Guide to Significant Wildlife Habitat - Door County Web Map

Protection is accomplished using a variety of tools, including fee acquisition, donations, and
conservation easements. Sites on state-owned lands, especially parks, forests, and fish and wildlife areas,
can simply be designated as State Natural Areas by cooperative agreements and management plans
between the NAP and the cooperator. Similarly, areas controlled by universities, federal agencies, and
private groups, such as The Nature Conservancy, are brought into the natural areas system by a
"memorandum of understanding" — a long-term, but not legally-binding, commitment to maintain the
sites as natural areas. Sites not owned by the state are purchased from willing sellers using funds from
the Stewardship Program. Established in 1989, the program provides money for state land acquisition,
including $1.5 million a year for natural area projects. An additional $500,000 a year from Stewardship
supplements the Natural [Heritage] Area Match Grant Program, which matches, dollar-for-dollar, private
donations of land or funds to the Natural Areas Program. In addition to donations and outright fee
acquisition, the NAP also purchases conservation easements on natural lands. Once secured by purchase
or agreement, sites are formally "designated" as State Natural Areas, becoming part of the natural area
system. Designation confers a significant level of protection as guaranteed by DNR Administrative Rules,
Management Plans, and Memoranda of Understanding, in compliance with state statutes.
A higher level of protection is accomplished by Articles of Dedication, a kind of conservation
easement, which provides the strongest long-term legal protection for land in the state. Legally
"dedicated" sites are protected in perpetuity for natural area use and may not be taken for other functions
without a finding of urgent and greater public need by the governor and the legislature.
As of September 2002, 353 sites covering more than 125,000 acres have been designated as State
Natural Areas. In addition to protecting biotic communities, these areas provide refuge for many species
of plants and animals on Wisconsin's Endangered and Threatened Species List.
Management
Management of State Natural Areas is based on specific plans agreed to by the land managing
agency. In most instances, the best management for natural areas is to do nothing except protect them
from human disturbance. For many sites, however, invasive exotic species and encroaching woody plants
are a real problem, requiring hands-on management. Prescribed burning and removal of trees and shrubs
are used as management tools on prairies, fens, savannas, and sedge meadows. Whether managing natural
areas or the person using them, much of the work is made possible through donations to the Endangered
Resources Fund. The fund was established in 1984 as a means for direct public support of endangered
resources protection projects, including management of designated natural areas.
Research and Educational Use
Natural areas serve as excellent outdoor laboratories for research on biotic communities and the
species that comprise them. A permit is required to conduct formal research on State Natural Areas, and
each year dozens of researchers undertake projects on these sites. When granting a permit, the ability of
the area to tolerate such use without deterioration must be considered. Natural areas maintained with
minimal human disturbance provide an unusual and valuable standard, or "benchmark," for determining
impact of use on managed lands. A baseline data acquisition project, which gathers basic plant and animal
information necessary to establish these benchmarks, is an integral part of the NAP.
When combined with the state's wealth of rivers and lakes, including Lake Superior and Lake
Michigan, the resulting range of habitat conditions is capable of supporting a wide array of plant and
animal life. This is suggested by the abundance of natural community types that ecologists have
identified here in Door County. Thirty-seven (37) natural communities have been cross-referenced with
the seventeen (17) habitat areas described in this document, see table Appendix “A”.
Appendix D – Natural Areas: A Definition &Status Report 181