2011
The Hubert Family
Homer Township, Midland County
Over six decades ago, Fred Hubert and Rosalie Miller’s parents settled their family along the banks of the Pine River in Midland County. In 2011, they donated a conservation easement to The Little Forks Conservancy to protect those 40 acres forever.
The land, once part of a larger farm, was used as pasture for sheep. Heavily grazed, the land had only a few trees when the family purchased it. “It was just open,” Mr. Hubert recalled. “Everything was mowed off to the dirt.”
Most of the trees were planted over the years by the Hubert family. Rosalie Miller remembered how her uncle “would go to the Conservation District tree sale and buy hundreds of trees. He would bring us a wash tub full of trees for us to plant.” The Hubert family estimates they have planted tens of thousands of trees over four decades.
“It’s hard to imagine looking at the beautiful forest today that it once was bare pasture,” said Elan Lipschitz, the Conservancy’s land protection specialist. “The entire Hubert family has put a lot of time and love into this land and it shows.”
The decades of good stewardship by the Hubert family will now be protected forever. Mrs. Miller concluded, “We like to leave it wild. We want people to be able to see it and enjoy it.”
