Land with old-growth, shoreside forest donated to Jefferson Land Trust

Majestic forests alongside wide waters have been at the heart of the Olympic Peninsula’s natural beauty, but are becoming all too rare. Thankfully, 32 acres of upland forest and shoreline property was generously donated to the Jefferson Land Trust by Carolyn and Clayton Wright after being in Carolyn’s family for more than a century. “To find a parcel of land in this region with mature forest that’s also connected to the shoreline is very rare.

It has an incredible amount of conservation value, and benefits a lot of wildlife species,” said Sarah Spaeth, the land trust’s director of conservation and strategic partnerships.  “We’re so thankful that Carolyn and Clayton chose to work with us to protect it forever in this truly generous way. It’s such an amazing gift,” Spaeth added.

Located north of Brinnon along the west side of US Highway 101, the property includes a sliver of Hood Canal shoreline. The parcel also contains key wildlife habitat, including some of the Olympic Peninsula’s last remaining old-growth forest. The land is part of a migration corridor used by the Brinnon elk herd and other large mammals.

Seasonal streams pass through a ravine that runs east underneath the highway and empties into Hood Canal, offering safe passage between forest and shoreline for wildlife.  Both the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife and Jefferson County identify the shoreline as Priority Aquatic Habitat. The property was initially acquired by Carolyn Wright’s family, the Irles (pronounced “earl”) in 1916.

According to family lore, one of her ancestors, Dr. Ruth Irle Davies, provided medical services to a patient who couldn’t pay the bill and offered the property as compensation instead.  It was passed through the family until it came into the possession of Carolyn’s uncle, Roger D.

Irle who grew up on Monroe Street in Port Townsend in the 1930s and ’40s. He left to attend Harvard, eventually earning a doctorate degree in sociology and later a degree in divinity, becoming an ordained Presbyterian minister, teaching sociology in Illinois and at the University of Oxford, and finally retiring to Sumner, Washington. Over time, he became tired of the constant letters he received from loggers interested in cutting the forest of the property.

He offered it to his “favorite niece,” but if she didn’t take it, Irle said, he’d consider giving it to a conservation organization.  Irle passed away in June 2022. The Wrights currently reside in Spokane, and, Clayton says, had no practical use for the land. 

Their deep love of Puget Sound caused them to consider Irle’s suggestion to give the land to a conservation organization so it would remain undeveloped. “We had heard about how Hood Canal has suffered from oxygen depletion and red tides, and didn’t want to add one more septic system to contribute to the problem. We couldn’t use the land ourselves and it seemed indecorous to sell it for money so some other family could turn it into a vacation spot.

We were also concerned that the upland forest would be logged, which was anathema to us as environmentally conscious people, and would be a crime after having been preserved for so long,” Clayton Wright said. The property was zoned for residential development, allowing up to six residences plus additional dwelling units to be built, while its valuable timber also made it vulnerable to logging.  According to the land trust, development or logging would have dramatically and negatively impacted wildlife populations, disrupted the connectivity of the wildlife corridor and waterways, and risked the future of the precious old-growth forest.

“Walking onto the land was astonishing,” Spaeth said. “The enormous old-growth cedars, firs, and maples, and the ravine, elk tracks and bear scratches on trees — it was all magical.”

To guarantee the land can never be developed or deforested, the land trust sold the development rights to the Navy through the Readiness and Environmental Protection Integration program at a bargain sale rate, placing a restrictive easement on the land, officials said.

The funding the nonprofit received in return will help remove some dilapidated structures and carry out stewardship activities and monitoring on the land, now and into the future.