Michael A. Sawyers
GRANTSVILLE — The Landowner Incentive Program — with 54 projects throughout Maryland, including several in Garrett and Allegany counties — provides government money so that private landowners can protect plants and animals considered to be at risk.
There are no strings attached, according to Linh Phu who directs the Department of Natural Resources program. “The program is completely voluntary. There are no regulations,” Phu said during a Friday morning interview in Grantsville.
Based in Annapolis, Phu was on a two-day road trip to various LIP projects in the western part of the state.
“Thursday I met with Roy Weitzell Jr. and Roy Weitzell Sr. whose 750 acres south of Accident are in the program,” Phu said. “The property has steep moist slopes that provide habitat for at-risk plants such as purple fringeless orchid and sandbar willow and for birds such as the scarlet tanager.”
Phu contends that the spring salamander population on the property speaks to the good water quality there. A globally rare snail can also be found on the Weitzell ground.
One of the conservation practices funded by LIP is the control of invasive species.
“That’s going on at the Weitzells’ land,” Phu said. The concern is that plants such as Japanese honeysuckle, barberry and multiflora rose, and even autumn olive, can take over a property and eliminate at-risk plant species and the animals that depend upon them.
Roy Weitzell Jr. is sold on LIP.
“Of most importance, Linh has put us in touch with the right people who can identify the exotic species and know how to get rid of them,” Weitzell said. “Our goal is to preserve the land in its most natural state as possible rather than generate income off of it, though we do have the right to log and harvest wood and other products.”
Other approved conservation practices include:
• Reforestation
• Creation of grassland or forest buffers
• Management of fallow fields and vegetation
• Fencing to exclude livestock
• Restoration of wetlands
Throughout Maryland, 607 wildlife species are considered to be at some level of risk.
The LIP projects in various states survive because of competitive grants from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. “Our most recent success was in getting two grants, one for $750,000 and another for $725,000,” Phu said. Those two grants are going straight into the land via payments for management practices, though Phu points out that the administrative costs of the program are paid from grant money also. A required 25 percent match must be obtained from nongovernmental sources.
Throughout Maryland, more than 3,000 acres have been enrolled in LIP.
“We identify land that would likely be eligible for the program and then do a site visit as well as a GIS (geographic information system) analysis,” Phu said. “Often, though, conservation-minded landowners are the ones who contact us, seeking to be in the program.”
The state and the landowner sign an agreement about what is to be done on the property and then the money is turned over to the owner to do the work or contract to have it done. Being in the program does not require a landowner to allow public access.
Phu sometimes works with nongovernmental organizations such as the Maryland Ornithological Society, which owns the 162-acre Carey Run Sanctuary south of Interstate 68 in eastern Garrett County.
“There were 25 Boy Scout troops from Southern Maryland that traveled here and camped at New Germany State Park and helped us remove autumn olive as part of their community service projects,” Phu said. “The Carey Run project has 150 different bird species on it.”
Landowners interested in inquiring about LIP service can begin by viewing www.dnr.state.md.us/wildlife/lip.asp.
Contact Michael A. Sawyers at msawyers@times-news.com.
