Stewardship
"What is our dream?
We want to demonstrate that it's not difficult to accomplish extraordinary restoration results in comparatively few years, document the steps and timing, and induce other growers to follow our example.
Our guiding sense is that most private landowners care deeply for their property in areas of soil conservation, water quality enhancement, wildlife habitat, productive farm capacity, and open space preservation. Government can facilitate this; we can develop effective government/private working relationships. We must learn from each other."
Mark & Jolly Krautmann
Mark & Jolly have been widely recognized in the Pacific Northwest for their personal and company commitment to natural resource stewardship. Restoration of oak, prairie and wetland habitat on their farms now includes more than 300 acres in a 15 year effort in which they have invested hundreds of thousands of dollars. They hired a full-time staff botanist to manage all of this, and the effort has evolved to include a major supply role in providing native wildflower seeds to others who restore prairie habitat in the Willamette Valley.
Tours of these sites bring together dozens of stakeholders annually to view first hand lessons learned about restoration on nursery farms, including riparian woodland, oak woodland, oak savanna, and upland prairie habitats.
Our Habitat Restoration page has many documents we have found useful in restoring native prairie and oak habitats on private land. Our Site Preparation page contains methods we have used on our farms. Examples of our own restoration work can be found Here.
"We abuse land because we regard it as a commodity belonging to us. When we see land as a community to which we belong, we may begin to use it with love and respect."
Aldo Leopold