Mohawk Hudson Land Conservancy Conservation Easement

The Heldeberg Workshop has  partnered with the Mohawk Hudson Land Conservancy (MHLC) to permanently protect the Heldeberg Workshop lands from development.

The Conservancy has been working to preserve the lands of the Heldeberg Escarpment by creating a protected corridor linking the lands and wetlands beneath the escarpment from Indian Ladder Farms to Thacher State Park and beyond. The 240-acre Heldeberg Workshop land is the largest unprotected property immediately below Thacher Park and provides a key connection in creating a conservation corridor of nearly 3,500 acres.

Our Workshop property is well known for its natural resource values that make the Heldeberg Escarpment so ecologically and geologically significant. These include:

    • rich fossil deposits, more than 60% of New York’s amphibian species, at least 13 bird species listed as New York Species of Greatest Conservation Need, plus large flocks of spring and fall migrants;
    • Vly Swamp, located at the base of our Workshop lands, has been identified as a biodiversity “hotspot,” with records of many other animals and plants of conservation concern, and;
    • limestone cliffs, boulders, and talus, which are present at the higher elevations of our Workshop lands, and which provide habitat for a variety of rare and unusual species of flora and fauna, including the endangered Indiana Bat.

~Alvin Breisch, Heldeberg Workshop Board Chairman