When Wilderness Calls Us Together

A tract of land full of potential straddles the line between Madison and Clarke counties. A small creek flows across the gravel lane that leads down into the valley. The occasional grant spangled fritillary flits by, offering a promising introduction to the site’s 422 acres of woodland and remnant grassland. 

Angular, aloe-like leaves of rattlesnake master grow prodigiously. White blooms of whorled milkweed, with petals arranged like a skirt and bodice, and the light orange, domed flower clusters of butterfly milkweed spring up on the crest of a prairie hill. 

There are no roads through the landscape — the woodland and grassland seem to flourish unencumbered on rolling hills, extending to the horizon. Atop those hills, a person can look across fog settling over the vistas of Iowa in the early morning and encounter nature at its most inspiring.

“It’s a place that feels ancient and established,” said Abby Hade Terpstra, INHF’s Director of Philanthropy. “It’s an area of land that makes you think, ‘I don’t know what’s over the next hill’ — and that’s amazing.”

When the landowner decided in 2024 it was time to part ways with their recreational land, it was apparent it held potential as a future public area: valuable wildlife habitat; possibilities for a variety of outdoor activities; proximity to land already protected and open to the public. Suspecting that it might be of interest to INHF, his son reached out to relay that the land was for sale. 

The neighboring Heritage Hills Wildlife Management Area, a property Iowa Natural Heritage Foundation protected in 2016 and is now under the Iowa DNR’s ownership and management, creates a similar roadless, fenceless experience on its 1,021 acres. The two properties adjoin. Side-by-side they create almost 1,500 acres — a unique and varied landscape. An Iowa wilderness. Opportunities to protect such massive blocks of contiguous habitat in the heart of central Iowa are exceedingly rare. 

Just like Heritage Hills WMA, this new parcel is ripe with restoration potential. Because the soil remained largely undisturbed, seeds of prairie species that historically grew on its slopes are likely resting dormant beneath the earth. With the proper care and the right conditions, those seeds can grow again. 

Birders could hear the mechanical song of the Grasshopper Sparrow echoing over the remnant prairie or see the silhouette of the Purple Martin’s quick wings beating against the blue sky. Hunters could practice their sport, confident that the expansive habitat provides everything healthy deer, pheasant or quail populations need. Hikers could explore all day on the property’s boundless prairie or in its dense woodland. The opportunities are as open and endless as the land. In the digital age, people of Iowa are looking to get a little lost in nature. That can be hard to find, but this parcel abounds with those experiences.

As the conversation around the possibilities progressed, it became clear that there was room for a joint effort to secure it. Protecting and restoring the area was a large undertaking. INHF needed a partner — one with complementary strengths, the same level of dedication to habitat restoration and a deep belief in the value of wild spaces. 

Enter Pheasants Forever (PF) and a novel angle to our partnership. While the habitat organization’s local chapters are tremendous partners to INHF, rallying financial support for myriad previous projects, this was a new opportunity to work side by side with PF’s national presence. 

“We knew that Pheasants Forever had interest in seeing this land protected,” said Heather Jobst, INHF’s Senior Land Protection Facilitator, “so we reached out and through several conversations a new level of partnership was unlocked.” 

The organizations’ similar missions and shared values set the stage for a successful partnership that allowed each to lean into their skillset, unique audience and specialized communication channels. 

“It’s symbiosis,” explained Ross Baxter, INHF’s Senior Land Protection Director and Counsel. 

PF saw things similarly.

“As permanent habitat protection continues to grow in complexity and demands greater resources, partnerships and collaboration become even more critical to success than ever,” said Eric Sytsma, Habitat Protection Officer with PF. “This is a big step forward.”

Along with the collaborative opportunities created by the project, it was a chance for PF to honor longtime employee and dedicated conservationist Jim Wooley.

Wooley worked for Pheasants Forever and its sister organization, Quail Forever, for 31 years before retiring in 2016. PF hired Wooley, a DNR wildlife biologist, in 1985 as their first regional biologist shortly after the organization was founded. Wooley quickly made himself indispensable. During his career, Wooley started chapters across the country, fostered deep relationships with volunteers and partners, built PF’s National Food Plot Seed program and served as field operations director for Quail Forever when it launched. 

