"It's all about co-creation."

Meredith Hill spent fifteen years at Pennsylvania's Department of Conservation and Natural Resources managing the Conservation Landscape Program before her recent retirement. She believes that no agency, no organization, no community can accomplish conservation at scale alone.

Today, Meredith joins our host Marci Mowery to discuss a program that has quietly reshaped how Pennsylvania thinks about land, community, and the relationship between the two.

Born out of a visionary leader's statewide listening tour in the early 2000s, the program designated eight multi-county regions across Pennsylvania, each united by shared values but driven by the distinct needs of its place.

In the Wilds, the priority was building a sustainable outdoor recreation economy around vast public lands to revitalize rural communities. In the Lehigh Valley, it was stitching green corridors together before open space disappeared forever.

The program is driven, says Meredith, by trust. After all, it takes years to build, and it requires DCNR staff to step outside their bureaus and work shoulder to shoulder with local partners.

Trust, in turn, produces the remarkable. Think of a network of local artisans selling handmade goods in state park shops; county planners meeting every other month for nearly two decades; communities like Galeton intentionally dimming their streetlights to protect a night sky that draws stargazers from across the world!

Key Topics:

• What Is the Conservation Landscape Program? (01:42)
• Pennsylvania's Eight Landscapes (03:31)
• Building Trust Across Diverse Partners (11:25)
• The PA Wilds Cooperative: Artisans, Entrepreneurs, and Local Business (14:53)
• One Experience Every Pennsylvanian Should Have: Dark Skies (23:16)
• Pennsylvania as a Model for Other States (26:30)
• Measuring Progress Over Twenty Years (28:30)
• Why Conservation Landscapes Matter (31:08)
• Agriculture, Solar, and the Hard Conversations (35:08)

Resources:

• Conservation Landscapes: https://www.pa.gov/agencies/dcnr/programs-and-services/community-outreach-and-development/conservation-landscapes
• Kinzua Bridge State Park: https://www.pa.gov/agencies/dcnr/recreation/where-to-go/state-parks/find-a-park/kinzua-bridge-state-park
• Cherry Spring State Park: https://www.pa.gov/agencies/dcnr/recreation/where-to-go/state-parks/find-a-park/cherry-springs-state-park
• Keeping Dark Skies Dark: https://paparksandforests.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/02/keep-the-dark-skies-dark.pdf

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It takes time to build trust. These things do not happen overnight, and because it's a collaboration, because it's working with partners, you're building relationship. I mean, that's really what it is all about. And I think, and Mike DeBeritinis, as I referenced earlier, he understood the importance of this. He understood that we needed to have DCNR staff who were willing to be on the ground working side by side with partners spending the time to build relationships to build that trust.

Imagine a place where stress fades, fresh air fills your lungs, and adventure waits around every corner. Welcome to Think Outside, the podcast that inspires you to explore, connect, and embrace the outdoors. Welcome to Think Outside with the Pennsylvania Parks and Forest Foundation. I'm your host, Marcie Mowry, and today I'm joined by Meredith Hill, who recently retired from the Department of Conservation and Natural Resources, where she managed the Conservation Landscape Program for the past 15 years. Meredith, thank you for joining us. Thank you, Marcy. I'm glad to be here. Yeah, I'm really looking forward to taking a dive with you to better understand the conservation landscape program and what this means for Pennsylvania. So, could you start by helping our listeners who may be unfamiliar with the concept of a conservation landscape understand what it is and why DCNR created that model.

