Upper Yellowstone Watershed.. Photo by Whitney Tilt
The Farm Bill is one of the most important federal programs affecting conservation and wildlife habitat. It offers the single largest source of funding for conservation on private lands.
Often overlooked. Farm bill programs fund significant water conservation work with watershed-wide impacts for trout, salmon, and other fish. The Farm Bill’s conservation programs also fund a significant amount of coldwater conservation across the country. Conservation groups, like Trout Unlimited, leverage these programs to improve and restore aquatic habitats for fish and people.
Every place where a cold trout or salmon stream runs through private working land, a potential conservation project could be funded through Farm Bill programs to improve the land and aquatic habitat throughout the watershed. TROUT UNLIMITED
Trout Unlimited outlines just a few examples of how the Farm Bill helps fishing:
It’s replacing undersized culverts in Oregon as part of a creating a Salmon Superhighway.
In the Gunnison River watershed, it’s modernizing irrigation systems to retain more water volume in-stream.
It’s coordinating multiple agencies to help reduce flooding on a farm in Utah.
In the Driftless Area of Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Iowa, its streambank stabilization, erosion control, and riparian planting.
In the Potomac Headwaters of West Virginia, it’s working with farmers to restore native eastern brook trout.
In New England, it’s strategic installation of woody material to control erosion and provide native brook trout habitat.
The common thread of this work is partnering with voluntary landowners to implement solutions that benefit both the landowner and the whole watershed and supporting rural economies by leveraging federal funds to deliver conservation services through local contractors. Trout Unlimited’s role in each project can vary from being a facilitator to federal programs and technical services, providing direct technical services, to full project management, engineering and implementation.
To learn more about how the Farm Bill funds conservation programs. watch Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership’s (TRCP) What is the Farm Bill overview and support a Farm Bull for Fish Conservation by signing TU’s petition to call on Congress to reauthorize the Farm Bil!.