Alaska's Wood-Tikchik State Park is known for its expansive, undeveloped wilderness and abundant wildlife. As a major spawning area for salmon—the foundation of southwest Alaska's ecology, economy and culture—the park was created in order to protect fish and wildlife breeding and support systems. It was also created to preserve subsistence and recreational activities.
The park's wilderness also makes it a top travel destination for outdoor enthusiasts. Thousands of tourists travel here each year for the world-class fishing opportunities and other nature-based adventures.
But private land development is a pressing threat to salmon and other wildlife as well as the scenic landscape so many visitors come to enjoy.
Through our Southwest Alaska Wild Salmon Initiative, we're working to place conservation easements or purchase property from willing land owners along the rivers and lakes in Wood-Tikchik. Some of our past projects include the addition of property at the start of the Agulukpak River and at the mouth of Elva Creek at Lake Nerka. The properties were considered highly valuable for development but both were also important spawning systems for tens of thousands of sockeye salmon.
Our work with local organizations resulted in a conservation easement on more than 20,000 acres, which preserves the entire length of the 4-mile-long Agulowak River and more than 40 miles of shoreline along lakes Aleknagik and Nerka.
We continue to work in Alaska so that future generations can enjoy the same salmon-rich rivers and vast wilderness that we do today.
While Alaska is blessed with an abundance of public land, access to that land is not guaranteed. Chugach State Park, located at the edge of Anchorage, Alaska’s largest city, has been impacted by the city’s rapid expansion—right up to the park's boundaries. Along the western boundary of the park, immediately adjacent to suburban Anchorage, lies the 149-acre Near Point property. The property provides access to Near Point and to the North Fork of Campbell Creek. We're now trying to raise funds to transfer this property to Chugach State Park.
No matter how tough the situation, we find the right solution to benefit the land and the surrounding community. In 2003 the Near Point property was the location of a proposed antenna farm. After the community defeated that proposal, it was slated for residential development. The Basher Community Council unanimously passed a resolution endorsing The Conservation Fund’s purchase of the entire property and our transfer of the property to Chugach State Park. Alaska State Parks plans to work with the Basher Community Council and the public to design appropriate facilities on this property—so all may easily access and enjoy Chugach in the future.
In previous years, we've been successful in assisting local partners with their efforts to ensure access to Chugach. In 2007, we assisted The Great Land Trust, in partnership with the Alaska Division of Parks and Outdoor Recreation, with the completion of a multi-year effort to secure public access to Rabbit Creek Valley, located within the park. Over the course of five years we had worked quietly with the various landowners involved to secure access to the valley. In partnership with the Great Land Trust, Alaska State Parks, the Alaska Legislature, the Rasmuson Foundation and ConocoPhillips, we raised the funds needed to purchase three properties totaling 320 acres, allowing park visitors to enjoy Rabbit Creek Valley for the first time in 20 years.
Working with community and government leaders we've been conserving land in Alaska for decades and will continue to work for decades to come.
Photo: View of Chugach / Rob Baird, Flickr (top); Rabbit Lake / The Conservation Fund (bottom)
Every spring and fall nearly half a million Western Arctic Caribou—the second largest caribou herd in North America—migrate through Kobuk Valley National Park. The caribou range covers 140,000 miles, and the Kobuk River, which runs roughly 61 miles through the park, is a critical point in the migration route.
When a local landowner needed to sell his property along the river—land that provides many strategic caribou crossing sites—he wanted a buyer who would conserve the land rather than develop it. As a Native Alaskan, he appreciated the value of his property as a significant part of the caribou migration corridor as well as a vital resource for his community. Local residents feed their families with caribou from the river crossing in the fall; in fact, there is archaeological evidence that people have hunted caribou along the river for 9,000 years. Losing the land to development could have changed the migration route and impacted not only the caribou herd, but the people who rely on it for sustenance.
Because the property is in a key location for the caribou migration, the National Park Service wanted to buy the land and incorporate it into Kobuk Valley National Park. But the park service didn’t have the funding to buy the property at the time of sale. NPS approached the Fund with the request that we purchase the land and hold it until the necessary funding became available. We frequently partner with the National Park Service in conservation efforts and were more than happy to help the NPS acquire this land. We transferred the land to the park service in the spring of 2010.
Our work in Kobuk is a great example of how we work with the government and local landowners to save critical landscapes. We have saved nearly 7 million acres across the United States.
To learn more about the caribou migration across Alaska visit the Kobuk Valley National Park website.
Thank you to Wendi Lyn for granting permission to use her images from the Kobuk River and Kobuk River Valley. All images are copyright Wendi Lyn and can be viewed on Flickr.
The Chena Greenbelt is a multi-partner effort to link approximately 30 properties together to form a network of green space for recreation, watershed protection, and wildlife habitat. In the midst of a rapidly urbanizing land base in Fairbanks, Alaska, these properties face direct conversion from wetlands to gravel pits and suburban development. In some cases the wetlands are excavated to form small lakes that lie at the center of the new subdivisions.
