{"id":9724,"date":"2026-01-27T17:29:46","date_gmt":"2026-01-27T21:29:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/?p=9724"},"modified":"2026-01-27T17:29:46","modified_gmt":"2026-01-27T21:29:46","slug":"trust-protects-500-acres-of-forest-in-pleasant-river-queens-co","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/2026\/01\/27\/trust-protects-500-acres-of-forest-in-pleasant-river-queens-co\/","title":{"rendered":"Trust protects 500 acres of forest in Pleasant River, Queens Co."},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"

Forested land in Pleasant River will be protected from development. (Nova Scotia Working Woodlands Trust)<\/p><\/div>\n

About 200 hectares (500 acres) of ecologically significant forest in North Queens will be protected from development by the Nova Scotia Working Woodlands Trust.<\/span><\/p>\n

The property in Pleasant River is the first one bought by the trust. The acquisition represents about 12.5 per cent of the organization’s goal to protect 4,000 acres by this spring.<\/span><\/p>\n

Mary Jane Rodger is the executive director of the trust.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThis is a really exciting step for us, obviously, because it’s the first property we’ve ever purchased,” Mary Jane Rodger, the trust’s executive director, told QCCR, “but then also because of some of the unique habitat features and species at risk that exist in North Queens.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Rodger says the Pleasant River property is a mixed-wood forest that\u2019s about 35 years old. The trust will keep about 100 acres of it wild, while using the remaining land as a demonstration woodlot to help teach sustainable forestry practices.<\/span><\/p>\n

“Our organization really has the capacity to help this property achieve its full ecological as well as economic potential. Within our model, we’re heavily vested in the working forest aspect as well as the kind of more traditional conservation aspect. So a portion of this property will be permanently protected.<\/span><\/p>\n

She said the organizaiton will be \u201cshowing woodlot owners different ways to steward their lands or manage their woodlot in a way that you get to cut down trees, but still leave most of them standing and hopefully still be economically profitable.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The property is also significant because it helps the trust get closer to its goal of accessing the carbon offsets market. That will help raise money to cover the long-term costs of protecting and preserving the forest.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cLand conservation in itself is an expensive endeavor. You have to send someone out to a woodlot every year to make sure there’s no cutting over boundary lines or invasive species or impacts from climate change. So we need to make sure that as an organization, we have the stability to continue to operate into the future because the nature of what we do is very, very long-term.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The trust bought the property from Neil Emenau for about $300,000. It partnered with the Mersey Tobeatic Research Institute, with funding from Parks Canada and the Southwest Nova Biosphere Region.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Pleasant River plot is next to the 3,000-hectare (7,400-acre) Pu’tlaqne’katik (\u201cshaving lake\u201d or \u201cshingle lake\u201d) Wilderness Area, which is protected by the Nova Scotia Nature Trust.<\/span><\/p>\n

The woodlands trust says the acquisition enhances an important conservation corridor around Kejimkujik National Park, which will help foster ecological diversity and strengthen wildlife habitat. The land will be protected from development and conventional clearcutting.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe see so many lakes and rivers, in Queens County and in Lunenburg County get subdivided and you lose a lot of that ecological integrity when people clear their land all the way to the lake. Another key component of this property is there’s quite a significant river frontage along Pleasant River that will remain forested forever.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

And it will still be accessible to the public.<\/span><\/p>\n

“So we’re hoping that we can encourage folks to access the property for hiking, snowshoeing, skiing, whatever it might be.<\/span> I know the ATV community does use it as a thoroughfare as well, which we’d be happy to work with them to continue that access.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Rodger says the trust hopes to get its charitable status this year, so that it will be more attractive for landowners to sell their properties.<\/span><\/p>\n

Email: rickcconradqccr@gmail.com<\/a><\/p>\n

Listen to the audio version of this story below<\/strong><\/p>\nhttps:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/woodlandtrustjan2726.mp3<\/a><\/audio>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

About 200 hectares (500 acres) of ecologically significant forest in North Queens will be protected from development by the Nova Scotia Working Woodlands Trust. The property in Pleasant River is the first one bought by the trust. The acquisition represents about 12.5 per cent of the organization’s goal to protect 4,000 acres by this spring. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13,5],"tags":[3750,972,3746,3748,729,3745,3751,29,3743,1258,49,3749,3744,3747,3323],"class_list":["post-9724","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-community-news","category-news-posts","tag-carbon-offset","tag-conservation","tag-ecology","tag-forest","tag-forestry","tag-land-trust","tag-mary-jane-rodger","tag-north-queens","tag-nova-scotia-working-woodlands-trust","tag-pleasant-river","tag-queens-county","tag-silviculture","tag-trust","tag-woodland","tag-woods"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9724","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9724"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9724\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9727,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9724\/revisions\/9727"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9724"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9724"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9724"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}