Private land plays a crucial role in the conservation of biodiversity in California, yet these lands are the least protected and most prone to environmental degradation. In 1930, Aldo Leopold recognized the potential to better conserve private land by an incentive scheme where recreational users would pay landowners for access to conserved wildlife habitat. While research has shown that significant funds are spent to utilize large areas of private land for wildlife-associated recreation, this study seeks to specifically understand whether this recreational use actually results in improved conservation practices. I use interviews with landowners to evaluate their motivations for management activities and determine whether those landowners with recreational utilization modify other land use activities or perform particular practices to enhance habitat conservation. Particular attention will be paid to government incentive programs such as California's Private Lands Management (PLM) program.
Oral presentation and poster titles, abstracts, and authors from the Society for Range Management (SRM) Annual Meetings and Tradeshows, from 2013 forward.