Learning from Landowners: Examining the Role of Peer Exchange in Private Landowner Outreach through Landowner Networks

Abstract

More than one-third of forested land in the United States is owned by individuals or families, making these lands a significant source of the nation's forest resources and services. Yet investments in traditional expert-led outreach efforts, including financial incentive programs and technical assistance for management plan development, have failed to engage the vast majority of U.S. forest landowners. Through case studies of five diverse landowner networks, this study explored peer exchange among landowners as an alternative means of fostering engagement. Sixty-one in-depth interviews revealed common themes across cases that contributed to landowner participation and learning, including maintaining an atmosphere conducive to social learning, emphasis on local information and hands-on learning, and access to rich networks that include both practical peer-derived information and trusted technical expert-derived information. These findings enrich existing landowner engagement theory by offering insight into landowner networks as an avenue for serving an ever-growing population of family forest owners.