Private land conservation towards large landscape goals: Role of relational values, property rights orientations and perceived efficacy in ranchers' actions

Many of the world's iconic, endangered and endemic species rely on large, contiguous landscapes for their survival. In the US West, working ranches are integral to large landscape conservation goals and there are numerous influences on ranchers' conservation actions, including their relational values, perceived self-efficacy and property rights concerns. Using survey data from 681 ranchers in eastern Idaho and western Montana, we sought to answer the question: How do relational values, property rights orientations, perceived efficacy and public lands dependence affect reported conservation actions on private ranch lands? Conservation adoption varied widely by action, with invasive plant removal having the highest (92%) and conifer removal the lowest (21%) rates of adoption. Conservation adoption was higher among ranchers who believe they are responsible for conserving nature, believe their land should be used to provide environmental benefits to the region, have higher perceived self-efficacy, lower property rights concerns and higher incomes. Programmes encouraging the adoption of conservation on private lands could benefit from message framing that resonates with the worldviews of landowners and land managers. Read the free Plain Language Summary for this article on the Journal blog.