Why We Use Farm Bill Conservation Programs on Our Land

March 1, 2022

Regenerative farmers Ashly and Stacy Steinke share how a commitment to improving habitat has paid off for their grass-fed cattle business, the local wildlife, and water quality in Wisconsin

We’re sharing firsthand accounts of how private land conservation programs are helping landowners not only to improve their soil quality and enhance wildlife habitat, but also to provide equitable hunting and fishing opportunities in rural communities.

Ashly and Stacy Steinke hunt, fish, raise three boys, and practice regenerative farming near Cornell, Wisconsin. With the help of multiple Farm Bill conservation programs, they have also been able to restore over 200 acres of wetlands, revive stream flows and water quality, install wildlife-friendly fencing, and implement conservation practices that benefit their grass-fed beef business.

Ashly tells their story:

Some of my earliest memories are of my dad bringing home animals from his hunts—I couldn’t wait to be a hunter like him. Then, I think in 1989, wild turkeys were reintroduced into my home county, right on the farm where my dad grew up. In the years that followed, we spent countless days just out watching those turkeys on the landscape, and I became obsessed with wildlife. In high school, I was further encouraged by an ecology teacher, Mike Harden, who was also passionate about wildlife and conservation. He took the time out of his evenings in the spring to take us to watch peenting woodcock and had us read A Sand County Almanac. (I’ve probably read it five times since then.) And so it really was a natural decision for me to attend college and graduate school for wildlife management.

I was working as a wildlife biologist when I first got to know the impact of private land conservation on fish and wildlife species, but I never saw these programs getting enough recognition. Then my wife Stacy and I decided to restore about 15 acres of wetlands on the first property we bought as a couple, back in 2010. That’s when I saw the power of restoration firsthand.

We converted an old, cool-season field dominated by invasive knapweed to a high-quality, native warm-season planting and buffered a worn-out stream with about 8,000 trees. I think the most important thing we learned from that project was how doable this kind of conservation work is and how many opportunities exist. It is still so rewarding to walk that property and see the results. And we still hunt wood ducks on that restored creek!

We bought our farm in 2014 after owning a successful wetland consulting business, and we started raising grass-fed cattle here almost right away. Now, we also run an Airbnb on the property, where there are opportunities to view wildlife—and our bulls—right from the firepit.

This land is also where we are raising our three young boys in the country lifestyle. Even though it is harder to hunt and fish with young kids, it is so rewarding to watch them become immersed in nature and the hunting and fishing lifestyle. We go ice fishing in the winter, hunt turkeys in the spring, catch catfish in the summer, and hunt geese and deer in the winter.

Our long-term goals are to make our land the best that we can—both to support our family and to have quality wildlife habitat resulting in excellent hunting for family and friends. It is our hope that our children will pick up this conservation ethic and want to put their stamp on this land when it is their turn.

With this in mind, the first Farm Bill conservation project we did on our farm was a Conservation Reserve Enhancement Program project, where we restored 47 acres of native upland prairie and wetland habitat. Nine wetland basins were restored, resulting in almost zero runoff leaving that part of our farm. The newly restored grassland and wetland habitat is home to an incredible diversity of wildlife, from bobolinks to a pair of trumpeter swans. We have documented 15 different species of waterfowl using these restored wetlands.

Later, we relied on the Conservation Reserve Enhancement Program again to create a 12-acre buffer along a stream through our fields. We planted approximately 3,000 trees along the riparian corridor to help filter water from ag fields before it enters the stream.

Next, we utilized the Environmental Quality Incentive Program for a forage and biomass planting and a grazing incentive. This helped us transition from the intensive tillage and row cropping practices of the previous landowner to a perennial, grass-based system. The soil health, water quality, and wildlife habitat benefits are striking when spending time in the pastures. You can see it in the invertebrate life underground and the butterflies and grassland songbirds who make our pastures home.

We are currently in the fifth and final year of a Conservation Stewardship Program contract, which has helped us to remove miles of barbed wire fencing and replace it with high-tensile, wildlife-friendly fencing. We also planted and continue to maintain a seven-acre monarch pollinator planting, and we leave standing grain for wildlife in the winter. We look forward to adding more projects for a future CSP contract.

We have restored over 200 acres of wetlands and associated upland plantings to date.

