Mill Branch Mitigation Bank Easement

Mill Branch Mitigation Bank Easement

Northwestern Denton County, Texas

Project Description:

The Mill Branch Mitigation Bank (MBMB) consists of 82.56 acres of land on a 748-acre cattle ranch in northwestern Denton County. The MBMB project will involve Riverbank Ecosystems (the mitigation bank “developer” as Third Party in the two easements) purchasing the developmental rights for the easement lands from the rancher Ricky Wilson, who is to be the Grantor. As part of the banking instrument with the US Army Corp of Engineers (USACE), Riverbank Ecosystems will be required to annually monitor the wetlands for at least 5 years or until the Performance Criteria are met. CCF will rely on these annual reports for qualitative and quantitative data concerning the mitigation status during the first 5 years, in addition to our performing at least one independent site visit each year to assure the organization and the USACE that stream development and site management activities are consistent with the easement language. Following the achievement of minimum success on the stream enhancement parcels, Riverbank Ecosystems will not be required to continue monitoring activities after minimum success is reached. At that time, Riverbank Ecosystems has completed their role in the mitigation project and is released for any other involvement in the lands. The rancher will take over management of the mitigation tracts along with his ranch tracts, and CCF will continue to perform at least one site visit each year with the generation of a monitoring report for submittal to the Grantor (the rancher) and possibly to the USACE as third-party enforcer. CCF should not be required to monitor the continued survival of the plantings for the USACE after the 5-year period.

The boundaries of these corridors will be fenced off to prevent grazing by cattle. There will be several cattle bridge crossings of the mitigation streams to allow for movement of the Grantor’s cattle between fields. Cattle are excluded from the mitigation stream corridors, and Riverbank is providing the Grantor with funds to purchase watering troughs in the cattle ranch for further ranching operations.

No educational or public recreational activities are being proposed for the site, but language will be included in conservation easement to allow for educational field trips.

Although not yet confirmed, it is Connemara’s intention to continue to work with the cattle rancher to later obtain a conservation easement over the remaining upland acreage within the 748-acre ranch.

Acreage:

The MBMB Project is actually two easements covering a combined 82.56 acres of land along the main stem and tributaries of Mill Branch and Cannon Creek. The total length of protected streams in the mitigation area is 17,812 linear feet. The main easement covers 81.53 acres of stream corridor in six easement tracts. Prior to the finalization of the mitigation bank through the USACE, a debtor project was approved by them which would require 1.03 acres of mitigation credits. The USACE allowed for those credits to be purchased from Riverbank Ecosystems. The 1.03 acres of stream corridor is designated as a separate easement tract in the Project (Tract 7), so a second conservation easement was established over that tract. The boundaries of the linear corridors along the mitigation stream extend out about 65 feet from the original channel top of bank. These protected tracts along the stream reaches are approximately 160 feet in width.