different easement holders. The results of this study suggest the need for increased easement holder capacity supporting targeted outreach with landowners; increased monitoring of ecological targets on easement properties; promotion of landowner participation in peer-to-peer management networks; and increased easement flexibility mechanisms by easement holders to better accommodate adaptive management.