James Scheerschmidt, a former Stettler farmer left a monetary donation and a chunk of land in his will to the Alberta Conservation Association.

According to his family and officials from the project, he wanted his land to be restored and conserved for public recreational activity.

“He wanted it conserved for wildlife habitat and recreational use for outdoor people to be able to experience the outdoors” said Mandy Couve, a project biologist from ACA.

The 240 given acres were a mix of native woodland and farmland with a drained wetland. Removing cattle from the situation was a step in the right direction according to Couve.

“They were really badly degraded because they had been used for cattle watering, they had been grazing on the site and some wetlands had actually been drained so they were in a really bad place when we got to there.”

Bob Thomson of Ducks Unlimited knew James personally and said he worked with Couve to make sure his requests were accomplishable.

“Those requests included fencing out the habitat area, doing some wetland restoration, possibly planting some trees, converting some of the cultivated land to perennial forage’s...”

Officials from the ACA say the wetland has been restored and the land has been cleaned up and re fenced. They are working with a neighbouring land owner to reseed 107 acres of the former cropland.

Now the area is open to the public to enjoy. According to Thomson it is a great place to get outdoors.

“It’s right next to Stettler so people can come and walk their dog they can have a picnic, they can go bird watching they can pick berries they can just enjoy nature, and it’s so close to Stettler!”

He adds that if you 'know your stuff' the berry picking is incredible.

“There are Raspberries and Saskatoon berries and high brush cranberries so if you know your berries you can go there the right time of the year and have a feast, there’s even goose berries.”