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PLAN: Goals & Design

Taking time to plan means you’ll get the best results, avoid disappointment, and reduce long-term costs. Planning starts with being clear about the goals driving your land stewardship.

Stewarding the land is an ongoing process. 

  • Walk the locations you are stewarding in every season.
  • Build a relationship with the land over time to create results aligned with your values and goals.
  • Monitor the activities of contractors and workers to ensure their work aligns with your values.

As you plan, think about: 

Where?
Which?
What?
When?
How?
Why?
Who?

“If you don’t know where you’re going, you will probably end up somewhere else.”

— Laurence J. Peter

Step by step

1. Know your goals:  The essential first step is to be clear about your goals and intended outcomes. Your goals determine your stewardship plan.

2. Assess the land: Understand the land’s ecological systems, history, and potential by filling out a  land inventory

  • Talk to previous stewards, visitors, and long-time neighbors.
  • Invite expert advisors to walk the land with you to share their perspectives and knowledge.   
  • Practice observing How Land Works through seasons and over time. Understanding land is a life-long, deeply satisfying practice.

3. Consider Opportunities And Constraints such as accessibility, required permits, and expenses, all of which create trade-offs. 

4. Make a written plan to collate what you’ve learned into a step-by-step, practical stewardship plan you can share, that lays out actions over time for different areas of the land.

Example plan that emphasizes long-term ecological function: Wildlands Preserve Stewardship Plan.

Example planning guides that include harvesting trees for an economic return: 

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