Conservation Clip List for Friday, March 4th, 2022
Conservation Clips is a weekly collection of articles distributed by NACD that provides our members and partners with the latest news in what’s driving conservation. These articles are not indicative of NACD policy and are the opinions of their authors, unless otherwise noted. If you have a relevant submission or need assistance with accessing articles, please contact the NACD Communications Team.
The National Association of Conservation Districts (NACD) gave the Distinguished Service Award to Hans Lawaetz at its 2022 annual meeting in Orlando, Fla., on Feb. 15.
Some neighbors are working to expand the Lakewood Conservation District. Over the past few months, a committee of 10 homeowners in our neighborhood has been meeting and working with the City of Dallas. They just formally submitted the request for a determination of eligibility and finalized the language for a petition.
This year, the contest was sponsored by Kentucky Farm Bureau and the Kentucky Association of Conservation Districts to acquaint students with conservation of our soil, water and related natural resources.
Efforts to control the spread of a deadly pest killing hemlock trees throughout West Michigan have stepped up with a new task force at the Muskegon Conservation District.
The bill, put forth by fellow Republican Sen. Travis Hutson, cleared its final Senate committee stop. Hutson’s bill puts strict limitations on membership eligibility for Florida’s Soil and Water Conservation District boards. The bill limits membership to farmers or employees of farms that earn more than $500K annually.
The New Mexico Forestry Division is working with the Carson, Cibola, and Santa Fe National Forests, Forest Stewards Guild, Fire Adapted NM, New Mexico Association of Conservation Districts, National Park Service, Bureau of Indian Affairs, and Bureau of Land Management New Mexico State Office to continue our wildfire preparedness calendar in 2022 and share the message across multiple platforms, including social media, webinars and community events.
Members of a new equity commission advising the U.S. Department of Agriculture said they want to make sure the USDA does a better job providing resources to Black farmers and other minority communities following decades of racial discrimination.
Soil health management systems are agricultural systems that prioritize the health of soils, by reducing soil disturbance and keeping living roots in the ground.
(Opinion) A microscopic view into healthy soils reveals a living ecosystem in which dead organic matter forms the base of a food web consisting of microscopic and larger organisms — all hard at work. Together, these organisms sustain other biological activities that promote plant, animal and human health.
“Our modern agriculture can produce huge, voluminous but very low quality food, and it’s using huge and more and more energy all the time,” Archuleta said. “Our soils are becoming more and more degraded. It doesn’t work. It is not the model that will feed the world.”
Cover crops do far more than cover soils. They provide an array of benefits, such as the ability to reduce soil erosion and increase soil health. They can help attract pollinators, repel pests, turn into “green manure,” or can be used as feed for livestock.
Dan and Ruth Boerst, of Manawa, Wisconsin, farm with soil health practices to help mitigate the effects of food insecurity in their rural American town.
Planting will soon be underway for most Illinois farmers, and while brain bandwidth might be in scarce supply, it’s worth casting a thought down river.
Growing pine trees in Arkansas is similar to growing corn in Iowa or soybeans in Illinois. Crop seeds are planted, they mature, and they are harvested. Instead of a short growing season during a single summer, a stand of pine trees can take decades.
(Subscriber Only) A new report from UC Davis indicates farms with surrounding natural habitat experience the most benefits from birds, including less crop damage and lower food safety risks.
There are various ways to help mitigate the effects of climate change on your land and improve your bottom line at the same time. One very effective way is by planting cover crops.
Results of the preliminary experiment, which included 10 farms across the U.S., show that the crops from farms following soil-friendly practices for at least five years had a healthier nutritional profile than the same crops grown on neighboring, conventional farms.
Community members with an eye for natural beauty and thoughts of the future found what they were looking for at the annual Arbor Week tree giveaway in Clanton.
“In Oregon, we’re facing several emerging issues: drought, fire, tree decline, insect outbreaks, tree pathogens and invasive species,” said David Shaw, Oregon State University professor and forest health specialist with the Forestry and Natural Resources Extension.
A new report led by UC Merced researchers estimates California’s drought cost the state’s agriculture sector about $1.1 billion and nearly 8,750 full- and part-time jobs last year.
“By continuing to be wise stewards of our natural resources, we can ensure a better and brighter future as we build the Texas of tomorrow,” Gov. Greg Abbott said in a statement.
Cover croppers seeking to improve the effectiveness of using a roller-crimper to terminate standing covers ahead of the planter may want to consider adding flames to the procedure.
New legislation in California hopes to reduce heat-related deaths by ranking heat waves similarly to hurricanes, by using categories and names. However, the National Weather Service (NWS) is currently in a multiyear experiment to also categorize heat waves.
“We’ve gotten off to a really busy start, early start to spring fire season this year,” said Brad Carico, Deputy Regional Forester for the Virginia Department of Forestry.
The work was part of the first coordinated sampling across all five Great Lakes to figure out what’s happening in one of the world’s largest freshwater systems in winter—something scientists know surprisingly little about.
In a recent study, University of Illinois researchers show new machine-learning methods based on laboratory soil hyperspectral data could supply equally accurate estimates of soil organic carbon.
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