Ted Turner, the media mogul whose death was reported Wednesday, built a conservation footprint around private landownership and habitat restoration across much of the western United States. According to the Associated Press, Turner owned one of the country’s largest private ranch holdings—about 3,125 square miles (8,094 square kilometers)—and treated conservation as a long-term project aimed at leaving land in better condition for future generations.
The AP reported that Turner’s conservation philosophy linked environmental work to climate change, biodiversity loss and resource depletion, and that he framed protecting nature as a way of promoting both human well-being and planetary health. In a 2016 interview with a travel publication, Turner said, “I want to inspire people to care about the environment,” and later added, “When we connect with nature, we heal ourselves. When we protect nature, we heal the planet.”
Turner’s conservation legacy, AP said, spanned decades and ranged from his early investments to large-scale restoration and species reintroductions. The report described ranches and habitat across New Mexico, Montana, Nebraska and elsewhere as “living laboratories,” with Turner’s “estancias” in Patagonia described as models of ecotourism. It also said Turner ensured his holdings would continue to be protected from development, citing Turner Enterprises as saying it managed the land and its ongoing conservation protections.
In the United States, AP said Turner’s ranch work grew from his personal commitment to bison recovery. The report said Turner bought his first bison in 1976 after reading a National Geographic piece as a child and deciding he wanted to help bring bison back. AP quoted Turner as saying in a 2019 program, “When I was a little boy, about 10 years old, I read National Geographic magazine and it had an article about bison, and it said how close they came to extinction. I decided then that, if I could, I would do what I could to help bring the bison back,” and also quoted him as saying, “I had to make a lot of money first. Because ranches are not cheap.”
AP described the Flying D Ranch near Bozeman, Montana, as a prominent example of “rewilding,” and said it had moved from traditional livestock use to habitat restoration with a bison herd after being overgrazed. At Vermejo Park Ranch, purchased in the mid-1990s, the AP reported that Turner’s team worked to restore areas degraded by overgrazing, mining and clear-cutting, and that the ranch also hosted a herd of what managers described as genetically pure wild bison. The AP said Turner owned 13 ranches in six states and that his properties combined ecology with revenue-generating programs such as bison ranching, recreation and tourism.
The AP also cited reactions from people in conservation and business who described Turner’s impact. Former CNN President Tom Johnson said Wednesday that Turner wanted land preserved in a way that reflected how “American Indians roamed those lands,” and Johnson said Turner “cleaned up the streams and brought back the gray wolves and the prairie dog.” Jennifer Morris, CEO of The Nature Conservancy, told the AP that Turner did not only “believe in protecting nature” but “acted on it and did so at a large scale,” adding that Turner invested in land, restored ecosystems, and showed “what’s possible when you pair vision with real commitment.”
Still, AP said Turner’s conservation approach did not escape controversy. The report described how Turner acquired ranches in Argentina during privatization waves in the 1990s and 2000s, when wealthy foreigners bought large tracts of land, and it said that this sometimes sparked nationalist sentiments and concerns about resource exploitation and public access to bodies of water. AP also said that in parts of the western United States, some ranchers criticized changes Turner made to land management, including shifts from cattle to bison and support for wolves that opponents said could harm livestock.
AP reported that Turner’s views on wolves included conservation work such as a Mexican wolf breeding program on the Ladder Ranch in New Mexico, and that the wolf efforts drew criticism from ranching organizations raising concerns about wild wolves killing livestock. The AP also described how Turner’s bison expansion and marketing efforts influenced ranching economics, including his effort to raise what it called the world’s largest bison herd and supply meat to restaurants associated with “Ted’s Montana Grill.” George McKerrow, co-founder of the chain, said Wednesday that “By making it a commodity, by making a business out of it, it caused people to get into the bison ranching business, which spread the gene pool dramatically and has made the bison herd extremely healthy.”
Beyond bison and wolves, AP said Turner’s conservation work extended to other species and programs connected to his broader “eco-capitalism” concept. The report described the Turner Endangered Species Fund as supporting species including the Bolson tortoise through captive breeding at the Armendaris Ranch in New Mexico, and said Turner’s team at Vermejo and the Bad River Ranch partnered with state and federal scientists to recover black-footed ferrets, which AP said have an estimated wild population of fewer than 300. It also said Turner’s efforts ranged from Aplomado falcons and desert bighorn sheep to bats and monarch butterflies, and that his idea of interconnected life was summarized in the phrase “Save Everything.”