Adams Ranch and the quest of rancher Bud Adams and his family to protect ranchland through conservation easements was featured by the Tampa Bay Times this past weekend in a major article. Click here to view.

Audubon Florida has been assisting Adams and other ranchers in building support for the purchase of ranchland easements, and Audubon's participation in recent efforts at the December 2014 Cabinet meeting in Tallahassee are featured in the article.

Hundreds of thousands of acres of ranch land north of Lake Okeechobee are vulnerable to development pressures. Ranch conservation easements such as those purchased under the Rural and Family Lands program of the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services provide a practical and economically attractive mechanism for ranch families to remove development rights from the land. Ranch lands protected by easements in perpetuity provide important habitat for birds and wildlife.

Adams Ranch and Bud Adams received Audubon Florida's "Sustainable Rancher of the Year" award for 2014.