An island in Lake Michigan will continue to be preserved now that the Nature Conservancy has purchased 94% of the land at a bargain price. The Fred Luber family of Milwaukee & Sister Bay sold virtually all of Saint Martin island, a two mile long strip located between the Door Peninsula in Wisconsin & the Garden Peninsula of Michigan. The plan is to keep it in its natural state, a place where birds, bats, dragonflies & butterflies can stop & rest & nourish themselves. The center of the island has a forest of sugar maple trees surrounded by a white cedar forest, dunes, limestone bluffs & cobble-stone shores. The Nature Conservancy based in Madison bought 1,244 acres for $1.5 million. That’s only a third of what the land is worth. The organization promises to devote the land’s remaining value to protecting the site. In the future, the Nature Conservancy plans to transfer ownership of Saint Martin & nearby Rocky Island to the US Fish & Wildlife Service. Rocky Island was donated to the Nature Conservancy 27 years ago.