Okay, sure. The Conservation Landscape Program is an innovative approach that the agency launched about 20 years ago, and it was a way for us to engage in a region, in a multi-county region, and these eight areas that have been designated across the state have a sense of place, they have natural, cultural, recreational assets, and they are defined by the region itself. It's a program that allows DCNR to move outside of our silos, so as you know, in DCNR we have a number of bureaus, we have the Bureau of State Parks, we have the Bureau of Forestry, the Bureau of Recreation and Conservation, and they are all doing wonderful things in their organizations, but what was realized a number of years ago by a visionary leader at DCNR, some of you may remember Mike DeBaradinis. He came into the agency, and he went around the state, and he asked people, what can we be doing as an agency? Where should we be focusing? And he heard time and time again that there was value in us taking a regional approach, a landscape scale approach, where our different bureaus could work together in a place, bringing their expertise to bear in a region, but not on our own, for us to work collaboratively with partners to create a shared strategy around conservation and shared values and goals around conservation, outdoor recreation, its connection to community revitalization. So he began to envision this program as a way to do that, and we began with the selection of these different eight landscapes, and they came about because there was interest by partners, or those particular issue that was facing a region that partners said we need to work together on this to make accomplish, or to accomplish goals in conservation that we don't think we can do by ourselves, so the program was born, and it has now been operating since about 2003 or four in eight places across the state. We have the Pennsylvania Wilds Conservation Landscape, that is the largest geographically, that covers 13 counties in north central northwestern Pennsylvania. There's a Laurel Highlands conservation landscape that is in the southwestern part of the state. One of its primary features, the Great Allegheny Passage, that you might be familiar with, that runs the length of that landscape. There's a South Mountain conservation landscape, the South Mountain Partnership, that's doing great work in south central Pennsylvania, Susquehanna River lands, that includes York and Lancaster counties. Moving further east, there's a Schuylkill Highlands conservation landscape in the northeast there. The Pocono forest and waters landscape, and the Kittatinny Ridge landscape, and that is a long linear corridor, a very important landscape that follows the Kittatinny Ridge mountain range in Pennsylvania.

Excellent, I love the idea of working collaboratively and forming partnerships. These are very geographically dispersed landscapes. What unites them, and what unites them to make them part of the statewide effort, but what makes them unique as well?

I think what unites them is a common vision to what the landscape partners are trying to accomplish, right? They're all looking at working together collaboratively around conservation outdoor recreation, but that looks different in different places. I think one of the landscapes that maybe I forgot was the Lehigh Valley Greenways. They are in the very eastern part of the state, as many of you know, the Lehigh Valley, but what they're facing is loss of open space, and so they rallied around the concept of how do we make connections between our conservation lands, between green space in in our region, so that was a defining feature for them, so that became very important to their landscape. That's not happening in the Pennsylvania Wilds, for example, right? The Pennsylvania Wilds is a landscape that's characterized by most of the state forest land that we actually have in Pennsylvania, amazing outdoor recreation assets, so much open space and public land that it just, there are different issues there that call, and those partners came together around the understanding, for example, that in that very rural part of the state there are these rural communities are struggling, and the public lands in many ways are an incredible asset to them, that they can build an outdoor recreation economy based upon those public lands that in turn help those communities from an economic viability point of view, for a quality of life point of view, but really the revitalization effort through the concept of sustainable outdoor recreation tourism. There,

well, it sounds like success then looks very different for each landscape based upon the

goals of the partners and the needs of place. That is accurate, I think that's right, Marcy. Each place is different. There are some commonalities that we like to track across each landscape, so as a result of the efforts of the landscape partners, how much land is being conserved that was not before? Are there new trails that are now coming into being in that region because of the efforts of the partners in the region partnerships, what are the partnerships that have now formed, and what do we see coming from that? So, there are some metrics that we track in that way. I would say sort of quantitative metrics, but I think the real story is the qualitative, which are the stories that come out of it. It's very hard to quantify collaboration. What does that look like? I think what we're seeing in this program is that some really big projects are able to happen because all of these partners are coming together. DCNR is bringing its resources to bear and collaboratively and strategically able to move big projects where they weren't able to before, and I talk about large trail projects like the Link Trail System, the Delaware and Lehigh Trail Corridor, Free Allegheny Passage. Some of these projects that they're difficult to lift individually when you step back and you bring partners together across this large area that involves those assets, you can see how you can make a difference.

Well, that kind of fed into my next question, thinking about an example of a partnership, whether it's local government, nonprofit, business, or volunteers, that demonstrates the power of this landscape approach. Do you have a particular example that you could share with the listeners?

Well, the landscape that I'm most familiar with, because I worked very specifically with them, is the Pennsylvania Wilds Conservation Landscape, and I'll just say that in DCNR we have a staff person that's connected to each of those landscapes that then works with an organizational nonprofit partner in that region to together collaboratively convene the work, bring partners together to accomplish an annual work plan, and so I was most connected to the Pennsylvania Wilds landscape specifically, as well as as directing the overall program. And in the Pennsylvania wilds, I mean, you know, 13 counties, it's a huge landscape, and so many different partners, it's very rural, I mean, it takes four hours to get from one side of the of the region to the other, and very early on, what was identified, and this was identified by local partners, was the important role of planners, and you can't create a sustainable tourism initiative and really look at bringing the value of the public lands to gateway communities and collaborating around that if you don't have good planning in place that you're not thinking long term, and so they created what was called the Pennsylvania Wilds Planning Team, and that was supported through state funding from both DCNR and also the Department of Community and Economic Development to get all of the county planners in that 30 count 13 county region together to say, How do we look at planning issues here? How do we get ready for this from a planning point of view, and this is a very important component of this landscape work, and so this Pennsylvania Wilds planning team was formed in about 2005 They've been meeting every other month since that time to really move forward important planning issues that are fundamental to making a region a sustainable outdoor recreation destination.