It is amazing how fast wetland animals like muskrats move into newly restored sites. It is so fun seeing a nesting pair of Canada geese on a muskrat hut just two years post-restoration. Probably the most obvious sign of the improvements is the variety of bird life, from swallows hunting bugs to broods of blue-winged teal. You can’t miss the cacophony of sound they make.

When beavers cut down the aspen trees we planted 10 years earlier, I considered that the greatest compliment I could receive as a conservationist!

I think we are like anywhere else in the country where we have a landscape highly dominated by corn-soybean rotation. This is of no fault to those growers as they are making a living how they see fit and we need farmers on the landscape. However, I feel that we can still make big differences for wildlife by not farming the poor areas of the field, utilizing no-till practices, and planting cover crops. In addition, many young farmers today are introducing cattle back to the landscape and utilizing managed grazing on their operations. All of these practices are proven as conservation success stories. I think we are on the right track of getting to where we need to be as agricultural producers leading the way in conservation.

Private lands, including those that have been enhanced using Farm Bill dollars, are also creating equitable hunting and fishing opportunities. In our immediate area, we have several properties that are enrolled in a walk-in access program that is funded through the Farm Bill’s Voluntary Public Access and Habitat Incentive Program. Many other farmers I know still open their properties to hunting through a warm handshake and a trust that the hunter will leave the property as they found it.

But we also have more—and healthier—habitat available on these private lands, and so there are better hunting and fishing opportunities for those using nearby public land access.

I wish that every hunter and angler was aware of how these programs are approved and funded by our government and that there is a need for all of us to advocate for the dollars that put these practices on the landscape. The conservation title makes up such a small percentage of the Farm Bill, but it can play such a huge role in boosting wildlife populations. I’ve seen it firsthand.

Learn more about the benefits of Farm Bill conservation programs here.

2 Responses to “Why We Use Farm Bill Conservation Programs on Our Land”

Karen Renfro March 3, 2022

I love this!

March 3, 2022 at 6:45 pm

Reply
Doug Finnman March 11, 2022

Kudos to this family for what their doing to restore their land to improve habitat, wildlife, and water quality. All while still making a living from their. They’ve got their priorities straight and we need more like ‘em!

March 11, 2022 at 8:44 pm

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by: Scott Laird

posted in: Habitat and Clean Water

February 24, 2022

Hunters See Opportunity to Conserve Big Game Migrations in SW Montana

An updated management plan for the BLM’s Dillon Field Office could safeguard some of the Treasure State’s finest hunting opportunities

The Bureau of Land Management’s Dillon Field Office is comprised of more than 900,000 acres of public lands within Beaverhead and Madison Counties in southwest Montana. These wide-open spaces provide excellent fish and wildlife habitat and a wealth of dispersed recreation opportunities. The Dillon Field Office encompasses seven Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks big game hunting districts (HDs 302, 303, 321, 322, 329, 331, and 340) that are well-known to sportsmen and sportswomen for to their world-class hunting opportunities for elk, mule deer, antelope, and upland birds. Hiking, fishing, camping, and wildlife viewing are also popular activities, and these public lands were also the site for a recent bighorn sheep reintroduction. A recent report found that hunting and angling in Beaverhead County generates over $167 million each year and creates more than 1,400 jobs.

The Dillon Field Office is conducting a 15-year evaluation of its 2006 Resource Management Plan and has agreed to welcome public input as a part of the process. Resource management plans are intended to guide the agency’s management priorities for public lands in a particular area for 15-20 years. The BLM is required by its own rules to conduct intermittent reviews of individual plans to determine if there is any new data or updated science that would be of significance to the current plan and/or if there have been significant changes in related plans of other federal agencies, state and local governments, or Tribes.

In the case of the Dillon Field Office’s 2006 Resource Management Plan, these criteria certainly apply. There have been significant changes to the landscape and its habitats since the last evaluation, and TRCP believes the plan should be updated to reflect new scientific information, particularly on big game migration and the threats that could impede these critical wildlife movements, as well as potential opportunities to improve them. In addition, the plan has not been revised to reflect guidance provided by Department of the Interior’s Secretarial Order 3362 to prioritize the conservation and improvement of big game winter range and migration corridors. Likewise, since the plan’s last review, Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks adopted a strategy for conserving wildlife migration, which should inform the BLM’s management of these public lands.

