The North Florida Land Trust (NFLT) has acquired a notable chunk of property that will be made into a conservation area in St. Johns County.
Ring Power, a Cat heavy equipment dealer in Florida, donated more than 1,700 acres in a conservation easement to the NFLT. The property is in western St. Johns County near the Shands Bridge that crosses the St. Johns River into Clay County.
The donation encompasses an area known as DeerCreek Plantation. It’s adjacent to some areas of another preserved stretch of land, the Jack Wright Island Conservation Area. The DeerCreek tract of land more than triples the mass of property at the Wright preserve.
The Ring Power owners — Randy Ringhaver, Paula Ringhaver, David Alban and Bree Alban — facilitated the donation. The DeerCreek property lies within the NFLT springs, aquifer recharge and water quality improvement preservation priority area. It’s also within the St. Johns River Blueway Florida Forever area.
“This generous donation is a major win for conservation in St. Johns County, which just continues to grow,” said Allison DeFoor, President and CEO of NFLT. “We are grateful to the Ringhaver family for recognizing the importance of saving this natural space because it is now or never.”
St. Johns County is one of the fastest-growing counties in Florida. Multiple housing developments have been erected in St. Johns County near the DeerCreek tract in the past two decades.
Randy Ringhaver said his family bought several tracts of the remaining wilderness beyond the easement they are donating to stave off the rush of development.
“A close friend once said some things are worth more than they can be sold for and that is exactly how we feel about DeerCreek,” said Randy Ringhaver, whose family will still have access to the property to organize quail hunting outings.
The NFLT was founded in 1999 as a nonprofit environmental and land conservation organization. It has been productive in the past year in terms of land acquisitions, adding thousands of acres to what’s called the Ocala to Osceola (O2O) wildlife corridor and the Florida Wildlife Corridor, which run through several counties.
