FRPP and Partnership Preserve New Hampshire Ag Land

This area of Shackford Point, looking up the Lamprey River, will be protected as part of a $3.65 million land purchase. Courtesy photo.

NEWMARKET - Preserving the integrity of Newmarket, New Hampshire, for future generations is a primary goal of town officials, who last week secured the preservation of 86 acres of land by The Nature Conservancy.

Now protected under this agreement are 34.9 acres at Shackford Point, 23.5 acres along the Lamprey River and an additional conservation easement along 27.3 acres of what many residents know as Sawyer Farm.

"The Seacoast is one of the fastest-growing areas in New Hampshire," said Eric Aldrich, director of communications of The Nature Conservancy. "The conservation we do now will define what the area looks like in the future."

The $3.65 million purchase by the Nature Conservancy, funded through a grant from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, was conducted through the Great Bay Resource Protection Partnership. Ownership eventually will be transferred to the New Hampshire Fish and Game Department.

The Great Bay Resource Protection Partnership was established in 1994 to protect the critical habitats around Great Bay. In addition to The Nature Conservancy and N.H. Fish and Game, other agencies involved in the transaction were the Audubon Society of New Hampshire, Ducks Unlimited, Great Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve, Natural Resources Conservation Service, Society for the Protection of New Hampshire Forests, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

The effort to obtain the land was a 10-year project for the partnership, according to Aldrich.

"This land was on our radar right away, emerging as one of our priorities back in ’94. We wanted to be able to protect the area from development and protect the land around the Great Bay," he said.

For some longtime Newmarket residents, the history of the land conjures up fond memories. For example, Zoning Board of Adjustment member Richard Shelton grew up with Warren Sawyer Jr.

"I remember the land - it is nice, with high, rolling hills. He (Sawyer) was a gentleman farmer, raised sheep and chickens, but he never really worked the farm."

In the past, Shackford Point was used as a perch site for nesting bald eagles. In addition, other wildlife and fowl could be helped with this effort, such as Canadian geese and American black ducks.

Deer also have been affected by development in recent years, a trend that Conservation Commission chairman Wilfred Hamel said he hopes to reverse.

Visit the NRCS Vermont web site.

"We’re trying to attach land to form some type of corridor that’s protected," he said. So far, the town has about 300 acres of open space that’s preserved in three areas that are somewhat attached.

While the preservation of Shackford Point may not seem like much compared with other properties held by the conservancy - one as large as 10,000 acres in Stratford - it is the largest in the Great Bay area. In addition, the conservancy also supports Lubberland Creek Preserve on the Newmarket/Durham town line.

Story by Lisa Tetrault-Zhe, Seacoast Online.