The Texas Land Conservancy, Rattlesnake Conservation Partners, Ltd, and Advanced Ecology make up the team of conservationists who have partnered with a landowner to protect the natural condition of 517 acres of ranch land in Houston County. Through this collaboration, the newly minted Rattlesnake Mitigation Bank (RMB) will be conserved in perpetuity, thereby benefiting the land’s native plants and animals, scenic condition, and vital water resources.

The Rattlesnake Mitigation Bank is 517 acres of the 9,000-acre 7J Rattlesnake Ranch, located approximately 20 miles southwest of Crockett, TX. A voluntary conservation agreement, or conservation easement, held by the Texas Land Conservancy will ensure that the property will be protected from fragmentation, helping to maintain the integrity of the land as a working ranch with important habitat for a diversity of species. The conservation easement prohibits commercial and industrial activities, dumping trash or toxic materials, and restricts most extraction activities and disturbances to the natural condition of the land.

The property is an excellent example of bottomland hardwood forested wetlands, a type of landscape rapidly being depleted in East Texas due to poorly-planned development, rapid land fragmentation, and unsustainable timbering techniques. The conservation agreement will also protect nearly three miles of the Trinity River, which runs along the western edge of the property. TLC, along with Rattlesnake Conservation Partners, Ltd. and Advanced Ecology will be working in the coming years to continue to improve the condition of RMB by increasing the diversity of native plant communities, and removing invasive species.

What makes this property particularly unique from other similar conservation-designated lands throughout the state is its status as a mitigation bank. The EPA defines a mitigation bank as “a wetland area that has been restored, established, enhanced or preserved, which is then set aside to compensate for future conversions of wetlands for development activities.” More simply, if a company has an unavoidable, negative environmental impact on a body of water, that company can compensate for that damage by investing money in a permanently protected piece of land, like the Rattlesnake Mitigation Bank. This is a creative, and increasingly popular, solution to industrial environmental degradation. Rather than levying nebulous fines on companies that pollute, this method first tries to avoid the damage, then, if unavoidable, lets companies actually choose the environmental benefit they want to make.