Visitors enjoy views from the peaks. Photo: NCLC
North Coast
Conserving an Iconic Coastal Landscape
Sunrise breaks on steep peaks in the new Rainforest Reserve above Arch Cape and Oswald West State Park. Photo: Hailey Hoffman/The Astorian
Three-thousand-foot peaks rise from the dramatic coastline between Cannon Beach and Manzanita, overlooking biologically rich lands that are part of a new 3,500-acre conservation area established by North Coast Land Conservancy (NCLC) with the support of OCF and its donors.
The Rainforest Reserve is the culmination of NCLC’s five-year effort to raise $11.8 million to acquire the lands.
“We’re grateful to North Coast Land Conservancy, local communities, OCF donors, and everyone who rallied around this ambitious vision of sea-to-summit conservation. The Rainforest Reserve provides climate resilience to benefit people and place,” says Carlos Garcia, OCF’s program officer for environment.
The reserve will protect portions of the Angora Peak complex, Onion Peak and the Arch Cape Creek watershed —home to rare plants, mature forests, salmon-bearing streams and the headwaters that supply drinking water to coastal communities.
“One of the most incredible parts of this project, aside from the lands and waters themselves, is what a moving and hopeful experience it has been. More than 1,000 folks showed up to make this happen for Oregon and for the planet. I just want to say ‘thank you’ for making the future brighter for the next generation.”
KATIE VOELKE
EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, NORTH COAST LAND CONSERVANCY
Along with adjacent Oswald West State Park, Cape Falcon Marine Reserve and the proposed Arch Cape Forest, the reserve will form part of a 32-square-mile conservation corridor that connects near-shore habitats off Short Sand Beach with Angora and Onion peaks. These lands sustain a mosaic of plants and wildlife, including species that exist nowhere else.
OCF and its donors contributed nearly $1.2 million toward the Rainforest Reserve; this support included $500,000 from the Pacific Northwest Resilient Landscapes Initiative. Launched with support from the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, this initiative is a partnership among OCF, Idaho Community Foundation, Seattle Foundation and the Land Trust Alliance.