Because the BLM has decided to open its review to public comment, Sportsmen and sportswomen now have an opportunity to speak up and request that the BLM Dillon Field Office update the current RMP to conserve and restore these habitats using the latest science. Across the West, collar data and other migration-related research has been used by land management agencies to guide strategically sited habitat restoration projects and fence improvements to facilitate wildlife movement, while also ensuring that development is sited away from vital habitats. Without incorporating the latest data and migration science, the Dillon Field Office’s current plan is obsolete and could result in missed opportunities to restore and conserve habitat in one of the highest-value landscapes in the nation.

For the reasons stated above, it is important that sportsmen and sportswomen provide input and request that the BLM Dillon Field Office update the current RMP to safeguard big game migration corridors using the latest science. The hunting and fishing opportunities found on these public lands are too important to rely on an outdated land-use plan for their conservation.

Public comments will be accepted by the agency until March 7, 2022. Click here and make your voice heard today.

by: Andrew Earl

posted in: Habitat and Clean Water

A Conservation Report Card for the 2018 Farm Bill

Here’s how we’d grade the implementation of each private land conservation program included in the last five-year bill—and what can be done better next time

The 2018 Farm Bill seems fated to be remembered as one defined by COVID-19 and the greater political universe. The bill took several steps to regain ground for conservation following agency-wide sequestration, but trade disputes and the onset of a global pandemic changed the reality facing American agricultural producers and strained resources at the USDA, right as implementation of the five-year bill hit its stride.

However, the Natural Resource Conservation Service and Farm Service Agency plowed ahead, with many of the federal employees responsible for Farm Bill conservation programs working from kitchen counters and dining room tables. Two years later, business as usual seems right on the horizon—and so is the next Farm Bill.

To secure the best possible value for hunters, anglers, landowners, and fish and wildlife in the 2023 bill, we need to know what worked and what didn’t. Below is a quick line-by-line report card on the USDA’s implementation of private land conservation programs since passage of the 2018 Farm Bill, plus what we’d like to push for in the next bill.

Voluntary Public Access and Habitat Incentive Program: A+

In March 2020, the USDA awarded $48 million in funding to state and tribal governments from the Voluntary Public Access and Habitat Incentive Program. Later in the year, the TRCP released a report highlighting the innovative ways that states are putting this money to use. States like Michigan, Illinois, and Colorado have used funds to work with landowners to open tens of thousands of huntable acres to the public. Other states have expanded mentorship programs and built websites and mapping tools to make access easier to find. In total, the Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies has estimated a return on investment of $5.20 for every $1 in funding to the program.

The swift distribution of VPA-HIP funds and clear benefits should be a sign to the hunting and fishing community to press for further investment in the VPA-HIP when the Farm Bill is reauthorized in 2023.

Conservation Reserve Program: B

Since 2018, the TRCP and our partners have been vocal about the impact that administrative changes had on enrollment in the sporting community’s favorite conservation program: the Conservation Reserve Program. Decisions to eliminate cost-shares and practice incentives and reduce soil rental rates accelerated the CRP’s waning enrollment from 36 million acres in 2007 to 20 million acres in 2020. Fortunately, in 2021, the USDA seized on recommendations from our community to boost enrollment—reinstating incentives and improving the financial reasoning for signing up. Landowners responded, with over 58,000 new contracts and 5.3 million acres enrolled in the program.

There is a General CRP sign-up ongoing through March 11 and a CRP Grasslands sign-up from April 4 to May 13, 2022—so enrollment numbers should continue to climb. But the TRCP and our partners continue to work with USDA officials and lawmakers to identify program improvements ahead of the 2023 Farm Bill.

Environmental Quality Incentives Program: B

Here’s how we arrived at this decent-but-not-stellar grade. First, the positives: EQIP, the most popular working lands conservation program, was significantly expanded in 2018 and has become a central tool in the Biden Administration’s toolkit for addressing agricultural land climate emissions. Increasingly, the NRCS is pursuing innovative ways to draw interest into the most popular working lands program—like a recent announcement that EQIP would offer a Conservation Incentive Contract option, created in 2018, nationwide in 2022. This focuses EQIP practices on specific resource concerns in high-priority conservation areas and provides annual payments over a five-year contract period. These contracts serve to help landowners transition from individual EQIP practices to the whole-farm conservation approach offered by the Conservation Stewardship Program. The agency also recently announced the availability of $38 million for cover cropping demonstration projects in 11 states, advancing the deployment of climate-smart adoption.

