(Radio Iowa) — An environmental group has bought an 830-acre property in western Iowa’s Loess (Luss) Hills for two-and-a-half million dollars with plans preserve its native prairie. The Nature Conservancy in Iowa has been talking with a landowner for decades about acquiring his property in Plymouth County to preserve the landscape. The Conservancy’s Graham McGaffin says they were aware of some competing interests to convert the property to smaller parcels or use some of the Loess Hills dirt for construction needs.

“The high quality prairie that’s here, we knew that would be a true loss if either of those outcomes occurred,” McGaffin says. The land links two other protected properties for a combined almost three-thousand acres in the northern Loess Hills.”It buffers two protected properties by the Iowa D-N-R so it’s kind of a puzzle piece in there,” McGaffin says.

He says the land will be great for migrating birds and other wildlife. “You know, it’s amazing to find a piece of ground not only that’s this large but has this amount of high quality native loess hills prairie,” according to McGaffin. They’ll eventually transfer the property — named the Hummel tract — to the Iowa Department of Natural Resources to manage. The public will be able to hunt and hike there.

(Thanks Katie Peikes, Iowa Public Radio)