A Guide to Conservation Programs for Iowa Landowners

Ag Drainage Well Closure

• Purpose: Provide cost-share to protect groundwater aquifers by closing high priority ag drainage wells and developing alternative drainage outlets to surface streams.
• Practices: Well closure and development of alternative outlets.
• Eligibility: Private landowners or drainage districts.
• Contract: Contract with landowner for reclamation and DSC enters contract with private company for construction work.
• Contact: DSC

Coal Mining

• Purpose: Regulate coal-mining activities in Iowa and insure that proper reclamation is completed for restoration of the site and achievement of the intended post-mining land use.
• Practices: Elimination of dangerous high walls, acid mine drainage, clogged streams, and hazardous water bodies; ridges of acid-forming shale are also graded and vegetated. Priority is given to eliminating health and safety hazards, restoring impacted land and water resources, and eliminating off-site environmental impacts.
• Eligibility: Licensed coal mine operator.
• Contract: If bond forfeiture is necessary, the DSC will contract with private construction company to perform reclamation
• Contact: DSC

Conservation Practices No-Interest Loans

• Purpose: Make loans available to eligible landowners at no interest for the construction of permanent soil conservation practices.
• Practices: SWCDs set priorities for practices to fund including terraces, waterways, erosion control structures and other conservation practice applications.
• Eligibility: Producers on agricultural land who are able to secure the loan and capable of repaying the loan.
• Contract: Loans up to $10,000 for a 10-year period with repayment in 10 annual payments equal to 10% of the initial loan amount.
• Contact: DSC, SWCDs, NRCS

Conservation Reserve Enhancement Program (CREP) Constructed Wetlands

• Purpose: Work with landowners to develop and install wetlands which are strategically located and designed to remove nitrate from tile-drainage water from cropland areas.
• Practices: Wetland restoration and adjacent buffer establishment.
• Eligibility: Enrollment on a continuous basis to landowners within the 37-county prairie pothole region of north central Iowa; eligible sites must be in landscape position to intercept significant tile flow while not obstructing normal drainage.
• Contract: Landowners will enter a 15-year contract with USDA-FSA as under the Continuous CRP. DSC funds are used for additional, one-time, up-front incentive payment to encourage participating landowners to enter into a required additional 15-year agreement or permanent easement; FSA and DSC funds will provide for 100% cost-share.
• Contact: DSC, SWCDs, FSA, NRCS

Conservation Reserve Program (CRP)

• Purpose: To reduce erosion, increase wildlife habitat, and improve water quality through the application of conservation plans (landowner sets aside cropland with annual rental payments).
• Practices: Tree planting, grass cover, small wetland restoration, prairie restoration, and others.
• Eligibility: Varies by soil type and crop history. For general signups, land is accepted into the program if the offer qualifies. Continuous signup is open for buffers, waterways, and environmental practices at all times. The living snow fence practice is now paying for 100-foot wide snow catch area with a match for areas near state highways, non-floodplain wetlands restoration initiative, and northern bobwhite quail habitat initiative.
• Contract: 10-15 years depending on the type of practice. Transferable with change in ownership.
• Contact: FSA, NRCS, DNR

Conservation Stewardship Program (CSP)

• Purpose: To reward farmers and landowners for past conservation work and provide technical and financial assistance to help implement- conservation plans that address specific natural resource concerns and complete more conservation work.
• Practices: Existing and new stewardship practices and enhancement activities.
• Eligibility: Private ag land and non-industrial forest land planted, except for land in WRP, CRP and GRP. Signup is continuous.
• Contract: 5-year contracts; annual payment is based on contract details.
• Contact: NRCS, SWCDs

Conservation Technical Assistance (CTA)

• Purpose: To assist land users to plan and install resource management systems that will improve and protect natural resources on their land.
• Systems: Includes many different practices to reduce soil erosion; improve soil, water, and air quality; improve and restore wetlands; enhance fish and wildlife habitat; improve pasture and rangeland; reduce upstream flooding; and improve woodlands.
• Eligibility: All land users may receive technical assistance from the NRCS. Land users are encouraged to work through their local Soil and Water Conservation District (SWCD) to become district cooperators.
• Contract: Contracts vary by programs and practices.
• Contact: NRCS, SWCDs

Cooperative Soil Survey

• Purpose: Develop and maintain reliable soil resource information for landowners, developers, government officials and others dealing with water and soil quality, crop production efficiency and farm profitability, urban and suburban development, and land use planning, value and taxation.
• Practices: Application of reliable soil resource information.
• Eligibility: Iowa’s 99 counties
• Contract: Contract between ISU, NRCS, DCS and county for duration of soil survey.
• Contact: NRCS, DSC, ISU, Iowa’s 99 counties

Debt Cancellation Conservation Contract (Debt for Nature)

• Purpose: To provide opportunity to cancel a portion of indebtedness in exchange for a conservation contract.
• Eligibility: An eligible person must be obligated to FSA under farm loan program, which is secured by real estate, and have marginal croplands or other environmentally sensitive lands for conservation, recreation, and wildlife purposes.
• Contract: 10, 30 or 50 years
• Contacts: FSA, FWS

District Initiatives

• Purpose: Develop and implement locally-led initiatives which prioritize and target sensitive areas by providing funds and resources where they do the most good, to accelerate the implementation of federal programs to protect water quality and fragile land. The statewide Buffer Initiative is one very successful example.
• Practices: Practices include buffer strips, waterways, riparian buffers, contour buffer strips, shallow water areas for wildlife, wellhead protection, etc.
• Eligibility: Landowners with land that qualifies for federal conservation programs.
• Contract: Financial assistance available through voluntary agreement with SWCDs.
• Contact: DSC, SWCDs, NRCS