Well, it sounds like it would be challenging to build trust across diverse partners. We all bring different priorities to a table, and would imagine those regular meetings are very helpful for that. But are there other ways that in these landscapes you're building trust among people with variety of goals,

I would say that that's probably the most important aspect of the concentration landscape program, and the one that I think is underappreciated, in terms of it takes time to build trust. These things do not happen overnight, and because it's a collaboration, because it's working with partners, you're building relationship. I mean, that's really what it is all about. And I think, and Mike DeBaradines, as I referenced earlier, he understood the importance of this. He understood that we needed to have DCNR staff who were willing to be on the ground, working side by side with partners, spending the time to build relationships to build that trust, and also for DCNR to put its money where its mouth is. We are very fortunate in Pennsylvania to have a grants program that can support partnerships, so there is a significant slug of grant funding that we are able to dedicate to our nonprofit partners that are working with us in these different landscapes, so bringing capacity building funding to the convening of these different landscape initiatives was very important. It continues to be something that sustains the program today, and also making strategic investments in our facilities, because they, in turn, are economic engines for these gateway communities, whether it's through our c2 p2 grant program, being able to provide funding for for trail projects, for river access projects, for feasibility studies, or planning for local acquisition projects, it helps the community advance their vision in the landscape, in terms of out the recreation and conservation. We are able to dedicate funds to do that, and I think stepping up and strategically providing those funds is another way that you build trust and build partnership and relationship.

Thank you. I think about one of the projects in the Pennsylvania Wilds that I've seen evolve over time, and with, you know, the Wild's involvement with investment by DCNR is Kinzuo Bridge, taking the bridge and putting in the observation platform, the restoration of, or the creation of the visitor center. And the last time I was there, I ran into a visitor that had come from South Carolina, because this had been - it was a destination for him. He had read about it, he was very intrigued by it, which you know that visitor to that local economy is bringing with him. In this case, it was a him resources. He's he's not going home from back to South Carolina that day. He's he's staying, he's visiting, he's eating, so he's investing in those local economies, which is one of the things we often talk about, is the benefits, one of the benefits of outdoor recreation is it helps you mentioned the gateway, you know, these communities at the entrances of parks or forest. It helps these communities to thrive

well in each of the landscapes, and particularly at Pennsylvania Wilds, our DCNR facilities, like our state parks, like you referenced. Can see bridge tape parks, I mean, they are the hub, they are in a way like the draw that get people potentially to the region, the Pennsylvania Wilds. We have a number of those that have been called out because the idea was to create sort of a patchwork quilt of these incredible destinations within the region to really engender people wanting to come and spend not one night but two nights, but maybe have their whole week long vacation for the year be in the Pennsylvania Wilds in that region, and so us making the investments, I mean, we put probably $12 million into Kinsey Bridge State Park, in both the Skywalk viewing platform that you referenced, and also this, the whole visitor center that's there, that interprets that place, that talks about what's so special about that railroad viaduct that crossed the Kinzua Valley there. So it's very important that we are able to make those kind of strategic investments, and then you know, so what does it mean to local businesses and local communities, well, Pennsylvania Wilds, one of their initiatives has been to create a whole network of entrepreneurs and small businesses that are connected to be able to provide the types of services, the types of amenities and products that people that visit the region are interested in, so it's known as the Pennsylvania Wilds Cooperative, but it has been able to create conservation shops. These are shops that are run by the PA Wild Center for Entrepreneurship. They are located at some of our state parks in the region, but it provides a place for 90% of the products there at that gift shop that they sell are actually created by people that live in the region, different artisans, different makers, so it's opening up a whole economic opportunity for these types of small businesses and producers that they can now get their product to now see real economic value from all of these visitors that are coming, because we all know, as we come to a place and we're interested in a place, you want to take home something special in terms of a souvenir, not something that's made elsewhere, not something that's really not authentic to the region, but something that you know was made here and is part of the place, and tells a story about the people that live in the place and that are inspired by the public lands to create beautiful art and beautiful products for sale, so you know that's one of the elements of that landscape that's quite successful, but our state parks are in a way the gateway to that kind of opportunity and market opportunity for local producers.

