Fort Myers Florida Weekly

Ranchers say most owners support corridor: ‘It’s our livelihood’




Farms and ranches protect green space essential for wide ranging species such as the Florida panther and provide habitats for other wildlife. This ranch, owned by Lightsey Cattle Company, is protected by a conservation easement, securing its place in the Florida Wildlife Corridor and protection of the Everglades Headwaters. CARLTON WARD JR. / FLORIDA WILD

Farms and ranches protect green space essential for wide ranging species such as the Florida panther and provide habitats for other wildlife. This ranch, owned by Lightsey Cattle Company, is protected by a conservation easement, securing its place in the Florida Wildlife Corridor and protection of the Everglades Headwaters. CARLTON WARD JR. / FLORIDA WILD

Florida has 47,400 farms and ranches covering 9.7 million acres of land that provide a large and stable economic base, according to the state Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services’ 2020 agricultural overview.

These working lands are also essential for the Florida Wildlife Corridor.

“Helping to sustain this state’s working ranches, farms, and forests that provide compatible wildlife habitats while sustaining rural prosperity and agricultural production” will be one of the ways the Florida Wildlife Corridor Act can accomplish some of its goals, according to language in the act.

The language not only recognizes the role the land plays in connecting and preserving the corridor, it recognizes its economic importance.

The act appears to be well received by the majority of those who work the lands for their livelihood, say two high-profile members of those industries, one a timber company co-owner and one a rancher.

They both have long histories in their respective fields and have received numerous accolades, both for their businesses and personally, in recognition of their work in environmental stewardship and conservation issues

USHER GRINER

USHER GRINER

Lynetta Usher Griner owns and operates Usher Land & Timber Inc. in Levy County with her husband, Ken Griner.

Jim Strickland owns Strickland Ranch and is managing partner of Big Red Cattle Company and Blackbeard’s Ranch, a 4,530-acre cow/calf operation that borders Myakka State Park.

Ms. Griner will also help play a role in the implementation of the Florida Wildlife Corridor Act, because she is a long-time member of the Acquisition and Restoration Council. The council is the group in the state’s Florida Forever conservation program that is responsible for selecting state land acquisition projects on the Florida Forever priority list. The priority list is where lands for the Florida Wildlife Corridor Act will come from.

Mr. Strickland is also vice chairman of the Florida Conservation Group, a nonprofit that advocates for land conservation funding and protecting natural and agricultural lands. The group assists landowners in getting conservation easements on their ranches or timberland, like those that would protect land for the Florida Wildlife Corridor.

Both Mr. Strickland and Ms. Griner are co-chairs of The Florida Climate Smart Agriculture Work Group, affiliated with the University of Florida, which explores how farmers, ranchers, and forest landowners can maintain their livelihoods and remain profitable while providing environmental protection.

Ms. Griner said she is “thrilled” that the Florida Wildlife Corridor Act passed the state legislature. It’s another tool to help the timber, agriculture and ranching industries, she said. Not only do these working lands host wildlife, “our lands are what provides water filtration, carbon storage and oxygen generation,” she said.

She doesn’t know of any timber farmers or ranchers who are against the act, Ms. Griner said. “I think we welcome the opportunity to work with environmentalists to protect our landscape.” In the past, farmers, ranchers and loggers were often at odds with environmentalists, she said. “We’ve come a long way.”

Quite often, they join conservationists in promoting policy, she said. Both want to preserve the same thing for different reasons. “It’s our livelihood,” she said. Conservationists want to preserve wildlife habitat, and enhance water storage, she said.

Among her other environmental stewardship roles and accolades, Ms. Griner is a board member of the Florida Chapter of the Nature Conservancy, former chair of the Suwannee River Water Management District, was named 2018 Florida Farmer of the Year and is the first woman to serve as president of the Florida Forestry Association.

Usher Land & Timber has been selected as the “Outstanding Logger of the Year” on state, regional and national levels. The Griners have also received awards for their environmental stewardship and wildlife conservation. They have 2,200 acres of land in conservation easements on their property.

Meanwhile, about 80% of the land that’s unprotected in the Florida Wildlife Corridor south of Orlando is on ranches, said Tom Hoctor, director of the Center for Landscape Conservation Planning at the University of Florida “So ranches are essential for accomplishing these goals.”

Mr. Strickland knows the value of those lands and the value of being able to continue working those lands in the face of encroaching development.

He said that fellow ranchers largely view the Florida Wildlife Corridor Act favorably.

“There’s very few against the corridor,” he said.

His work with the Florida Conservation Group helps ranchers navigate the complex process of getting conservation easements on their land. “I won’t call it a mine field, but I’ll say that there’s a lot of different moving parts,” whether it’s a water management or a federal easement or a state easement, he said. “Because it is a big decision for a landowner to basically give away the majority of their development rights on a piece of land. So there’s a lot of questions that are asked around the dinner table with families, maybe boardrooms of corporations, that they want to make the best decision for the future of their families and that ranch that may have been in the family for five years or it may have been in the family for 105 years,” he said.

Mr. Strickland said he has 15,000 to 20,000 acres of ranch land, either owned or under leases, management or partnerships. About 1,700 acres of that land is under conservation easements, he said.

Mr. Strickland was named the 2019 Audubon Florida’s Sustainable Rancher of the year.

He has served as president of the Florida Cattleman’s Association and is past chairman of the Florida Cattleman’s Foundation

Blackbeard’s Ranch was awarded the 2018 Florida Cattleman’s Association Environmental Stewardship Award, the Florida Agricultural Commissioner’s 2018 Agricultural-Environmental Leadership Award and The National Cattleman’s Beef Association’s 2019 Environmental Stewardship Award for the Southeast Region.

The Florida Wildlife Corridor Act is a common-sense approach to conservation, said Carlton Ward Jr., wildlife photographer and a co-founder of the Florida Wildlife Corridor Coalition, which advocates to connect the corridor lands.

“It’s pretty obvious to anyone who looks at the maps, when you have a state park and a national park and a cattle ranch in between, it’s much better for that to stay a working ranch or be preserved as an addition to the public land, than it is to put a subdivision in that spot,” Mr. Ward said.

“The ranches, the farms, the timberlands — those working lands are what is holding our remarkable network of public lands together. And without them, our public lands will be zoos without bars, like islands of habitat surrounded by development.” ¦

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