Red Lodge Clearinghouse

CRP lost millions of acres in 2007, impacts on wildlife expected

More than 2 million acres of land previously enrolled in the Agriculture Department's Conservation Reserve Program were converted to cropland in 2007, according to a Land Letter analysis of federal figures. The shift can be explained in part by federal programs that encourage conversion of protected land to more productive uses.

The losses, which carry serious implications for wildlife species dependent on that land, were most severe in Montana, North Dakota and South Dakota. Those three states combined lost about 800,000 acres last year.

This development concerns wildlife groups such as Ducks Unlimited, among others, since the three states are part of the Prairie Pothole Region, North America's most important and threatened waterfowl habitat. About 70 percent of North America's ducks are produced in the Prairie Pothole Region, which includes Iowa, Minnesota, Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota and parts of Canada.

In North Dakota, where federal figures show almost 420,000 acres of CRP land were converted to cropland last year, Ducks Unlimited said it is as if someone plowed a three-mile swath from the state's southern border to Canada. The state lost more than 12 percent of all CRP acres in the state.

Greg Link, assistant wildlife chief for the North Dakota Game and Fish Department, said the state was expecting about 250,000 acres to come out of CRP last year and to lose another 300,000 through 2010, based on USDA estimates. But with high commodity prices, incentives to grow crop-based biofuels and the low rental rates offered under CRP, more farmers than expected decided to convert their CRP acreage to cropland.

"We expect that trend to continue," Link commented. "We don't know where it's all going to go, but it's not looking very good right now."

CRP offers producers payments through 10- to 15-year contracts to convert highly erodible cropland to grass. Contracts on another 2.2 million acres are set to expire this year.

Scott McLeod, farm bill specialist with Duck Unlimited's Great Plains Regional Office, worries there won't be many acres of CRP left in a few years, which could have significant impacts on wildlife populations.

"Those areas are critical nesting habitat and they're going away and it's going to be important to every state in the nation," McLeod said, in reference to the Prairie Pothole Region. "As birds no longer use these areas to nest and the nest success goes down, hunters will feel the effects all over the U.S."

The Fish and Wildlife Service credits CRP with helping to produce more than 2 million ducks a year. Ducks Unlimited worries that the lost habitat will mean fewer ducks migrating through or wintering in the contiguous 48 states.

In addition to the loss of waterfowl, McLeod noted that the loss of CRP acres could harm the region's water quality and lead to more carbon dioxide emissions, as carbon currently sequestered beneath the conserved acres is released through agricultural practices such as tilling the soil.

Tom Palmer, a spokesman for Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks, noted that CRP acreage is also important for wildlife such as sage grouse and deer, as well as fish. "The impact of CRP is so enormous, we'd hate to lose that," Palmer said. "It's very important to every aspect of wildlife management in the state of Montana."

Chuck Schlueter, a spokesman for the South Dakota Department of Game, Fish and Parks, noted that there are other benefits to CRP besides providing an economic opportunity for farmers and preserving habitat for wildlife. "There are economic benefits from having wildlife in South Dakota, including pheasant hunting, which is a multimillion-dollar business," he said.

Schlueter said state officials are concerned that the loss of acreage under CRP could result in a repeat of what happened in the 1960s when USDA's soil bank program was discontinued. The state experienced a great reduction in the pheasant population, which eventually led to drastic drops in hunting. "We're trying very hard not to have that happen in 2008," he said.

Groups hope to change 'rental rates'

Ducks Unlimited and other wildlife organizations have been trying to get the Agriculture Department to change the rental rates under CRP to make them more competitive with cash rates on cropland. Dave Nomsen, vice president of governmental affairs for St. Paul, Minn.-based Pheasants Forever, said wildlife groups are hopeful the farm bill pending in Congress will include language that would encourage USDA to update rental rates.

"CRP is not being competitive with high crop prices and high land values," Nomsen said. "We're hopeful that we'll find additional incentives to make the program more competitive."

Link said North Dakota is concerned that the program may no longer be viable if USDA doesn't raise the rental rates. "With commodity prices right now, unless USDA finds a way to upgrade and increase the rental rates to make them more competitive, farmers just aren't going to stay in the program," he said.

But McLeod admits that under the current budget climate, it isn't going to be easy.

Kent Politsch, a spokesman for USDA's Farm Service Agency, which oversees CRP, said he wasn't aware of any effort to change the program's rental rates, but he said President Bush and USDA are very committed to CRP.

"The CRP program is shifting to a more specific type of set-asides," Politsch said. USDA Secretary Mike Johanns will be traveling to Minnesota in a couple of weeks to announce a few of these projects, which will put more emphasis on conserving acreage with the greatest environmental benefits, he said.

In addition to increasing rental rates under the program, environmental groups are pushing for a strong Sodsaver program in the 2007 farm bill. The Sodsaver program would remove incentives, such as crop insurance and disaster payments, for farmers who convert native grasslands to crops (Land Letter, Dec. 13).

Duck Unlimited's Becky Jones Mahlum said about 500,000 acres of native prairie have been lost since 2002, including almost 64,000 last year. "It's a 10,000-year-old national treasure. We can never replace the flora and fauna that exist in native prairie," she said.

Gable is an independent energy and environmental writer in Woodland Park, Colo.