conservation

A forested parcel of 700 acres is now part of a 2,000 acre conservation area, the largest in southern Maine.

The groups behind a proposed community forest in Rumford say they have secured enough money to move forward with the project.

Conservation groups joined state and federal officials in Rangeley late last week to celebrate the climate and ecological benefits of a large-scale forest conservation project in western Maine. Its completion also marked a milestone for a federal program that made the project possible.

The projects include one in Wells that will create a new portion of the Eastern Trail, as well as a 279 acre acquisition for the city of Ellsworth near Branch Lake to preserve public drinking water access.

More than 13,000 acres on two parcels of land in the western Maine Mountains have been permanently protected by the Trust for Public Land, The Nature Conservancy in Maine and the Maine Bureau of Parks and Lands.

The Conservation Fund is serving as a bridge between landowner Herb Haynes and the Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife.

Twelve new conservation projects will receive state funding under the Land for Maine's Future program. One includes the 63,000-acre Reed Deadwater parcel in Aroostook County.

Other projects selected this year span from Kittery to Machias. The program was established under a state bond in 1987 as the state's primary method of conserving land. More than 600,000 acres have been protected.

The Grafton Notch Forest was considered a crucial gap in a conservation corridor that connects hundreds of thousands of acres across Maine and New Hampshire. Most of the land will remain as working forest, but more than 6,000 acres will be managed as wilderness.

Irving Woodlands has agreed to place a conservation easement on nearly 17,000 acres it owns in Aroostook County. Irving will be able to continue harvesting trees on some land covered by the easement, which will be held by the Forest Society of Maine.