Community Corner

State Officially Adds Mason Property to its Open Space Rolls

The land off Reservoir Road totals 449 acres.

Open space.

It's the final frontier in these parts, according to Connecticut Department of Energy and Environmental Protection Commissioner Dan Esty.

That's why he made such a big deal on Friday in announcing that the  acquisition of a 449-acre parcel of land off Reservoir Road had been finalized.

The former Mason family property "preserves an ecologically intact and environmentally sensitive watershed in Vernon, and expands the range of protected lands in the area," he said.

The 449-acre property, now known as Tankerhoosen Wildlife Management Area, was purchased by the DEEP from Tancanhoosen LLC, for $2,965,000.

Tancanhoosen LLC is comprised of 18 family members of the extended Mason family, originally from Vernon. Most family members now live throughout the United States, but Tom and Susan Mason still live in Vernon. The Mason Family owned the land for more than a century.

"The land has circled back to the original vision of the Mason and Belding families," Tom Mason said at the ceremony.

The land is located adjacent to and upstream of the 282-acre Belding Wildlife Management Area that was donated to the state by Max Belding in 1981. The new Tankerhoosen WMA ensures protection of much of the watershed and the entire riparian zone for a stretch of the Tankerhoosen River of more than 2.5 miles, downstream of the Walker Reservoir, DEEP officials said.

“The land we are protecting today is one of the largest and most significant open space preservations in Connecticut history, funded, in its entirety, by the state’s Recreation and Natural Heritage Trust Program,” said Dan Esty, Commissioner of the CT DEEP. “The Tankerhoosen Wildlife Management Area supports high densities of catchable size brown and brook trout in the Tankerhoosen River and many species of birds, invertebrates, and reptiles in need of protection.”

Vernon Mayor George Apel said the Mason property is "one of Vernon's most beautiful locations." Apel publicly thanked the Mason family for its continuous upkeep of the land. So did state officials.

Esty said the acquisition doubles the size of the Wild Trout Management Area, Esty said. The corridor includes the Belding WMA and also Valley Falls Park in Vernon, Bolton Notch State Park and the Northern Connecticut Land Trust property.

The wildlife corridor contains a large number of species and habitats considered of greatest conservation need, DEEP officials said. 

Species the open space land will help protect include the eastern box turtle, cerulean warbler and brook trout, officials said. A section of the property that was a former gravel pit will now provide protection for the brown thrasher, field sparrow and prairie warbler, official said.

The land will also provide a habitat for rare invertebrates, according to environmental officials.

Since the Open Space and Watershed Grant program began in 1998, the state has provided $102,517,477 in grants to assist with the purchase of about 380 properties, preserving 67,000 acres in 125 communities. The acres are part of the estimated 238,778 acres of protected land owned by municipalities, conservation organizations and water companies.


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