Sustain livestock ranching to sustain habitat: land sharing at risk on San Francisco Bay Area exacted conservation easements

Abstract

Grazing lands supporting livestock production and nature conservation exemplify land sharing conservation. In California, livestock producers own or manage a large portion of land with the highest biodiversity ecosystems. Grazing reduces flammable biomass and can benefit habitat of numerous rare and endangered species. However, the role of grazing, livestock production, and rancher stewardship in conservation is often overlooked. Spatial analysis shows a significant contribution of grazing lands to conservation in the San Francisco Bay Area (SFBA) that is not recognized in regional planning analyses. Lands protected for conservation cover nearly 0.5 million ha, or 29% of the SFBA, and 43% of the protected land is grazing land. Over 65% of the region’s land described as essential or important to conservation by the regional planning network is grazing land. A case study review is used to examine in greater depth the management dynamics of partial-title acquisition of grazing land for conservation. Exacted conservation easements, a type of easement fulfilling mitigation requirements for land development, are growing in use in the SFBA and throughout California, and they are well funded by development interests to support conservation. Political ecology theory terms a redefinition of territory that can displace resource users and enable others to benefit from newly created economic values, reterritorialization and capital accumulation. A case study of exacted easements on SFBA ranches reveals how the resulting redefining of the land’s purpose and the significance of its various ecosystem services provides funding for third parties for new services required to implement and uphold the easements, but not necessarily to support land sharing and the ranching livelihood that provides grazing needed for habitat management. Planning that considers the needs of the livestock operation would increase the probability of achieving desired conservation outcomes and the durability of appropriate habitat conditions.