The 2018 Farm Bill also expanded eligibility under EQIP programming to water management entities (i.e., irrigation districts) that provide water to farmers and ranchers in the West. Expanded eligibility under EQIP will be a helpful tool in achieving large-scale water efficiency and conservation improvements, which enhance river flows for fish and wildlife. Here’s where things can improve: Based on reports from partners, NRCS state and local staff have received little guidance on how to update EQIP procedures to accommodate new eligible entities and have limited capacity to market the program to eligible users. TRCP is encouraging USDA leadership to provide additional resources to NRCS state and local offices to properly administer and market these new opportunities.

There also continues to be concern in the Colorado River Basin that certain efficiency practices adopted by these entities aren’t translating to water savings benefiting fish and wildlife, despite requirements that efficiency savings not be directed toward activities that increase overall water use. The conservation community continues to work with the NRCS and champions in Congress to ensure that EQIP dollars are achieving the program’s conservation goals.

Climate-Smart Agriculture: A

Among President Biden’s earliest actions in office was an Executive Order directing federal agencies to develop climate mitigation strategies, with a goal of achieving carbon neutrality by 2050. The USDA later released a request for information on how new and existing funding and authorities can be used to encourage the voluntary adoption of climate-smart agricultural practices. This process, which the TRCP and partners took part in, yielded important feedback on the need for everything from improved data quantification and management and the development of climate-smart commodities to better landowner outreach and flexibility. Following the feedback process, the USDA released a 90-day progress report in May 2021.

In February 2022, the agency announced $1 billion for climate-smart commodity pilot projects over a period of five years. The program will support partner-led efforts to bring climate-smart commodities to market, supporting carbon quantification, reporting and verification of climate benefits. These partnership projects will serve as proof-of-concept for the future of climate-smart commodity development. These incentives keep lands from being converted and advance the conservation and restoration of ecosystems like wetlands, grasslands, and forests—all of which is critical to securing huntable habitats for generations to come.

Conservation Compliance: D

In April 2021, the Government Accountability Office released a report detailing ineffective enforcement of Conservation Compliance. Also known as Swampbuster, this accountability effort has been in place since 1985 and prohibits those who drain temporary, seasonal wetlands in the Prairie Pothole Region from taking part in farm bill programs. The watchdog agency found that USDA wetland specialists were only reporting a fraction of the compliance violations they witnessed. Potential violations are only reported if met during an active inspection. So, wetland drainage violations in sight of roads, property lines, and visible in aerial imagery go unreported. In total, the agency reported less than five violations on 417,000 tracts of land between 2014 and 2018.

Since the report was published, the USDA acknowledged failings and agreed to implement a handful of the report’s recommendations. The TRCP, its partners, and greater conservation community continue working to address this decades-old problem.

Regional Conservation Partnership Program: C

As the premier public-private conservation program, the RCPP lends federal resources to locally led conservation projects to carry out conservation on a landscape scale. It was created in the 2014 Farm Bill and expanded in 2018.

In 2021, the NRCS announced $330 million in RCPP funding awards to 85 projects across the U.S. While notable, partner stakeholder groups continue to report that innovative projects, and those with the greatest conservation impacts, often do not move beyond the application stage because of inflexibility in USDA selection criteria. These and other concerns about burdensome contracting authorities are creating an environment where landowners, conservation groups, and private companies hesitate to take part. This must be improved.

Overall Grade for Implementation of the 2018 Farm Bill: B

The USDA and its implementing agencies have the unenviable task of managing the various, and often competing, facets of American agriculture. Particularly in recent years, market fluctuations, global health, and the swing of the political pendulum have all played a role in shaping how farm bill conservation dollars touch the ground. Considering the drawbacks of the 2014 bill, the 2018 Farm Bill remains a significant achievement, and given all that has gone on in the time since, we give the USDA more than a passing grade in its efforts.