To date, The Conservation Fund has acquired ten properties totaling 210 acres to form the nucleus of the Chena Greenbelt. The project is funded in large part by mitigation fees resulting from projects that impact wetlands. The Conservation Fund operates the only wetlands mitigation program in Interior Alaska, and these funds are essential to the success of the Chena Greenbelt Project.
To date the Fund has helped to conserve nearly 325,000 acres of Alaska’s most extraordinary landscapes—land valued at more than $134 million. Working with public and private partners throughout the state, our conservation work has achieved multiple goals including protection of important fish and wildlife habitat; providing public access for fishing, hunting, hiking and other uses, and preserving economic opportunities for local communities.
The city of Anchorage has expanded right up to the borders of Chugach State Park. Along the western boundary and immediately adjacent to suburban Anchorage lies the 149-acre Near Point property, an access point for the park. First slated to become an antenna farm and then for residential development, we worked with the community to acquire the property and in the process of raising funds to transfer it to the park.
With hundreds of pristine rivers, lakes and streams, the southwest Alaska region abounds with natural resources, diverse habitats, world-class recreation spots and a rich culture and history. Covering an area the size of Washington state, this 40 million acre region supports a wide variety of fish and wildlife. Our Southwest Alaska Salmon Habitat Initiative, the largest land protection project of its kind, offers an exciting opportunity to conserve one of the greatest natural landscapes in North America.
For more information about the initiative, click here.
Learn about the initiative's efforts in Wood-Tikchik State Park.
Every year nearly half a million Western Arctic Caribou migrate through Kobuk Valley National Park. When a landowner needed to sell his property and the National Park Service wanted to buy it, they asked for the Fund's assistance.
See images of the caribou crossing and learn more about this project >>
Internationally recognized for the importance of its wetlands, Izembek National Wildlife Refuge, at the tip of the Alaskan peninsula contains one of the largest eelgrass beds in the world. Threatened Steller's eider and more than 90 percent of the world's Pacific brant population feed on eelgrass here in fall and winter. Emperor geese, caribou, sea otter, brown bear and harbor seal are also found here.
In 2008, the Fund and its partners protected more than 12,500 acres of wetlands on the Alaska Peninsula. The area covers more than 100 miles of Pacific Ocean coastline and over 200 miles of fish streams and rivers that teem with five species of Pacific salmon. In 1999 The Richard and Rhoda Goldman Fund, in partnership with us, donated a nearly 8,500-acre addition to the refuge. Our decade of conservation efforts has transferred a total of 71,511 acres to the Izembek National Wildlife Refuge Complex.
Though Alaska is a state known for its expansive open and natural areas, small places matter too. We worked to save land at both Cape Bingham and Windham Bay. Learn more about our efforts >>
Point Possession, just 15 miles southwest of Anchorage, is a magnificent piece of wild Alaska. Its waters shelter major runs of red and silver salmon, and it is exceptional habitat for moose, brown and black bear, and tundra swans. In partnership with the Point Possession Native Group and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the Fund helped secure 4,247 acres of the point, which lies within a designated wilderness area in Kenai National Wildlife Refuge.
Help us protect your favorite places before they become just a memory. Make a donation today.
Though Alaska is a state of great expanse, small places matter. As the critical first project of The Conservation Fund’s Coastal Alaska Initiative, more than 830 acres of rugged Cape Bingham cliffs and 12 miles of pristine coastline now are protected.
Cape Bingham in the Tongass National Forest is dramatic and unforgettable. Sea-battered cliffs rise sharply to snow-capped peaks. Sprawling colonies of raucous sea lions, otters and harbor seals share the surrounding waters with migrating whales. Brown bears hunt in the majestic temperate rainforests. And Cape Bingham’s craggy granite barrier islands shelter Southeast Alaska’s inner passage-its quiet coves, deep inlets and productive tidal marshes.
Cape Bingham represents the crowning achievement in an extraordinary $5 million Alaska conservation campaign initiated by the Richard and Rhoda Goldman Fund, a remarkable commitment that motivated other donors and enabled The Conservation Fund to leverage the foundation’s charitable investment. Beginning in 1998, the Goldman Fund has fueled protection of almost 10,000 acres of Alaskan wildlife habitat, in such singular areas as the Izembek National Wildlife Refuge, Kodiak Island, Wood-Tikchik State Park and Chilkat Bald Eagle Preserve.
Windham Bay, at the heart of southeast Alaska's 17-million-acre Tongass National Forest, is a unique combination of lush rainforest and fresh and saltwater estuaries that create a bird and whale-watcher's paradise. With support from Too Far, a California-based publishing company, the Fund and the USDA Forest Service added more than 100 acres of old-growth forest to the Tongass National Forest's Chuck River Wilderness, which safeguarded stands of Sitka that harbor bald eagle, brown bear, flying squirrels and moose.
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