What Drives Choice
Choice is both a simple act and a profound mystery. It’s a constant interplay of personal desire, external pressure, and the intricate workings of the mind. Every day, we make decisions, from the mundane to the transformative, and the forces behind them are as complex as the individuals making them.
At Black Swamp Conservancy, we talk often about choice. The choice to volunteer or donate to conservation, or the choice to foster deeper connections to nature. We’ve explored it in past issues of The Rookery, yet not as much in the context of land restoration and conservation. Just as individuals choose to support conservation, landowners and organizations make pivotal decisions that shape landscapes for generations.
How We Choose What to Restore and Conserve
Our process for selecting properties is guided by both concrete quantitative measures and more qualitative, emotional, and strategic considerations from a community engagement perspective. Increasingly, our capacity to restore and manage land is also a significant factor in our decisions.
Conservation Planning and Priority Sites
Our Natural Habitats Conservation Plan identifies the highest-priority existing natural areas that should be protected. This plan was developed through collaboration with local experts and partners, including state and federal agencies, local park districts, non-governmental organizations, and academics. We collectively identified and ranked sites based on conservation value and potential threats. While this effort took place over 15 years ago, it remains our guiding framework, and it is gratifying to see how many of these sites have been protected in that time. However, many important sites remain unprotected, and we continue monitoring opportunities to engage with landowners when they arise.
While our conservation plan is comprehensive, we acknowledge that we have missed critical sites. Planning isn’t always perfect. New opportunities emerge, and we adapt to address them as they come.
Restoration Site Selection
Restoration site selection follows a different approach, which is why PERM was developed. Developed with GeoAce with grants through the Land Trust Alliance and H2Ohio, PERM—which stands for Parcel-based Ecological Restoration Model—is a quantitative tool that helps us assess restoration potential. When assessing a parcel of land, PERM factors in soil conditions, hydrology, tile density, proximity to existing conserved land, and other key attributes. While this tool eliminates many unsuitable opportunities, it does not account for emotional or community conservation factors, which remain crucial in our decision-making.
Balancing Capacity
As mentioned, when considering a restoration site, we have to be realistic about our long-term capacity to restore and manage land. If we lack a viable strategy for a long-term owner, we often have to pass on even high-value opportunities. Adding land to an existing preserve or management zone is a different calculation than taking on a completely new property. To expand our capacity, we continuously explore ways to reduce management inputs and seek new long-term owners.
Not Just Where, but How
Every piece of land holds a story, and its history shapes the path we take in restoration. Before making decisions, we look at the land’s past, its present conditions, and its potential future.
One of the first considerations is water. Much of Northwest Ohio has been drained with underground tiles that funnel water directly into streams, bypassing natural filtration. Understanding where that water comes from and where it can be accessed allows us to redirect it through our restored wetlands or floodplains, improving water quality before it reaches major waterways. A well-planned restoration can also capture runoff from surrounding fields and properties, filtering out excess nutrients and sediment before they cause harm downstream.
Connectivity is another key factor. Small, isolated restoration projects may have benefits, but land that is near existing natural areas provides greater ecological value. When restoration efforts link to other natural spaces, they create wildlife corridors, expand habitat ranges, and increase biodiversity. These larger, interconnected landscapes support healthier ecosystems, more resilient plant and animal populations, and improved long-term success.
We also study the land itself—the subtle clues it provides about its past. Even in a field that has been plowed and flattened for decades, the land holds hints of what once was. Slight depressions or wetter patches can indicate the remnants of old wetlands or waterways. By recognizing these patterns, we can restore landscapes in ways that work with the land’s natural tendencies rather than against them.
While historical ecosystems guide us, we also adapt restoration efforts to modern challenges. Much of this region was once covered by elm-ash forests, but with the introduction of Dutch elm disease and the emerald ash borer, those species are now vulnerable. Rather than replicating exactly what once was, we take inspiration from past ecosystems while incorporating diversity and resilience. If a site can support multiple habitat types, such as wet woods, prairie, and vernal pools, we maximize its ecological potential. In a state where natural habitats are steadily declining, creating multi-functional landscapes ensures that we’re not just restoring what was lost, but also expanding opportunities for biodiversity, wildlife, and plant communities to thrive.
Restoration is not just about returning to the past, it’s about shaping a sustainable future. By considering water movement, ecological connections, land history, and habitat diversity, we make choices that support both conservation and the working landscapes that define our region.
The Role of Community and Strategic Considerations
While environmental and historical factors shape our approach, so do the needs of the people who live, work, use the land. We don’t just restore landscapes—we collaborate with communities to ensure conservation efforts provide lasting benefits beyond ecological value. Some properties don’t fit neatly into traditional conservation models, yet they hold immense significance for the people who interact with them daily.
Conservation success depends on trust, collaboration, and shared vision. The Wintergarden Woods is one such example. This heavily used natural space provided a rare opportunity for expansion, but its success hinged on rebuilding trust between the sellers and the park district. By stepping in to facilitate this acquisition, we helped ensure this valued community resource could grow. Similarly, the Fox-Shank property may not have been the highest-scoring PERM site for restoration, but its potential as an educational resource for a local school made it invaluable. Community engagement and environmental education are just as critical to our mission as habitat restoration.
Even smaller projects, like Webber Woods, can have an outsized impact. Though more compact than our typical projects, it provides critical migratory habitat while also establishing a much-needed conservation presence closer to Toledo, where much of our support is based. Heron Crest, with its mile-long stretch of the Maumee River, required a creative approach. The land was divided into multiple auction tracts, and while one tract was key for watershed protection, another became a strategic asset for future public access and field equipment storage.
Each of these projects demonstrates that conservation is not a one-size-fits-all endeavor. By balancing ecological priorities with community needs, we create spaces that serve both people and nature, ensuring that our restoration efforts have lasting, meaningful impacts.
The Broader Vision
Every project is unique, and we evaluate each on its own merits. At our core, our mission is conservation and restoration. While our organization was originally founded on the principle of preservation, restoration has become an integral part of our work.
What makes our approach special is our ability to integrate farmland preservation with habitat restoration. This dual mission allows us to address the landscape holistically and advocate for collaborative conservation strategies. We are making progress in unifying this vision, but there is still work to be done.
Beyond land conservation, we aim to inspire more people to care about conservation in Northwest Ohio. This is not work we can do alone. Through education, events, and storytelling, we build awareness and engagement, strengthening our base of support. Our work is not just about protecting land—it’s about ensuring that future generations understand its value and continue making choices that sustain our natural world.