Original article by Daniel Urie for PennLive posted 23 June 2026
The Robert A. Kinsley Nature Preserve in York County. Photo courtesy of Lancaster Conservancy.
The Lancaster Conservancy has agreed to purchase 31 acres of land to add to the Robert A. Kinsley Nature Preserve in Hellam Township, York County.
With this new addition, the Robert A. Kinsley Nature Preserve will total 829 acres. The conservancy said the property under agreement includes 630 feet of Susquehanna River shoreline and protects critical undeveloped forestland.
“Growing existing nature preserves is always a high priority, and this addition to Robert A. Kinsley Nature Preserve further safeguards habitat while serving as a connector to the Susquehanna River. The Conservancy will continue to work with our partners to ensure this ridge is protected forever,” Fritz Schroeder, president and CEO of Lancaster Conservancy, said in a news release.
The conservancy said the property’s forested slopes buffer and protect the water quality of Wildcat Run and another unnamed tributary flowing to the Susquehanna River.
“The 31 acres were placed on the public market and could have been developed and timbered, but now these woodlands will be preserved forever,” the conservancy said in the news release.
Terms of the agreement weren’t disclosed.
“This property is the last undeveloped tract fronting on the Susquehanna River adjacent to the Robert A. Kinsley Nature Preserve and Wildcat Run,” Kate Gonick, senior vice president of land protection and general counsel at the conservancy, said in the news release. “Its protection is critical to sustaining important water resources and a wildlife corridor for large mammals.”’
Robert A. Kinsley Nature Preserve is in the Susquehanna Riverlands Conservation Landscape. This state-designated landscape, led by the Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources and the conservancy, includes the municipalities that border the Susquehanna River in Lancaster and York counties.
The preserve is between the conservancy’s Wizard Ranch and Roundtop nature preserves to the south and the Susquehanna Riverlands State Park, which the conservancy helped protect in 2022, to the north.
It is part of the conservancy’s Hellam Hills Conservation Area, which includes more than 2,500 acres of protected natural lands.
Visitors who want to access the nine-mile trail system at Robert A. Kinsley Nature Preserve can use the limited shoulder parking available at Furnace and Chimney Rock roads.
Since 2015, the conservancy has protected more than 4,000 acres in York County along the Susquehanna River.
The Lancaster Conservancy is a nonprofit land trust that has protected more than 11,000 acres of natural lands in Lancaster and York counties.
