DRA Purchase Expands Dodge Point, Fulfills a Wish

The new DRA Davidson Preserve (see map) will add almost 93 acres to Dodge Point and connect to several other River~Link properties. While sold to DRA by Alida Busby, it is named after her husband Louis J. Busby Jr.’s mother’s family. The Davidson’s inhabited the land for generations and many of them are buried right next door.

Did you know that Dodge Point straddles River Road? Most people visit the shoreward portion, but about a third of the land lies west of River Road.

This spring the Damariscotta River Association (DRA) purchased from Alida Busby 93 acres of forest land right next to that inland portion of Dodge Point, connecting Dodge Point all the way to Lynch/Dodge Road.

The property is not only next to beloved public land, but it is also loaded with vernal pools vital to salamanders and wood frogs and part of a large area of uninterrupted forest important to larger animals like moose.

Vernal pool on Davidson Preserve

It presents future opportunities for carefully sited trails, but most of all serves to connect and buffer Dodge Point from encroaching development.

“This purchase would not have been possible without our loyal members and supporters,” notes DRA Executive Director Steven Hufnagel. Nor would it have been possible without the partnership of Maine Coast Heritage Trust [MCHT] and the support of the Maine Natural Resource Conservation Program [MNRCP] managed by The Nature Conservancy for Department of Environmental Protection and US Army Corps of Engineers.”

“MCHT helped to assess the property and write the grant and we couldn’t be more grateful. The MNRCP grant paid for the property in its entirety. And of course we are deeply grateful to Alida Busby for allowing us the time to secure the funding so we could purchase this important land that had been in her husband’s family for generations.”

Alida Busby commented, “I couldn’t be happier knowing that this land my husband so carefully stewarded, and that had been in his family for over a hundred years, will be in the care of the DRA and conserved forever, a haven for wildlife”