Fox Wolf Watershed Alliance adds Upper East River GLRI Project

In 2017, the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) awarded the Fox Wolf Watershed Alliance (FWWA) a new Great Lakes Restoration Initiative (GLRI) grant that will provide additional funding for agricultural conservation practices in the Upper East River Watershed.  The proposed grant had been a collaborative submittal between FWWA and the Brown County Land Conservation Department.

Project staff began working on this project in January 2017 and, although it has taken a few months to get this project off the ground, staff are beginning to report results.  This project proposes to utilize our gains from the Plum and Kankapot Creek projects in an effort to begin implementing shoreland buffers on agricultural lands while also promoting a Pay for Performance Cover Crop system.

Buffers installed utilizing grant funds will help reduce sediment and nutrient loading from agricultural surface water runoff by filtering out pollutants along stream corridors.  The Pay for Performance Cover Crop system funds agricultural cover crops as well as limited tillage in the spring in order to promote infiltration of precipitation and also reduce sediment and nutrients from leaving agricultural lands.

Project staff have reported gains in agricultural lands that have started limited tillage practices in 2018.  Brown County has further contracted with producers in the Upper East River watershed in hopes of having 1000 acres of cover crops planted this fall.  Staff will be performing field checks of the cover crop plantings in the coming weeks.