I love that. I was also, as you were wrapping up, I was thinking about a lot of these areas also have craft beverages. I was thinking, like, South Mountain part down in South Mountain with a South Mountain Partnership. There are cideries and wineries and breweries that are capitalizing and benefiting from being part of this landscape and this concentrated effort to market place,

that's right, marketplace, and what's unique and special about that place, and in a way the conservation landscape partners help develop that experience. What does that experience look like in that landscape, and then be able to share that with people, so that they're excited about visiting, and all of those that make a visitor's experience rich and fun. They're all part of the mix when you're talking about inviting people to come to your special place to see what's so unique and wonderful about it, whether it's natural resources or it's on the creative and cultural side, or craft beverages, and those kinds of things that go along with what visitors are interested

in. We had had a conversation with Rob over at Jacobsburg Environmental Education Center, and he shared that

one of the ways they felt that they had succeeded was with the Greenway. They had somebody that one of the local bicycle shops was finding that he was selling a lot of baskets, and they realized that people, the local community members, were utilizing the trail to do their errands, and they were putting the baskets on their bikes to be able to visit these, the farmers market, you know, the local businesses, and they were doing their errands via the trail, and they felt that that was a real sign of success. Yeah, absolutely. There are all kinds of really interesting approaches and stories and successes in each of the landscapes. We do have a conservation landscape story map that's available online, if you want to delve a little bit more into each of the landscapes and understanding what they're doing about really innovative and different approaches, and it's all about co-creation, it's all about in that place what the partners, whether they be in the public sector. Or the private sector, the nonprofit sector, different ideas they have, and how you can co-create really some amazing outcomes by working together around these shared values of conservation and outdoor recreation, and what that means for a community,

and I love what it's role modeling, working cooperatively, as opposed to working against one another, or working competitively.

Absolutely, it just, and that I think is the real aha and takeaway for me is just what has been accomplished, because that approach has been taken, and it's not without challenge, because you know we're talking about relationships, and you know, sometimes there's conflict, but I think often that really helps expand sort of the mindset around the different, the different voices that aren't being heard, or different projects that are important to step back and think a little bit more. It's just important to think about having everybody at the table, and what they bring to the table to the overall benefit of the landscape.

You mentioned people that may not have been heard. How is there a way that you're ensuring that voices are heard, and that there's equitable access to outdoors and to some of these landscape features that you're sharing with us.

Well, I'd say in every landscape it really is an important component of their work. So, DC and R, as you know, has diversity, equity, and inclusion initiative. We're doing a lot of different work in that arena with different partners, whether it's untold stories, just making sure that people feel welcome when they come to our spaces, and it's something that we bring to the table to the landscape conversation to be incorporated into the overall strategy that that landscape might be undertaking, so it looks, it looks different, and may look very different in different places. Maybe looking at outdoor recreation assets, and can everyone have an enriching experience, and have access to the different things that we have in our parks and forests. So, you know, I think it is a component of every landscape's work. It just may look a little bit different from landscape to landscape. I know in the Pennsylvania Wilds, they look - they just did a project in Blackmore Shannon State Park, and I think some of your listeners, Pennsylvania Parks and Forest Foundation, are aware of the work that you do around inclusive environments and experiences, and so there they installed viewfinders that allow people that are colorblind to actually see the beauty and the color within nature, and I think PPFF has taken that to the next level as well, with I think now goggles, goggles that you can, that people can use to experience that, so it's just, and these different, they look different from one landscape to the next, because there are different things that come up, and people say, oh, this is an opportunity, let's go with this.

I love that. Is there a project or place within one of the landscapes that you wish every Pennsylvanian could experience?

