By Keila Szpaller
Farmer and rancher Denny Iverson answers questions from land managers from around the world Tuesday afternoon in the Potomac Valley as part of the International Seminar on Protected Area Management.
...To keep the land, (click here) Iverson hammered out a conservation easement with the Five Valleys Land Trust to protect the property from development. He also worked on a new plan for retirement, one that meant making the ranch more productive.
The conservation easement is an idea stewardship manager Jenny Tollefson views as a manifestation of Iverson's private property rights, his power to protect the land in perpetuity. Five Valleys is one of 12 land trusts in the state, one of 1,500 in the country, and it holds some 145 easements in western Montana.
"It doesn't matter who owns this land. Forever, it will remain ... a largely undeveloped landscape," Tollefson said.
On Tuesday, some 24 land managers who are participants in the University of Montana Wilderness Institute's annual International Seminar on Protected Area Management stood in a half circle around Iverson, on a corner of his acreage used for calving, and heard his story.
The institute is part of the UM School of Forestry and Conservation, and the seminar examines strategies to conserve the world's special places. From its base in Missoula, the group will visit national forests, wilderness areas, the Flathead Indian Reservation and Yellowstone National Park, among other places.
"What better place than Missoula to bring this diverse group from around the world to explore public landscapes in the western U.S. as an inspiration?" said Wilderness Institute director Natalie Dawson....
