The second cohort of the Peregrine Accelerator for Conservation Impact is focusing on innovative conservation solutions that support or advance ecological and human health in the North Atlantic Transboundary Landscape.
2025 Cohort
Strategic Forestland Conservation and Community Resiliency in Northern Vermont
Northern Green Mountains Key Wildlife Linkage
Through a grassroots and welcoming community-based coalition, Cold Hollow to Canada seeks to maintain and build enduring partnerships to protect and steward our corner of the Northern Forest for people and wildlife for generations to come.
The Wabanaki Resilient Forests Fund
The Wabanaki Forest (New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, Canada)
Community Forests International, in partnership with the Wolastoqey Nation in New Brunswick (WNNB), Mi’gmawe’l tplu’taqnn Inc. (MTI), Fort Folly First Nation (FFFN) Habitat Recovery, Passamaquoddy Recognition Group Inc. (PRGI), and Nature Trust of New Brunswick (Nature Trust), propose to create a stewardship fund to provide an ongoing, sustainable source of maintenance funds to support culturally-appropriate and climate-focused stewardship of jointly conserved lands for the next seven generations.
Conseil régional de l’environnement Chaudière-Appalaches
South Quebec
Conseil régional de l’environnement Chaudière-Appalaches (CRECA), partnership with Conseil régional de l’environnement de l’Estrie and Conseil régional de l’environnement du Centre-du-Québec, will use a concerted inter-regional approach to identify core habitat and corridors in a high priority connectivity area in Canada and ultimately develop a connectivity Master plan, including a prioritization of conservation actions and funding possibilities.
CoastCheck
Nova Scotia, Canada
Ecology Action Centre will pilot its CoastCheck project, a community based citizen-science coastal monitoring initiative, to better understand how and why our coasts are changing so we may work to safeguard them for future generations.
Follow the Forest: Leveraging Community Science for Conservation Action
Green Mountains of Vermont to the Hudson Highlands of New York
Housatonic Valley Association, in partnership with the Staying Connected Initiative, Litchfield Hills Greenprint Collaborative, and The Nature Conservancy, will integrate place-based community science with high-level connectivity modeling to inform strategic land conservation and restore terrestrial connectivity.
Kitigan Zibi Anishinabeg First Nation
Eastern Quebec, Ottawa and St. Lawrence Rivers, Nova Scotia, and northeast U.S. Tribal territories
Kitigan Zibi Anishinabeg First Nation, in partnership with St. Francis Xavier University, Canadian Wildlife Federation, SUNY ESF, River Institute, and the Centre for Evidenced-Informed Conservation, will develop an Indigenous-led transboundary strategy to reconnect migratory fish, especially American Eel, to their historic habitats, grounded in partnership with Indigenous knowledge holders and leaders throughout the region to share challenges, strategies, and goals.
Nature NB
Coastal areas of New Brunswick
Nature NB, in partnership with Anqotum Resource Management, Birds Canada, Nature Trust of New Brunswick, Nature Conservancy of Canada, will expand their Healthy Coasts NB program to protect species of conservation concern, promote community resilience to climate change, and support a coastal way of life.
Schoodic Institute
Acadia National Park and Sipayik and Passamaquoddy reservation lands
The Schoodic Institute, in partnership with Wabanaki Youth in Science, Maine Coast Heritage Trust, Sipayik Climate Resilience Committee, Friends of Acadia, and The Nature Conservancy, will develop a roadmap to support the leadership and engagement of the Wabanaki people in the Maine Tidal March Restoration Network—a state-wide effort to restore salt marsh biodiversity, provide carbon storage and coastal protection, and protect Wabanaki cultural resources.
The North Atlantic Transboundary Landscape:
This nest is defined primarily in accordance with the New England-Acadian Forests ecoregion, as outlined by OneEarth. Additional consideration was given to the inclusion of Indigenous territories and to the Salazar Center’s desire to recruit a cohort with a shared ecology and common socio-cultural ground, but from a large enough swath to bring together groups from two countries in a context where they might not otherwise interact.
The North Atlantic Transboundary Landscape is highly fragmented, both in terms of ecological connectivity and jurisdiction, and is characterized by a high proportion of privately owned lands. At the same time, it presents significant potential to increase landscape connectivity, reverse biodiversity loss, and achieve targets like 30×30 in the region. Momentum is building around these efforts in both countries and across the international boundary, and a number of regional networks and collaboratives are connecting place-based groups in their conservation efforts across the landscape. Still, these initiatives by no means represent all the groups, communities, and rightsholders undertaking important conservation work in the North Atlantic, and many lack the capacity and resources to align their on-the-ground efforts beyond the local scale and in partnership with others in the region.
Despite a longstanding and robust track record of traditional conservation in the region, such work has not been prioritized for funding at the federal level in either country. For example, in 2022, the four Canadian provinces in this region receive just 9.4% of environmental funding compared to other Canadian provinces; a 2024 report from Environmental Funders of Canada confirms that this trend has continued in the region. Meaningful multinational conservation initiatives have seen some success (e.g., with Resolution 40-3, passed in 2016), but not nearly to the extent that has been realized in the Yellowstone to Yukon (Y2Y) region, another important transboundary landscape between the U.S. and Canada. National regulations and policies continue to present incompatibilities between the two countries in the North Atlantic, with sovereign Tribal and First Nations’ leadership and participation often excluded from the conversation altogether.
Taken in sum, the North Atlantic Transboundary Landscape represents an array of complex challenges—as well as opportunities—to enhance ecological and community health.