There are so many, but the one that I will say, and, of course, as I referenced, you know, my, my connection to the Pennsylvania Wilds, it's got to be the dark skies, whether it's Cherry Spring State Park, that's specifically designed for someone to have an experience with the night sky, or it's some of our other parks in the region, because it's not a very populated region, you don't have a lot of ambient light, so you have can have a wonderful experience to view the night sky, and I think there are a lot of people that have never seen, truly seen the night sky, whether it be the Milky Way or the constellations, or yes, now the varying satellites that are transversing the night sky, but it can be a really sort of transformative experience for people, and I know at Cherry Springs, in particular, people come from all over the world to see that night sky there. It's set up particularly for incredible viewing of the night sky, and DCNR is able to facilitate that with educational programs, and so forth, but we see a lot of people coming from the East, from from Asian countries that don't, can't see the night sky, but they very much revere the night sky, and so it's really quite an experience for them, but they're coming all the way across the world to have that experience, but does it need to be someone from that far away? Any of us can experience it, but Cherry Springs and the dark skies of the Pennsylvania Wilds are at the top of the list for me.

Well, and. Cherry Springs receives a lot of visitors, but it's an Emporium. Just recently opened a dark sky area, so there are opportunities for viewing dark skies in Pennsylvania. Yeah,

all, and Terry Springs, in a way, led the way in that, because people realizing that we can do this in other places, and communities like Emporium are saying we can do this too, and so they now are establishing a small dark sky park on some of their county park land,

but I think one of the benefits of that, just as with a little digression, is that

in order to keep the dark skies dark, local communities are looking at their lighting, and that not only benefits the skies but it also benefits creatures that function in the night, it benefits bird migration, so there's there's other benefits outside of that, that attraction of the dark sky that absolutely is true, 100% And Potter County, which is the county where Cherry Spring State Park is located, the one of the little gateway communities is the borough of Galton, and they have very intentionally made dark sky lighting in their community paramount because they know that that is directly related to preserving the dark sky resource that we have at Cherry Springs and in that area

and we'll include in the links we PPFF today an infographic on how to be a good visitor to a space with the dark sky, so that you don't adversely impact the experience for other people.

What have you learned from your 15 years in the conservation landscapes that could benefit other states or regions, or even communities that want to look at a community-wide approach to thinking about their planning and their connection to culture, recreation, and the arts, and building a sense of place. We do see there, there are other landscape scale programs around the nation and the world. Mostly, we see that they are very focused on ecological aspects of landscape scale conservation, which are very, very important, but they don't necessarily take the next step to look at how it connects to community, and so I think our program in Pennsylvania ties these different things together, and really takes a more holistic approach. Ecological, the environmental aspects of landscape skill conservation are part of it, but it's also looking at what that means to community and what that means to community revitalization, what that means to local land use issues and different issues that are part and parcel of a place. I think we recognize that in exclusion, you can't just take one of those elements in exclusion and expect maybe to get as much success as if you weave them together and all of those come together in a landscape strategy. So I would say that it's it really is the fact that we have brought those different issues together in one sort of strategic strategy that has made it sort of stand out, and we had people say to us, this is really unique in Pennsylvania, the approach that you're taking and have looked at it as models for elsewhere, and we're, we take real pride in that,

as you should. I think you've done an incredible job,

and you, you talked about success, which leads me to the question of how do you measure success, or how do you measure progress when this is this isn't something that's it's a one year project, you've been doing it for 15 years. The program has been in existence for about 20 years. How do you measure progress when the work spans that many years and that many partners, and that in some cases some very large landscapes or very linear landscapes? Well, it's very challenging, and I will say it's an area of the program that we are really specifically being focused on because we're not sure we're doing it very well. How you communicate this to people, it's it means different things to different people, right? Because it is so interconnected with all these different aspects. So I think that's why we come back to how do you tell the story, the story of the place, the story of what's significant about that place, and what's significant about some of the challenges and conservation challenges of that place? And then talk about the work of the collaborative in that place, what has been able to be achieved. We'll say the South Mountain Partnership, the South Mountain Landscape has done a tremendous job in this regard. They established a state of the region project that tracked dozens of metrics to look at really the viability. And the state of their region, when it comes to different things, land use, cultural aspects, a whole host of things, they have really, I think, landed on something that's important, and they're there, I think they're providing a vision for other landscapes to look at. So, what, what is success here? What are we trying to measure here in this landscape? It could vary a little bit from landscape to landscape, and what do we see happening? And then be diligent about setting that in place and tracking it from year to year to year. So I would, anybody that wants to really understand that in detail, to look into the South Mountain Partnership, their state of the region report, and what's come out of that, because they have been able to show tremendous successes across a whole number of aspects in their landscape.

Yeah, I'd forgotten about that report. PPF is a member of the South Mountain Landscape, and totally forgotten about that. To look at that again. Thank you for that reminder. So, as we're wrapping up, why do you think conservation landscapes matter?

