Patricia Otto, a longtime Whatcom County resident, has made local news for securing a Conservation Easement with Whatcom Land Trust to preserve 100 acres at Agate Pond Preserve, where she lives. Her decades of stewardship since 1988 have culminated in this development in March 2025.
“She has been living on and stewarding this property for about 40 years,” says Alex Jeffers, Conservation Director at Whatcom Land Trust. “And through that time, she’s really put a lot of effort into restoring and maintaining the habitat there. It’s been some pretty incredible transformation of what has taken place over the 40 years that she’s been there. In the mid-2000s, she worked with the City of Bellingham. This is in the Lake Whatcom watershed, part of the drinking water supply for over 100,000 people in our county. So the City of Bellingham put some moderately restrictive easements on the property that essentially removed some of the opportunities for it to be developed further in the future.”
Whatcom Land Trust stepped in to secure more binding easements, publishing their own article and video documenting the process.
“She was really starting to think about the legacy of the property and what she wanted that to look like in perpetuity, and wanted some more restrictive easements to really protect the habitat,” says Jeffers. “That’s where Whatcom Land Trust was able to come in and engage with her and figure out what we can do with easements to place those protections on the habitat.”
Establishing Agate Pond Preserve
The new easement protects native flora and fauna with bird boxes, replanted trees and shrubs, and restored wetlands.
“Patricia is a birder and has documented a huge array of birds that nest on the property,” says Jeffers. “Band-tailed pigeons are one: it’s sort of the western counterpart of the passenger pigeon that went extinct in the east. She gets a huge group of band-tailed pigeons every year. It’s pretty amazing, and I think the most iconic species that she has there, and the one that’s had the most dramatic impact on the property, is the beaver. She’s really made an intentional decision to live with the beavers and accommodate them, and it’s just created an amazing mosaic of forested wetlands and marsh out there. And then there’s the black bear and cougar.”
Thanks to Patricia Otto and volunteers, the Preserve is now one of the only places in Whatcom County to thoroughly remove invasive species such as Herb Robert and reed canary grass.
“We’re going to check on it every year,” says Jeffers. “We’re going to work with the landowners to make sure that all the terms of that easement are being upheld and the conservation values are being honored. That said, we don’t take an active role in management on our conservation easement. So that’s really where Patricia’s dedication to the property has been so astounding. She works with groups of people that she brings out to the property multiple times a week, every week, pulling out any invasive species.”
Whatcom Land Trust Handles Easements
The new Conservation Easement will protect Agate Pond Preserve forever.
“There were a lot of players to work through that and then make sure that it was right, that the language was accurate and reflective of both the goals of Patricia and the Land Trust,” says Jeffers.
As Jeffers explains, local projects like this support global efforts to protect public and private lands alike.
“People’s minds, when they’re thinking about these really big ecological and climate goals that we have as a society, jump to the public lands: the national parks, the national forests, and the state parks,” says Jeffers. “But in the end, if we’re going to really take seriously meeting those goals, we need to have the private lands be part of that conversation as well. And this shows how private landowners can take it upon themselves to care for their properties in a way that contributes to these larger goals. The Land Trust can step in as a partner to make sure that that work is preserved in perpetuity.”
Toward Preservation in Perpetuity
The new easement has widely received support from community members who know both Whatcom Land Trust and Patricia Otto.
“I’ve been having folks come up and saying how inspired they were by Patricia’s story and the work she’s done out there,” says Jeffers. “There’s been a number of folks that have sort of popped up, saying, like, ‘I met Patricia 20 years ago when she was helping with bird boxes on one of my properties.’ You could really see the impact that she’s had over a long time.”
Whatcom Land Trust, which has protected over 26,500 acres of land in the county, can continue its work with residents’ help.
“Folks can get involved as volunteers and donors to help support this work,” says Jeffers. “We’re a small community nonprofit, and our ability to do this kind of work and have the impact that we’re really hoping to have is tied to that community support.”
