The Spring 2013 newsletter of the Finger Lakes Land Trust, Paisley had bought 128 acres of forests, fields and wetlands in the town of Richford in Tioga County, New York, according to The Land Steward. When life doesn’t give you time to breathe, you tend to look out for space to do the same yourself, deliberately. For Jeanne Paisley, a schoolteacher with three kids and a half-hour daily commute, there was a consistent wish for some room to breathe.
About 40 years later, at the age of 86, Paisley still continued to reside on the land. In a 2019 review published in Science Advances, Gregory Bratman and his co-authors summarise research related to nature and its impacts on mental health.
Andy Zepp, executive director of the Land Trust, said she and her family helped expand a network of protected lands in her Southern Tier neighbourhood. She had placed a conservation easement on her property with the Finger Lakes Land Trust. A conservation easement is an agreement that restricts the manner in which the land will be developed in the future. Her property joins several nearby protected areas, including multiple state forests, the Land Trust’s King Nature Preserve, and another conservation easement. Time spent in nature, the researchers argue, is linked with better well-being, better sleep, and lower stress. Many of the findings show links, not proof. Experiments suggest a short time in nature can brighten mood, but it is less clear whether that builds long-term mental health. The paper also lists water purification as one example of the benefits ecosystems provide, echoing Diaz’s point about water quality at Owego Creek.