Well, we've touched on this a little bit. I think it matters because it's having an impact on in so many different ways. I'd say number one at DCNR, it's had a huge impact because it's helped our own staff have a way to interact differently with partners in a place in a region, not just in their state park, or not just in their state forest, or their particular grant region, but as part of a strategic initiative with partners, and so it really allows them to move outside their silos and to share their expertise, so that's been a real change, I think, within our agency, and how it's been a value for our own staff, and for staff development, and staff engagement with our partners. I'd say the other aspects of the initiative, because it is so broad, and it can take in so many different disciplines, whether it's how does a trail fit into community revitalization, or how do we lift up our local businesses and and producers and artisans. You know, there's places for all aspects of society and partners to engage, so I think that's opened the door for a really rich and robust conversation among so many different partners and sectors, and I think that's the real

value of the program. So, I guess that's that's what I would say, and that made me think, I mean, you had mentioned it earlier, that when you're bringing all these partners together, you are identifying where there might be holes, and that is is an entryway for an entrepreneur to look at what can I do. I love where I live, and how do I help fill this hole, and that could be a new business or a new new opportunity, and a new economic engine for a location, I

think that's right. I think it's an entry point for a lot of people with a lot of different interests in terms of outdoor recreation and conservation and revitalization of the place that they live, and one element that I didn't mention that I think is important in a number of landscapes, probably all of them to a certain degree, but we were talking about South Mountain, and that's a region that it's the fruit belt of the state, that's where we have incredible agricultural, cultural, and heritage and production, and you know, through the initiative, we've also been able to bring in other state agency partners, so the Department of Agriculture has also been a partner with us in that, and they engage, so I think the program also allows DCNR to help facilitate engagement of their state agencies in the work, and in the Pennsylvania Wilds, you know, one of those agencies has been the Department of Community Economic Development, whether it's be them from a point of view of tourism, their tourism programs, their business support programs, their local government planning skill set that they bring, but to be able to leverage the resources of other state agencies, I do think is another sort of hallmark of and success of this program,

and I'm so glad you mentioned that, because agriculture is also a sense of place. It's also the legacy of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, and in order for lands to remain in agriculture, they have to be viable. There needs to be a market for what's being produced, and these landscapes have helped to find other markets, make these lands so that they are places that are protected, or where it's you can make a living being a farmer, or working in agriculture, or raising crops, running an orchard, or you know, raising a specialty crop for a particular niche product, and so that really is another thing that preserves this legacy. University of Pennsylvania, which is our outdoors, our agriculture, our arts, right, all coming together

now. And what are some of the issues that face some of these industries, like agriculture in the South Mountain landscape? They've taken a lead on looking at solar farms, because that has, from a land use point of view that has has had an impact on agricultural lands within their particular landscape,

meaning utilizing their lands for solar arrays and using that as part of their way to make farming economical,

part of that, but having it done in a way that does not degrade the agricultural farmlands and benefits to the region, and I think in the Pennsylvania Wilds, one of the things that we struggle with is that so much of that land is forested, there are indeed places where and private lands that are being sold for solar development, but then the mature tree stand that has been there is removed to put in solar. Now that's a question, that's, you know, is that a good land use decision? We don't need to go down that

quandary, we call that to go down that road, but that

gives you a sense too, that's a conversation then within our conservation landscape team, and and work about what you know, what does that mean, and so you know you can get into all these different types of conversations, but the importance is that we have people around the table from all these different sectors and disciplines to be talking about this and moving forward something to benefit that that place and that landscape,

and it's so much easier to have a conversation when you have a relationship, and I think you stressed that in the very beginning, this was about forming relationships.

Exactly. Excellent. Well, Meredith, is there anything that you would like to add as we start to wrap up? I would just say, you know, if you're interested in learning more about the different conservation landscapes we have in Pennsylvania, I referenced that on the DCNR website. We do have a story map that you could go through each of the landscapes and and talks in detail and shows a map of the whole area for each of the landscapes, I would say take a look at that, and if you do live in one of the landscapes, please reach out if you want to be involved, reach out and join the conversation,

and I will add that link in the show notes, so people can find it. Meredith, thank you for coming out of retirement today to have a conversation. I really appreciate the expertise that you have on this topic on conservation landscapes and your passion for the work that you've done, and particularly your work with the Pennsylvania Wild. So, thank you very much for joining me.

Thank you, Marcy. It's been a pleasure. Thank

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