In the 18 months between now and expiration of the 2018 bill, the TRCP and our partners will continue to closely track how these important programs touch down on the landscape. In the year ahead, we will begin the process of drafting legislation for inclusion in the bill’s reauthorization. In doing so, we will rely on our dedicated audience of sportsmen and sportswomen to make their voices heard in support of a strong conservation title in 2023.

Check out the TRCP’s Farm Bill resource center to learn more about these important programs.

Top photo courtesy of the USDA via Flickr.

by: Guest Author Kevin Hyde

posted in: Habitat and Clean Water

February 18, 2022

Collaborative Conservation Restores a River Delta

How one national wildlife refuge created invaluable opportunities for hunters and anglers in the Pacific Northwest

Easily accessible from Seattle, Tacoma, and Olympia, the Billy Frank Jr. Nisqually National Wildlife Refuge in Washington state draws more than 200,000 visitors each year, including about 10,000 students. Its proximity to one of the Northwest’s largest urban hubs allows the refuge to provide abundant wildlife viewing opportunities to a wide range of people.

Among them each year are hundreds of sportsmen and sportswomen who come to the refuge to hunt geese, duck, and scaup during the fall and winter hunting seasons. In 2019, the Billy Frank Jr. Nisqually National Wildlife Refuge was among the 77 refuges and 15 hatcheries within the system wherein the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service expanded hunting and fishing opportunities in what was—at that point—the single-largest increase of its kind in the refuge system’s history, adding 1.4 million acres of expanded access.

In many ways, the refuge demonstrates the importance of hunting to the National Wildlife Refuge System, the critical role that refuges play in offering public access to people from all walks of life, and the power of collaborative conservation work between a variety of stakeholders to benefit fish and wildlife.

Establishing the Refuge

The Billy Frank Jr. Nisqually National Wildlife Refuge encompasses more than 4,500 acres around the delta of the Nisqually River, where glacial meltwater from the slopes of Mount Rainier flows into the southern end of Puget Sound. In this estuarine environment, saltwater and freshwater marshes, grasslands, mudflats, and forests provide habitat for salmon species and forage fish; waterfowl, songbirds, raptors, and shorebirds; and mammals like beavers, coyotes, deer, otters, and minks.

The Nisqually River Delta’s ability to support robust fish and wildlife populations was not always certain. In 1914, prior to the refuge’s establishment, a Seattle attorney named Alson Brown purchased more than 2,000 acres of land in the area and built a long dike to transform the estuary into farmable fields. Later, from the 1940s through the 1960s, the Ports of Tacoma and Olympia proposed dredging the site for a new, deep-water port to accommodate the larger and heavier ships developed for maritime trade.

Events during the 1970s resulted in a different future for the Nisqually River Delta. In 1974, the persistent efforts of the Nisqually Indian Tribe, the state of Washington, landowners, and local environmental advocates led the Department of the Interior to purchase 1,295 acres of the delta for the purpose of establishing a national wildlife refuge. That same year, a federal district court ruled in the case of United States v. Washington: what is now known as the Boldt Decision reaffirmed the treaty rights of Washington tribes and established tribes as co-managers of salmon and other fisheries with the state. Now, as co-managers, the Nisqually Indian Tribe started to look closely at the Nisqually watershed and the salmon habitat in the river.

In 1996, the Nisqually River flood overran Alson Brown’s old dikes, inundating some areas of the refuge. In turn, the refuge sought funding to assess the feasibility of removing the dikes and restoring the delta. The dikes ran in a loop that served as a hard border around the outer parts of the refuge, inhibiting both the natural meandering of McAllister Creek and the Nisqually River as well as the exchange of water between the creek, the river, and Puget Sound. The removal of these impediments and the completions of some additional landscape modifications would reconnect historic floodplains and open up prime habitat for salmon, waterfowl, and other wildlife.

Restoring the Delta

In 2007, a group of partners that included the Nisqually Indian Tribe, the Nisqually National Wildlife Refuge, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the U.S. Geological Survey, and Ducks Unlimited launched the Nisqually estuary restoration project, the largest estuarine habitat restoration project in the Pacific Northwest.

The project secured public and private funds, including more than $1.8 million from the Puget Sound Acquisition and Restoration fund—co-administered by the Puget Sound Partnership and the Washington State Recreation and Conservation Office—pooled together by different watershed groups that contributed to the project; federal salmon project funding; and private funding raised by Ducks Unlimited.