“His impact on our organization is hard to describe,” said Sytsma. “To honor someone like that you need a really special property.” 

PF feels they’ve found that property in this Madison and Clarke county project which, following the completion of the fundraising campaign, will be named the Jim Wooley Family Tract. 

Despite his achievements, Wooley likes to focus on PF’s work as a community effort.

“He’ll be the first to say it wasn’t just him,” said Sytsma.

True to Sytsma’s predictions, Jim Wooley said of the property, “I’m so deeply honored. And my family is deeply honored that [PF and INHF] chose to name [the Jim Wooley Family Tract] after me, but I’m very cognizant that I stand on a lot of shoulders here. Every Pheasants Forever volunteer, every member who came to a banquet and supported us, every professional agency that worked cooperatively with us. All those folks had a role in this too and I can’t tell you how much I appreciate that support.”

A mirror image of Wooley’s feelings about his career, the protection of the Jim Wooley Family Tract also stands on a lot of shoulders: donors, partners, volunteers.

Specifically, support from PF’s local and national membership has been instrumental to fundraising efforts. Together, INHF and PF set a goal of raising $500,000 through private donations. A significant portion of those funds have been contributed by local PF chapters through PF’s longstanding Build a Wildlife Area program. This program focuses on permanent habitat protection and public access, which Sytsma said often ranks as the primary concern when PF polls its national membership. 

This tremendous private donor support helps but is only a portion of the total project cost. To fully fund the acquisition, INHF and PF must work together to generate $3 million in grants and other funding. Currently, INHF and PF have met 90% of the $3 million dollar total. 

At time of publication, less than $300,000 is left to be raised. In its own way, this is again an example of how collaboration gets important work done. As work to meet the fundraising goal continues, it becomes apparent that projects like these depend on the enthusiastic support from donors and financial supporters as well as collaboration with partners.

“The Wooley Tract is a project that appeals to people who love Iowa’s outdoors in many different ways,” explains Terpstra. “Dark sky enthusiasts, birders, hikers, hunters, proponents of rewilding, prairie botanists, ecologists… Here is a way for all of us to bring our passions together to protect a place where nature thrives.”

The Jim Wooley Family Tract is a one-in-a-million project. The chance to permanently protect and open to the public a truly unique habitat situated next to the equally unique Heritage Hills WMA is the chance to do so much. It’s a chance to assure public access to outdoor recreation space. It’s a chance to oversee the long-term conservation of wildlife, diverse landscapes and rare remnant prairie. It conserves the “wildness” used to describe the property, but it’s hard to capture just how grand this place is.

Even Jim Wooley, with his more than three decades of doing work just like this, was at a loss for words. “Holy smokes! I don’t quite know how to describe it.” Then, Wooley found it. “There’s a long deep, central valley with tracts of grassland and timber rolling up both sides... it’s almost cathedral-like…and once that prairie is restored, it’ll really be something.” 

The Jim Wooley Family Tract gives a sense of being deep in nature. It’s a vast and natural terrain that Iowans don’t often find themselves in, and it speaks to an incredible human experience. 

“You don’t need a degree or a hunting background to understand the value of this property,” said Sytsma. “It’s timeless. Places like this are key to the quality of life for people here [in Iowa]. Places like this are why I do what I do for a living.” 

Places like the Jim Wooley Family Tract are why a lot of people do what they do — INHF and PF employees, volunteers, donors. Projects like these allow people who value habitat protection to come together in partnership (or stand on each other’s shoulders, as Jim Wooley might say). When that happens, massive undertakings that didn’t even seem possible at first become real, and wondrous, irreplaceable places like the Jim Wooley Family Tract can be protected. 

You can help!

INHF and PF still need to raise just shy of $100,000 in private donations to permanently protect the Jim Wooley Family Tract and work to transfer it to a public partner so it can be open for all to enjoy. Visit inhf.org/wooleytract for more information and to make a donation.