Stories from the Field

OSI's mission is to make lands more accessible to all ages. Working with our partner the Butler Conservation Fund, we highlight three landscapes that are now more available to young and old.

Using our experience in the Adirondacks, know-how, and taking quick action, OSI helps to resolve a long-standing land dispute.

Harvey Forest is one of eight climate-resilient properties totaling almost 12,000 acres that OSI helped safeguard through grants and loans in 2016, including five projects in Tennessee, one in Pennsylvania, and another in New Hampshire.

OSI’s preservation of natural lands is the key to water quality, and OSI-protected farmland is producing some of the best hops and barley in the country. The next time you raise a glass of your favorite local brew, offer a toast to conservation.

​OSI’s Klipper Family Fund for the Champlain Valley is using land protection to grow the local economy while saving time-honored rural traditions.

How OSI created a serene park in the middle of a busy office complex in suburban Morris County, NJ.

When the Smiley Road reconstruction and the new trail completed, OSI envisions a unified trail network surrounding and crossing the Shawangunk Ridge that will total 116 miles in length.

For OSI, whose conservation work over the decades had added over 40,000 acres to the state’s 335,000-acre state park system, the prospect of parks closings prompted disbelief, then resolve

OSI's Transborder Fund is doing what comes naturally.

OSI’s Bayshore Highlands Fund conserves farmland to protect drinking water in the Delaware Watershed. Research shows that wide buffers of natural vegetation along springs, streams and wetlands can filter out pollutants from farming.

A recent Open Space Institute loan of $2.18 million to The Nature Conservancy and OSI's purchase of the Fairlawn tract, will secure more than 1,400 acres for longleaf restoration at the Talladega National Forest in Alabama.

Dyaami D'Orazio, OSI's 2017 Conservation Fellow, traveled to Sussex County, NJ, to learn more about on-the-ground initiatives around forest and drinking water protection.