North Texas is home to a vast ecosystem of prairies, from the Blackland Prairie to the East and West Cross Timbers. However, as the state’s population booms — it is expected to double to 54.4 million by 205 — rapid development means less than 1% of the state’s original prairie remains. 

To preserve what’s left, the Native Prairies Association of Texas has created the North Texas Prairie Initiative. The association is raising funds to support the initiative with the goal of conserving 2,000 acres of prairie in the region during the next four years. 

“Our primary goal with this initiative is to protect as much native prairie and restored grassland as possible in North Texas and with urgency,” said Jeff Sargent, the group’s development director. “There aren’t too many conservation organizations that are protecting land in North Texas. There aren’t enough. There needs to be a lot more protection to maintain some stability in the native prairie ecosystem around here.” 

Rachel Seets, the North Texas conservation manager at the Native Prairies Association of Texas, said protecting prairies is vital as they offer not only benefits to wildlife but also to humans. Seets pointed out that prairies provide a “natural protection” from flooding since they can absorb water, acting like a “dry sponge.” Prairieland also provides clean drinking water because its root system can filtrate water underground. 

“Prairies hold a lot of value to us as Texas residents,” Seets said. ”On top of being this gorgeous land and vital to a lot of cherished wildlife, it’s crucial for us as residents to maintain this prairie land.” 

Urbanization and development has led to the rapid disappearance of prairie, Sargent said. One strategy the association wants to develop is partnering with utility companies, state organizations, college campuses and corporations that have tracts of land in urban areas as a way to restore pocket prairies, small-scale prairies that support wildlife. 

The Native Prairie Association of Texas “is by no means against development. We need that for our economic growth,” Seets said. “We’re just advocating for mindful preservation of lands in anticipation of further development.” 

The association also works with private landowners to voluntarily sign conservation easements. The legal agreements permanently restrict certain uses of land in order to protect its conservation values. Even when the property is sold, the easement stays with the property, Sargent said. 

“When some people hear about easement, they think, ‘Oh, the government is involved,’ and that’s not it at all,” Sargent said. “This is an agreement between a landowner and an organization like ours that helps them complete the agreement. And we help them monitor the agreement so it continues to maintain the conservation values that are spelled out.”

The association is working with four private landowners from Somervell County, Ellis County, Parker County and Denton County who have donated portions of their land to be protected with an easement. 

There are additional costs that come with easements, Sargent said, including an appraisal, the boundary survey, title insurance and other legal documents. 

“Then there’s also stewardship costs involved for us to go by each year and work with the landowner to monitor and see how things are going with protecting their land under this conservation easement.” 

On average, it costs more than $55,000 to complete each conservation easement, he said. 

“All those together add up to a not insignificant sum that often the landowners can’t afford,” Sargent said. “That’s where we step in to try to help them with providing those funds. But we don’t always have all those funds available either, especially when we’re trying to work on four right now at the same time.”

Prairie advocates hope to draw attention to the initiative through North Texas Giving Day, a fundraising campaign that encourages residents to donate to charitable causes in September. Although the campaign wraps up on Sept. 19, Sargent said the association will continue to accept donations on its website, with a goal of raising $110,000. 

The association wants people to understand that protecting prairies is much more than maintaining the ecosystem. Preserving land helps humans more than anything else, Sargent said. 

“Nature protects cities,” Sargent said. “We’ve got to protect our food source, we’ve got to protect our cities from floods, we’ve got to protect our water to make it clean, our clean air. All of these things come back to protecting people.” 

Kevin Vu is a recent graduate of the University of Texas at Austin and contributor to the Fort Worth Report.