Nature Conservancy Chapter Puts Gift Toward 1,100 Acres of Prime Habitat $1.8M for Beloved Loons is Bemidji Native’s Legacy
By Tad Vezner, Pioneer Press, St. Paul, Minn.
Apr. 1–Nature Conservancy chapter puts gift toward 1,100 acres of prime habitat $1.8M for beloved loons is Bemidji native’s legacy — Iva Weir gave her life savings for the loon.
After growing up in Bemidji, Minn., and moving to Oregon in her 20s, she lived in a tent while building her home in the woods and worked as an elementary school teacher. She died two years ago at 85.
Through investments and frugality, she squirreled away some $2 million. The bulk of it — $1.8 million — she left for the preservation of Minnesota’s state bird, even though she returned home to see it only occasionally.
“She always talked about Minnesota. Those were the happiest days of her life. She just loved the lakes — and the loons, of course,” said Pat Blair, Weir’s neighbor and caregiver in Corvallis, Ore.
“She was just an institution. She built her house, planted all her trees, chopped her own wood. Had a stroke while planting a tree . … She died eventually from that.”
The Minnesota office of the Nature Conservancy, a national nonprofit organization dedicated to preserving unique and endangered habitats, received the donation. The organization has since used much of it to buy 1,100 acres of prime loon nesting habitat in two separate conservation areas in central Minnesota.
“It’s the largest bequest I can remember to the state organization,” Peggy Ladner, director of the Nature Conservancy’s state chapter, said Monday in announcing the bequest.
Ladner said that until her bequest came in, Weir was a relative unknown.
“She’s been a member for years, but she’s not someone who
was a major donor,” she said. “It’s a magnificent gift. The loons enriched her life.”
“If you preserve that habitat, you’re getting quite a bit with that — you preserve the essence of Minnesota,” said Weir’s niece, Chris Weir-Koetter, a resource specialist for the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources.
Much of Weir’s money has been used to buy shoreline property at the Nature Conservancy’s Lake Alexander preserve, near Brainerd, and at the Ordway/Glacial Lakes preserve, near
Willmar.
With Weir’s donation — which was used to buy land specifically favorable for loon nesting — the Conservancy now owns about 5,100 acres between the two areas.
Of what remains of the bequest, some may be used to buy more land, and some will go toward its maintenance.
Ladner said the Nature Conservancy’s preserves are generally open to the public but are kept natural.
Carrol Henderson, the DNR’s nongame wildlife program supervisor, said loons are territorial, with each pair needing some 100 acres to nest.
“The population is healthy, not declining, but it’s kind of one you have to pay attention to to stop any declining,” Henderson said, noting Weir’s gift does exactly that.
Weir-Koetter remembers her aunt’s loon-laden Oregon mailbox and pictures of the bird scattered through her house. After moving to Oregon, Weir taught fifth grade until retiring on five acres of land she kept as natural as the day she bought it.
Weir-Koetter scattered her aunt’s ashes on the headwaters of the Mississippi River near Bemidji. As she did, she said, several loons flew overhead and called out.
“She had a three-loon salute.”
—–
To see more of the Pioneer Press, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.twincities.com.
Copyright (c) 2008, Pioneer Press, St. Paul, Minn.
Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.
For reprints, email tmsreprints@permissionsgroup.com, call 800-374-7985 or 847-635-6550, send a fax to 847-635-6968, or write to The Permissions Group Inc., 1247 Milwaukee Ave., Suite 303, Glenview, IL 60025, USA.