Summit Land Conservancy announced Friday it has permanently protected 2,800 acres known as East Hoytsville Range, conserving one of North Summit’s largest working ranches through a voluntary conservation easement. The property safeguards agricultural land, wildlife habitat, and clean water in the Upper Weber Watershed while ensuring the landscape remains undeveloped for generations to come, the conservancy said. The conservation easement is the conservancy’s 16th completed project since launching its For the Future campaign in 2023, an initiative to save more land and faster. Together, those projects have permanently protected 15,215 acres, bringing Summit Land Conservancy’s total preserved lands to 28,392 acres across northern Utah. Owned by local ranching families for more than a century, East Hoytsville Range remains an active cattle operation and an important part of North Summit’s agricultural heritage. The conservation easement allows ranching to continue while permanently extinguishing future development rights, ensuring the land remains open and productive rather than becoming fragmented by residential development, according to the conservancy. “The East Hoytsville Range Company is made up of 12 shareholders and their families, so getting everyone to agree on something is no small task. But when it came to placing a conservation easement on this land and ensuring our beautiful range would never be developed, the decision was 100% unanimous,” said Kent Pace, president of East Hoytsville Range. “The company was formed in 1938 with the purpose of running livestock, and we all want to see that legacy continue for generations to come. It has been a long process, but it has been well worth the wait.” The ranch provides habitat for a wide range of wildlife. Large expanses of sagebrush, scrub oak, and native rangeland support elk, mule deer, moose, black bear, snowshoe hare, ruffed grouse, and numerous migratory bird species. The property also lies within a state-designated Greater Sage-grouse Priority Habitat Management Area. Beyond its value for wildlife, East Hoytsville Range plays an important role in protecting water resources, the conservancy said. Springs, seasonal streams and Spring Canyon Creek flow through the property before joining the Weber River, while a culinary spring on the ranch supplies drinking water to the Hoytsville community. “This conservation easement has been nearly two decades in the making,” said Cheryl Fox, CEO of Summit Land Conservancy. “The families of East Hoytsville Range first approached Summit Land Conservancy almost 20 years ago because they wanted to ensure their ranch would remain intact for future generations. Conservation takes time. It takes patience, trust, and a shared vision to bring landowners, partners, and funding together.” Fox continued, “Like many federally funded conservation projects, this one encountered administrative hurdles that delayed closing. We’re incredibly grateful to the dedicated federal employees who worked tirelessly to resolve those challenges, and especially to the landowners, whose patience and commitment never wavered. We’d also like to thank Congressman Blake Moore’s office for helping cut through the red tape and keep this important conservation project moving forward.” Support came from the Natural Resources Conservation Service’s Agricultural Conservation Easement Program, Summit County’s Open Space Advisory Committee, and Summit Land Conservancy donors. “This property is especially significant because it’s connected to a number of neighboring ranches whose owners also hope to permanently conserve their land,” Fox said. “When we’re able to protect connected landscapes, the benefits multiply. Wildlife can move more freely, watersheds function more naturally, working ranches remain viable, and entire ecosystems become more resilient. East Hoytsville Range is the first phase of what we hope will become one of the largest connected conservation landscapes in North Summit.” East Hoytsville Range is part of a greater vision for conservation in the Wasatch Back, conservancy officials said, as development moves east from Park City and along the Interstate 80 corridor. The East Hoytsville Range conservation easement represents the first of a two-phase project. A future conservation easement is expected to permanently protect an additional 3,900 acres, bringing the East Hoytsville Range conservation project to nearly 6,700 acres, according to the conservancy The post Conservancy protects East Hoytsville Range as open space appeared first on Park Record. ...read more read less