Couple Want Nature Center to Protect Area : Alabama: They raised money for 20-acre site to combat overdevelopment and create an appreciation of natural setting.

Amid the beachbound traffic, golf courses and new homes for retirees in coastal Alabama, an effort by one couple to save native plants and creatures stands out like a colorful sail at sea.

The couple put their 50-foot sailboat to work as a tourist attraction and raised money to build a nature center in this town known primarily for sausage festivals.

Fred Saas, who says he’s got to hear frogs at night, worries that commercial development could ruin the area. For his wife, Carol Lovell-Saas, nature’s lure includes butterflies, plants, birds and spiders.

Their creation is the 20-acre Biophilia Nature Center.

“We lived in every harbor on the California coast before coming here 12 years ago,” Lovell-Saas said during a walk through a greenhouse at the center.

She gave up teaching biology at a school in Pensacola, Fla., because of the hourlong commute to their secluded home on Roberts Bayou, a few miles south of the nature center.

But she hasn’t really stopped teaching. The couple hopes to turn the center into a site for research on native plants and animals for students and visitors. The property contains five acres of swamp that draws Sierra Club hikers. Lovell-Sass calls the swamp “incredible for bird-watching.”

At the end of the greenhouse is a butterfly conservatory. Along the property line is a border of loblolly pines and woody shrubs. Lovell-Sass is trying to raise rare pitcher plants from seed. Wildflowers grace another 20,000 square feet. The couple’s closest neighbors raise bees and strawberries.

Agriculture remains a key industry for Baldwin County, but farmlands are turning into subdivisions and golf courses with the influx of retirees. The county’s population has grown from 78,556 in 1980 to 115,805 today.

According to county building inspectors, the value of new construction grew from about $90 million in 1993 to $120 million last year, much of it in more expensive homes. New homes going up in the county had averaged $100,000, but some now range from $500,000 to $1 million, according to inspector Frank Santa Cruz.

Lovell-Saas has encouraged new homeowners to landscape with native plants and trees. She’s spreading the word through the nature center, where admission is free.

Saas, a Coast Guard-licensed captain and an architect, takes groups on trips into the sandy bayous along Perdido Bay, where blue herons gather.

“I’ve lived all over, but you couldn’t find a nicer place than this,” Saas said.