Nearly Four Decades of Conservation in the Pennypack Creek Watershed
A Brief History of the Pennypack Ecological Restoration Trust
Click here to read about Pennypack's 40 Year History
The Pennypack Ecological Restoration Trust is a private, non-profit land trust located in Huntingdon Valley , Pennsylvania , 15 miles northeast of central Philadelphia . As the steward of 771 acres of protected meadows, woodlands and floodplain forest, the Trust manages Montgomery County 's second-largest privately owned natural area that is open to the public. The lands within the Trust's natural area, the Pennypack Preserve, are located in the townships of Abington, Upper Moreland and Lower Moreland and in the Borough of Bryn Athyn. Over 1,200 dues-paying members support the Trust, and the preserve hosts 20,000 visitors annually.
The Trust's mission is to protect, restore and preserve the lands of the central Pennypack Creek valley so that they:
• enhance the quality of life of both residents and visitors,
• offer habitat for native plants and animals, and
• become a standard of excellence for innovative restoration and stewardship practices that can be shared with others joined in a common commitment to the environment.
The Pennypack Trust was founded in 1970 as a membership-based environmental group called the Pennypack Watershed Association whose primary mission was to improve water quality in the Pennypack Creek's rapidly suburbanizing watershed. In 1975, the Association's Board of Directors adopted a Master Plan for preserving undeveloped and environmentally sensitive land in the central watershed, identifying 855 acres of steep slopes, wetlands, and floodplain forests that were deserving of protection. In 1976, the Association began to assemble the Pennypack Preserve natural area through a combination of land donations, purchases, and conservation easements.
By 1993, the watershed association had acquired 480 acres. Meanwhile, during the previous two decades, water quality in Pennypack Creek had consistently improved as industrial and municipal wastewater treatment plants upgraded their facilities. Because water quality was increasingly governed by diffuse non-point sources (i.e., suburban runoff) that were difficult to address, the organization decided to redirect its efforts to the stewardship and restoration of the land it had acquired and to rename itself the Pennypack Ecological Restoration Trust.
Since 1993, the Trust has protected 291 acres, bringing the total land protected to 771 acres. The new acreage includes the 160-acre Raytharn Farm, a former sheep farm, whose conversion to native grasslands will provide a haven for species of meadow-nesting birds that are threatened on the East Coast. Through a recent revision of its original 1975 Master Plan, the Trust has identified over 200 additional acres of unusual shrub swamp wetlands, old fields, and maturing forests that are worthy of protection, and the organization has committed itself to conserving these lands in the future as they become available.
Active restoration of the lands protected in the Pennypack Preserve is apparent everywhere. For example, the Trust's stewardship staff and volunteers have planted nearly 11,000 trees since 1990. Large tracts that had been overwhelmed by non-native vines just a few years ago are now cleared and ready for reforestation. Nearly all of Raytharn Farm has been planted with native grasses. And gaps in the tree canopy of three ancient forests have been planted with young trees to replace aging giants.
As a member of the Land Trust Alliance, the Pennypack Trust works cooperatively with other regional conservation organizations to promote ecological restoration practices in land stewardship. In addition, the Trust is developing a program of professional education to train land management practitioners, volunteers, and university-level students and researchers in the techniques and philosophy of ecological restoration.
The Trust's 10 miles of trails are open to visitors free of charge every day of the year from dawn to dusk.