MIDDLETOWN — Another week, another boon for open-space advocates.

The Aquidneck Land Trust announced yesterday that its partnership with the town and John B. Peckham has preserved a strategic Jepson Lane property of more than 11 acres. The Peckhams’ property, bounded on one side by the John Kesson Lane and Pasture Farm Drive residential developments, is sandwiched between two privately held open-space parcels and near the Sisson Pond public water reservoir.

The property, part of the land trust’s Center Island Greenway, is home to a number of animals, including robins, goldfinches, cardinals, red-winged blackbirds and white-tailed deer, contains acres of farmland and provides scenic vistas.

The Land Trust and the town are splitting the $95,000 payment to the Peckhams for a conservation easement on the property. A conservation easement is a legal agreement by which a landowner transfers part of a property’s interest to a conservation organization to permanently restrict that property’s uses.

The Land Trust calls the purchase a “bargain” and a “lasting green gift.”

The trust and the town partnered about a week ago with the Kempenaar family to conserve the Boulevard Nurseries property on East Main Road, permanently protecting 31 of the acres from development. A prominent real-estate developer had sought to build 35 new houses on the site. The land trust will pay the Kempenaars $500,000 for an easement on their property, and the town will then buy the land for $1.5 million with open-space money.

Edward S. Clement Jr., executive director of the Land Trust, credited both the Kempenaars and the Peckhams for their willingness to protect open space on Aquidneck Island. Both families have long histories on Aquidneck Island.

“You have families that are deeply connected to Aquidneck Island who have been extremely good partners,” Clement said. “Neither family was in a place to just give it away for free, but they did make substantial bargain-sale contributions and without that, this wouldn’t have been possible. The common denominator is that long-standing connection to this place and love of this land. They’re the real heroes.”

The Peckham family will retain one acre of the property on which a family member may build a home or barn.

“My family has lived on Aquidneck Island since the 1600s, so it is with great pleasure that we permanently conserved a piece of this special island that has sustained us for decades,” John Peckham said in a news statement.

mwims@projo.com