Maine to get $500,000 in grants, loans for forest preservation

PORTLAND – Maine will be getting $500,000 in grants and loans to protect open space in its northern forest.

The Open Space Institute in New York announced Monday six grants and loans to four land trusts totaling $4.2 million in support of the purchase of more than 245,000 acres of private forestland.

The money will support five projects to acquire land or conservation easements in Maine, New Hampshire and New York.

In Maine, the Forest Society of Maine received a grant of $400,000 for the purchase of the 4,242-acre Big Spencer Mountain and 6 miles of shorefront on Moosehead Lake. The purchase is the first phase of the 329,000-acre West Branch Project to protect headwaters of the Penobscot and St. John rivers.

The Appalachian Trail Conference received a grant of $100,000 toward the purchase of roughly 6,400 acres on Mount Abraham and Saddleback Mountain near Rangeley Lake in western Maine.

Alan Hutchinson, executive director of the Forest Society of Maine, said the $400,000 grant kicks off conservation efforts to protect the tract, which includes old-growth forests, mountain peaks, lumber lands and hiking trails.