UPSTATE SC — In the final months of 2025, local conservation nonprofit Upstate Forever worked with landowners and partners to close on more than 2,100 additional acres of conservation easements across seven counties: Anderson, Oconee, Greenville, Laurens, Pickens, and Spartanburg in SC, and Polk County in NC.
“We had a great year-end in 2025, with nine new and amended conservation easements closing over the course of a few months,” said Scott Park, Upstate Forever’s Glenn Hilliard Director of Land Conservation. “We are honored to work with dedicated landowners and partners to protect some beautiful properties that reflect the diversity of this region.”
The protected properties include mostly active agricultural land as well as forested and mixed landscapes that safeguard waterways, wildlife habitat, and rural character throughout the Upstate.
“We’re pleased to see such incredible land protection momentum in this fast-growing corner of the state,” said Raleigh West, director of the South Carolina Conservation Bank. “From farms to forests, these places define the character of the Upcountry.”
Duck Haven in Pickens County is a former peach orchard and cattle farm encompassing 146 acres of open fields, wetlands, and deciduous and evergreen forests along the Saluda River. This conservation easement helps safeguard habitat for threatened and endangered species while maintaining the property’s agricultural and recreational character. Project funders include Easley Combined Utilities, Pickens County Conservation Bank, SCCB, Sustain SC, ULCF, the US Fish and Wildlife Service, and Upstate Forever.
“I am proud that the Pickens County Conservation Bank could partner with other community groups to preserve Duck Haven,” said Pickens County Administrator Ken Roper. “This unique property offers extensive habitats for our native plants and animals, all of which are essential for our natural heritage.”
“Shortly before we lost Mother to COVID in late 2021, I promised her I would find a way to keep our land together,” said Duck Haven landowner Alice Smith. “Our conservation easement honors many generations of our family for their hard work and sacrifices. While Mother didn’t live to see the easement in her lifetime, her children have. Young, third cousins will never witness developers and heavy equipment move in. Wildlife will keep their homes. It’s my home too. I love this place! It’s special the way it is, and with Upstate Forever’s help, it’s together, forever, and protected. I kept my promise. I’m sharing our story publicly to just maybe plant a seed: ‘If I can do it, so can you.’”
Another year of protecting Upstate lands
The 2025 totals are in — Upstate Forever protected more than 2,700 acres via conservation easements last year, including the properties listed above and others previously announced here and here.
In addition to enacting and stewarding conservation easements, Upstate Forever works to further cooperative regional land protection by supporting conservation partners on projects that benefit the Upstate. In these instances, Upstate Forever does not take on a new conservation easement but provides other support integral to the effort’s success.
In 2025, these additional projects with conservation partners — including the SC Farm Bureau Land Trust, Upper Savannah Land Trust, Spartanburg Area Conservancy (SPACE), PAL: Play. Advocate. Live Well, and Conserving Carolina — comprised more than 2,500 additional protected acres across the region.
Since its founding in 1998, Upstate Forever has permanently protected nearly 44,000 acres through conservation easements and partner efforts across the ten-county Upstate region of Abbeville, Anderson, Cherokee, Greenville, Greenwood, Laurens, Oconee, Pickens, Spartanburg, and Union Counties and surrounding areas.
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