Over the course of two years, from 2008 to 2010, the Nisqually estuary restoration project removed six miles of dikes and roads to restore more than 750 acres. Afterwards, aerial photos showed a thousand branching channels and sloughs running through the tidal marsh across the refuge, providing important habitat for Chinook salmon, steelhead, and bull trout, as well as a variety of other fish and wildlife.

The expansion of the tidal marshland also affected the number and type of birds that visited or inhabited the refuge, and the composition of waterfowl at the refuge has changed—there are more wigeon and estuarine waterfowl now than before. This development, in addition to the post-restoration decision to allow hunting on refuge lands adjacent to Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife hunting areas, has created a large stretch of accessible and productive hunting land at the refuge.

Caption: Comparison of Billy Frank Jr. Nisqually National Wildlife Refuge from before the estuary restoration (1997) and after the restoration (2009). 1997 aerial photo by U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. 2009 aerial photo by U.S. Geological Survey.

Opportunity for All

Prior to the 2019-2020 hunting season, the refuge expanded the area where hunting is permitted, opening more than 1,100 acres of waters and tideland for waterfowl hunting. The refuge is open to hunting for more than 100 days per season, stretching from mid-October to the beginning of February.

Cody Raffensberger and Tyler Klump, two hunters who came out to Nisqually National Wildlife Refuge on the opening day of the 2021 waterfowl season, said hunting at the refuge appeals to them for different reasons. Raffensberger, who has hunted at Nisqually 15 times over the last three years, said he appreciates the accessibility of the refuge and the convenience of the boat launch at Luhr’s Landing. “There’s a good number of birds here, and the population stays year-round,” Raffensberger said.

It was Klump’s first time hunting at Nisqually, and he said he enjoyed the experience. “The places I normally go, they’re a lot more compact, with pre-built lines and things like that, and usually a lot more crowded,” he said. “Here, you can kind of get out on your own and check out better areas. This was the best day of duck hunting I’ve had.”

Greg Sullivan, another hunter who came out to Nisqually on the opening day of the 2021 waterfowl season, explained that he likes the hunting at the refuge because it offers more than just mallards, snow geese, and teal ducks. “I love that, no matter what, every time I come here, I’m going to see something interesting even if it’s not something that I’m going to hunt,” he said. “For example, there’s a group of at least six eagles in this area that’s always really cool to see. There’s a lot of marine wildlife and a good variety of waterfowl—that’s all interesting.”

These types of experiences and observations reveal some of the unique values of the refuge system, which provides all Americans with quality experiences in the field and on the water, conserves biodiversity, and sustains habitat connectivity for fish and wildlife. Looking ahead to the future of the system, sportsmen and sportswomen can point to the establishment and restoration of the Billy Frank Jr. Nisqually River Wildlife Refuge as an example of a collaborative, locally supported effort where hunters and anglers came together with other stakeholders in what can only be described as a conservation success story.

Kevin Hyde is the communications specialist for the Puget Sound Partnership, the Washington state agency that leads the region’s collective effort to restore and protect Puget Sound. He enjoys hiking and camping throughout the Pacific Northwest.

Top photo: USFWS Pacific via Flickr

by: Tiffany Turner

posted in: Habitat and Clean Water

February 17, 2022

Six Ways to Help Farmers, Foresters, and Ranchers Combat Climate Change

We were proud to support a broad coalition effort to identify priority policies for improving private land habitat and capture more carbon

The TRCP has long been a vocal advocate for farmers, foresters, and ranchers who are strong partners in conservation. This commitment is most recently shown through our membership in the Bipartisan Policy Council Farm and Forest Carbon Solutions Task Force, a group of organizations working together to develop policy proposals that enhance climate-smart agriculture and forestry practices. We’re proud to support the resulting recommendations that recognize and incentivize actions by private landowners to invest in the productivity of their land, while delivering better wildlife habitat, more hunting and fishing access, greater resilience to the effects of climate change, and increased carbon stored in soils, forests, and wood products.

The task force recommendations cover a range of actions across six broad policy objectives. Here are some of the highlights.