DNR Watershed Improvement Program

• Purpose: To provide funding for local groups to develop a Watershed Management Plan, which identifies water quality problems and proposes solutions.
• Practices: DNR Watershed Implementation Grants provide funding and technical resources to implement the plan. U.S. EPA funding for these grants is made available through Section 319 of the Clean Water Act.
• Eligibility: SWCDs, County Conservation Boards, RC&Ds, cities, counties, utilities, colleges, solid waste agencies and other non-profits.
• Contract: Funding for planning and/or conservation practices is typically administered through contracts with IDALS Division of Soil Conservation, local SWCDs or other agencies.
• Contacts: Iowa DNR Watershed Improvement Program, EPA

Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP)

• Purpose: To provide technical and financial assistance to landowners to develop and implement conservation plans that address specific natural resource concerns.
• Practices: Livestock manure management, grazing land management, soil erosion control, and water quality improvement practices are eligible for financial assistance statewide.
• Eligibility: Agricultural producers on agricultural land are eligible. Projects are selected based on environmental benefits.
• Contract: Up to 10 year contracts.
• Contact: NRCS, SWCDs, FSA

Farm Pond Program

• Purpose: To provide quality fishing opportunities for licensed anglers.
• Eligibility: DNR will provide fish at a cost of $25 per acre if ponds meet the following criteria: new or renovated and free of fish; surface area of at least 1/2 acre; maximum depth of at least 8 feet; fenced to exclude livestock with a 60 foot minimum buffer between pond edge and fence.
• Contract: Landowner signs agreement to follow recommendations regarding management of the pond and adjacent wildlife area.
• Contacts: DNR

Fish Habitat Restoration

• Purpose: Restore streams and make improvements in a few priority watersheds.
• Practices: DNR sets priority watershed streams where select practices could be funded, including fish habitat, bank stabilization, oxbow restoration, removal of fish barriers, erosion control structures and other conservation practices. These practices must be part of a watershed plan.
• Eligibility: Producers on agricultural land within the boundaries of priority watershed (Boone River and selected tributary streams to Boone River and selected trout streams).
• Contract: Voluntary agreement with DNR to install practices with up to 50% cost-share and up to a 20-year maintenance agreement.
• Contact: SWCDs, NRCS, DNR, Iowa Soybean Association, The Nature Conservancy

General Non-Point Source Program (Low-Interest Loans)

• Eligible Projects (not limited to): restoration of wildlife habitat, stream bank stabilization, urban stormwater management, remediation of storage tanks, water conservation and reuse, and wetland flood prevention areas.
• Contact: DNR • (www.iowadnr.com/water/srf/nonpoint.html)

Integrated Farm and Livestock Management

• Purpose: Demonstrate statewide the effectiveness and adaptability of proper agricultural inputs of tillage, fertility, and pest management to optimize production and minimize potential impacts of sediment, nutrients and pesticides on the state’s soil and water resources; Iowa Learning Farm is an example.
• Practices: Practices that result in water quality benefits and/or other environmental benefits.
• Eligibility: Producers on agricultural land.
• Contract: Agreement with DSC for project administration.
• Contact: DSC

Iowa Financial Incentives Cost Share

• Purpose: Provide cost-share or financial incentives to private landowners for the implementation of permanent and management soil and water conservation practices in Iowa to control erosion and reduce sediment.
• Practices: SWCDs set priorities for practices to fund including terraces, waterways, erosion control structures and other conservation practice applications.
• Eligibility: Agricultural producers on agricultural land who are SWCD cooperators are eligible.
• Contract: Voluntary agreement with SWCD to install practices with up to 75% cost-share and up to a 20-year maintenance agreement.
• Contact: DSC, SWCDs, NRCS

Minerals Mining

• Purpose: License limestone, sand, gravel, gypsum and clay mine operators; and bond and register mining sites in Iowa.
• Practices: Observation certain setbacks from buildings, dwellings, property line and public right-of-ways; stabilization and vegetation of overburden piles and prevent damage from occurring offsite as a result of mining activity; removal of debris, grading and vegetation of disturbed overburden; prohibition of practices that bury or destroy topsoil.
• Eligibility: Limestone, sand, gravel, gypsum and clay mining activities.
• Contract: Licensor and registration with DSC.
• Contact: DSC

On-Site Wastewater Assistance Fund

• Purpose: To provide low interest loans to repair or replace existing on-site septic systems.
• Eligibility: Landowners must be able to secure the loan, be capable of repaying the loan, live in an unincorporated area and be approved by the county.
• Contracts: Landowners may borrow amounts beginning at $2,000 for up to 10 years.
• Contacts: County, DNR

Partners for Fish and Wildlife

• Purpose: To provide cost share and technical assistance for landowners to restore and enhance fish and wildlife habitat on private lands.
• Practices: wetland restoration, native prairie restoration, stream restoration, migratory bird habitat, endangered species habitat and invasive species control.
• Eligibility: All private landowners with priority given to watersheds located in national wildlife refuges.
• Contract: Voluntary participation with 10-year agreements.
• Contact: FWS, Doug Helmers, 515-994-3400

Publicly Owned Lakes Program

• Purpose: To provide cost-share through SWCDs to private landowners for practices that reduce sediment delivery to a lake in a designated Publicly Owned Lake (POL) watershed

• Eligibility: Approved SWCDs, in watersheds of designated Publicly Owned Lakes

• Contact: DSC, DNR, SWCDs (Funding for eligible practices is administered through SWCDs.)