Tom and Jim Irwin protected their 158-acre family farm in Grass Lake in 2021 | Wikimedia Commons A historic barn on Michigan’s Old Mission Peninsula.
The farm had been in the Irwin family for more than 150 years, with Tom and Jim inheriting it in 2017. Their father had previously worked with Legacy Land Conservancy to protect another portion of the property through conservation easements between 2004 and 2008, and the brothers completed the new agreement with the Ann Arbor-based nonprofit on Earth Day in 2021, according to Legacy Land Conservancy’s announcement on April 26, 2021 .
A permanent conservation easement was placed by brothers Tom and Jim Irwin on their 158-acre family farm in Grass Lake, Michigan, in April 2021, which restricts the property from future development and keeps it together as farmland, forest, and wetlands, and fulfills a wish that their late father, Richard “Dick” Irwin, had already acted on during his lifetime.
A conservation easement is a legally binding agreement that places a limit on how land can be developed or used, and it can protect agricultural soil, wetlands, and other natural features without transferring ownership to a government agency or conservation group. The property remains privately owned under the Irwin agreement, but development that would potentially undermine its conservation value is restricted. Michigan’s Department of Agriculture and Rural Development explains that agricultural conservation easements can limit subdivision and other development while making sure that the land is under private ownership, and the restrictions are intended to preserve farmland and open space over the long term.
James Irwin, the brothers’ great-great-great-grandfather, purchased the first 80 acres of the estate in 1836, and the original deeds were signed by President Martin Van Buren on sheepskin, according to Legacy Land Conservancy. At its largest, the farm covered about 354 acres, and later passed through generations of the family. Dick Irwin arranged conservation protection for part of the land before his sons inherited the farm, with Tom and Jim then choosing to place the remaining 158-acre property under a new easement.
In comments published by Legacy, the brothers said that their father had taught them to leave the Earth in better condition for the next generation, and they said that the agreement put his values into practice and would keep the farm as one parcel that would extend beyond their lifetimes.
