Same but different: sources of natural resource management advice for lifestyle oriented rural landholders

Amenity migration to attractive and accessible non-metropolitan areas changes social and environmental relations with consequences for natural resource management and landscape composition and trajectories. Lifestyler oriented rural landholders are often cast as a problem for land management and extension. Managers and some researchers see them as a cause of landscape and social fragmentation and report difficulties in engaging such landowners on natural resource management issues and responsibilities. In contrast, limited existing research indicates that lifestylers do join and form networks of personal and other contacts for advice and support in land management. We contribute to this research with a survey of rural landholders in southeastern New South Wales (NSW). We explicitly compare the sources of advice for land management for lifestylers with those of farmers. We focus on the types of sources available to rural landholders in Australian regions and their relative importance to these two landholder groups. We find that lifestylers and farmers are different in their sources of advice but that both prefer personal sources rather than sources such as agencies. We reflect on the significance of the differences for engagement with lifestyle oriented rural landowners and for understanding landscape change.