The Conservation Reserve Program provides a yearly rental payment to farmers who remove sensitive land from crop production to plant species that improve environmental health and quality. As the local Natural Resources Conservation Service has conducted status reviews this year, District Conservationist Cathy Froelich advises those farmers enrolled in the program to maintain the land, especially if they are looking to re-enroll:
“We are starting to see trees come up in CRP, that is something you need to get rid of and shoot it with some Tordon or something so they don’t come back. We have also been seeing a lot of weeds out in the CRP ground, you need to control the weeds. It is a ten year, set aside basically program. Once it has established a third year, that doesn’t mean you ignore it. We want folks to go out and maintain it because after ten years, when it comes to expiring, if you want to re-enroll it, it will have to be back to that original status of the grass stand.”
The long-term goals of enrolling into the Conservation Reserve Program is to re-establish land cover by improving water quality, prevent soil erosion, and reduce the loss of wildlife.