Start With What’s Already Working

The task force recommended expanding existing Farm Bill programs that already deliver climate benefits and offer pathways to new market opportunities for farmers, ranchers, and forest landowners. To do this, Congress should double funding for USDA conservation programs. Conservation practices have been proven to improve habitat while also storing and sequestering more carbon. The TRCP supports boosting funding to deliver increased carbon sequestration and soil health, rather than borrowing from existing funding that supports much-needed wildlife and water quality. Learn more about Farm Bill conservation programs and take action in support of doubling investments in private land habitat.

Give Landowners More On-the-Ground Support

With new opportunities for landowners to implement natural climate solutions, there’s also a need to expand technical assistance to support them and address related workforce needs. The USDA should recruit private-sector partners to work with their Extension offices and provide training on climate-smart practices. Farmers, ranchers, and foresters can play a pivotal role in addressing climate change, but most don’t know how or where to start. When they do look for help, it’s usually within their own community or from trusted representatives, including agricultural retailers, cooperatives, seed and feed companies, other landowners, procurement foresters, and nonprofits. Many of the TRCP’s partners regularly serve in this capacity with existing networks and should be leveraged to expand access to and engagement with USDA programs.

At the same time, the administration should strengthen USDA’s data and technology capacity to allow farmers, foresters, ranchers, and other landowners to more easily estimate the impact of adopting climate-smart practices on their land. Providing clarity and supporting their decision-making would maximize the benefits—including better habitat—of natural climate solutions.

Strengthen Carbon Markets

The task force also recommends that Congress pass the Growing Climate Solutions Act and the Rural Forest Markets Act, which would reduce barriers to entry for voluntary carbon markets, improve market integrity, and create jobs. Together, these bills establish trusted and credible third-party verifiers and technical service providers and offer guaranteed federal loans to voluntarily manage land that generates carbon credits while improving habitat and air and water quality.

USDA should use the Commodity Credit Corporation, which provides U.S. producers with financial assistance, to support piloting of climate-smart practices. By lowering the transaction cost for landowners and leveraging carbon markets, this initiative can promote innovation and test new tools. Priority should be given to projects and practices that provide other co-benefits, such as improvement in habitat, access, or air and water quality.

Tie Conservation to More Successful Farming

To help overcome barriers to the broad adoption of natural climate solutions, the USDA should conduct a comprehensive study to compare the impacts of conservation practices on crop yields and insurance payouts under the Federal Crop Insurance Program from yield losses attributed to drought, flooding, and other extreme weather events. We believe the findings from this study would confirm that conservation practices reduce losses and offer co-benefits in terms of carbon sequestration and emission reductions. The study would also help underscore the need for an improved crop insurance program that incentivizes reducing climate risk.

Support Forest, Grassland, and Sagebrush Restoration

There is also a need to enhance resilience to wildfire, drought, insects, disease, and invasive species on a landscape scale through reforestation, but we’ll need a doubling of the current output from tree nurseries to meet the demand. The task force is asking Congress to pass legislation to modernize and expand public and private seed collections and tree nurseries to support the scale-up of natural climate solutions like reforestation.

Congress should also establish and fund the North American Grasslands Conservation Act, a major initiative for the TRCP that is modeled after the highly successful North American Wetlands Conservation Act. The new bill would provide landowners with voluntary, flexible economic incentives and opportunities to help improve and conserve grasslands and sagebrush habitat while promoting carbon storage and sequestration.

Reduce Costs and Challenges

Finally, we stand behind the task force’s recommendation that decision-makers should foster innovation in the agriculture and forestry sectors to make natural climate solutions cheaper and easier to implement and to address measurement and monitoring challenges. Congress should provide increased funding across USDA research programs to enhance collaboration with other federal agencies, universities, and the private sector and improve the development of new technologies for landowners interested in implementing nature-based solutions. This work would build on existing innovation programs and accelerate scaling of successful approaches.

If implemented, these recommendations would provide a multitude of benefits for wildlife habitat, clean water, and the outdoor recreation economy, while spurring investment in rural communities and empowering farmers, foresters, ranchers, and other landowners to contribute to climate resilience.

For more information about the climate-smart policies backed by the hunting and fishing community, check out ourlandwaterwildlife.org.

Top photo courtesy of USDA NRCS Montana via Flickr.