Lining Nebraska's Landscape
Recent legislation encourages Nebraska landowners to establish buffer strips to help reduce the levels of sediments and other pollutants reaching surface water and which can ultimately effect the quality of our drinking water.
I put in 13 acres of filter strips because I got tired of cleaning silt and sediment out of the channel. I put big bluestem and switchgrass in filter strips on both sides of the creek in the spring of 1998. It was too wet along here some years for crops," said Butler County producer John Anderson. "I like the looks of it. It's good for erosion control and wildlife."
Anderson is one of many Nebraska landowners taking advantage of the Nebraska Buffer Strip Program created by the Nebraska Legislature last year.
"The program is intended to encourage landowners to establish buffer strips along vulnerable surface water resources," said Scott Merritt, executive director of the Nebraska Corn Growers Association. The program is funded from fees assessed on all pesticides registered in Nebraska.
Land eligible for the program includes cropland adjacent to perennial streams, intermittent streams, wetlands or permanent bodies of water and existing buffer strips established after Jan. 1, 1996 along these same areas.
Payment rates vary, depending on whether the land is dryland or irrigated land and whether or not the land is already enrolled in the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP).
The program is administered by the Nebraska Department of Agriculture and local Natural Resources Districts. Upon approval of an application, the landowner enters into a formal agreement with the local NRD and establishes the buffer strip according to USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service requirements.
Applications for 1999 may be submitted at any time, as program funds allow. For a complete explanation of contract terms and lengths, contact the local NRD, the NRCS or the Nebraska Department of Agriculture.
Other partners in the "Nebraska Conservation Buffer Initiative" include
- The Nebraska Corn Growers Association
- Nebraska Environmental Trust fund
- USDA Farm Service Agency
- University of Nebraska Cooperative Extension
- Nebraska Sustainable Ag Society
- Nebraska Grain Sorghum Board
- U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
- Center for Rural Affairs
- Nebraska Wildlife Federation
- Wildlife Management Institute
- Nebraska Game and Parks Commission
- American Fisheries Society
- Nebraska Forest Service
- Nebraska Department of Environmental Quality
- Novartis Crop Protection Inc.
- Nebraska Soybean Association
- U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
- Nature Conservancy
- Nebraska Public Power District
- Nebraska Water Quality Foundation
- Omaha Metropolitan Utilities District.
