L. and Annette Gannon and Alexis Brooks have worked with Eastern Shore Land Conservancy to permanently conserve 285 acres in Windy Hill, a tiny community just east of Trappe in Talbot County. The conservation easement was made possible through the Maryland Department of Natural Resource’s Rural Legacy Program, funded through Program Open Space. The easement protects 140 acres of prime farmland including conservation reserve program (CRP) buffer strips. 139 acres of deciduous forest, managed with a forest stewardship plan, enclose the farm’s grain fields and provide 100-foot-wide buffers for 3,900 feet of Ash Bridge Branch, a tributary of Miles Creek and the Choptank River. Many of the farm’s trees are more than 100 years old and are home to Delmarva fox squirrel and vulnerable forest interior dwelling bird species. Six acres of impoundments offer rest and food for migratory waterfowl.
Approximately 122 acres of Windy Hill Farms exists within Chesapeake Bay Critical Area, which means the easement will not only permanently protect the scenic, open space, and natural integrity of the farm, it will simultaneously safeguard the water quality and plant, fish and wildlife habitat of the Chesapeake Bay. “Windy Hill Farms provides these many ecological benefits in concert with more than 2,039 acres of protected lands that all lie less than one mile away,” commented ESLC President & CEO Steve Kline. “Connectivity like this is critical in order for easements to have the greatest possible impact on wildlife, cultural preservation, healthy agricultural and economic systems, and community climate resilience.”
“We chose to work with ESLC because they had worked with other local landowners and because of their attention to detailed calculations for the environmental value the easement represented,” commented landowner J. L. Gannon. “There is a wealth of knowledge with the office staff and personnel that helps enlighten you on the easement’s value for the environment.”
Windy Hill’s scenery is not only beautiful, but powerfully influential. The farm’s conservation easement protects almost 8,000 feet of scenic road frontage and 3,100 feet of scenic water frontage, with particularly special autumn and winter sunsets that illuminate “pretty much every species of waterfowl common to Maryland and some rather uncommon, as well,” said Gannon. These unique autumn views were captured by several of the nation’s top plein air painters during ESLC’s 2026 Forever the Forest alumni invitational at the Avalon Foundation’s Plein Air Easton Festival. In person and on canvas, Windy Hill’s beauty is now able to inspire stewardship in perpetuity.
