Conservation Reserve Program - Video Clip


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In 1985, Spring surveys by the U.S Fish and Wildlife Service placed waterfowl breeding populations at 25.6 million ducks and predicted a fall flight of 54.5 million. Mallards, pintails, and blue-winged teal in particular were in trouble, with populations at or near their lowest ebb in the 30-year history of the surveys.

Waterfowl experts from the U.S., Canada, and Mexico began working on a biological blueprint to bring back the ducks. That effort, which was to become the North American Waterfowl Management Plan, set as its goal a spring breeding population of 62 million ducks and a fall flight of 100 million. At the same time, Congress was working on another problem-the 1985 Farm Bill and a new provision to that bill called Conservation Reserve Program.

CRP's soil conservation strategy included paying farmers to retire marginal croplands from production for 10 years. Its political support came from its potential to reduce expensive commodity surpluses.

CRP was about to create millions of acres of prime upland cover that would help protect nests from predators and dramatically increase nesting success.

From 1986 to 1990, farmers enrolled 8.2 million acres of cropland in CRP within the prairie pothole region--that vast, glaciated area of the north-central U.S. and southern Canada where as many as 70 percent of North America's ducks are produced. Nearly 13,000 square miles--an area larger than the state of Maryland--was converted to dense nesting cover through CRP.

In the early 1990s, the northern great plains began to escape the grip of prolonged drought. Pothole wetlands that had been dry for more than a decade suddenly filled with water. The prairie sprung to life and waterfowl piled into prairie potholes surrounded by CRP grass, short-stopping their spring migration to traditional breeding grounds in Canada. Biologists in the Dakotas, once used to thinking in terms of "acres per nest," were now often finding "nests per acre."

Ducks nesting in CRP were no longer easy targets for predators. Prior to CRP, nest success of 10 percent meant that much of the U.S. prairie pothole region was a biological "sink" where waterfowl mortality exceeded annual recruitment. Recent research by Ducks Unlimited and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service shows that CRP has tripled waterfowl nesting success throughout the prairie pothole region.

With both abundant grass and wetlands, spring survey numbers began to climb, first to 26.3 million ducks, then 32.5 million and finally to 36.9 million in 1995--40 percent higher than when CRP was authorized a decade earlier. However, despite its many conservation achievements, CRP was in trouble. Authority for continuing CRP expired in 1995, and waterfowl's amazing recovery was in jeopardy.

Ducks Unlimited and other wildlife organizations scrambled into action. U.S. farm policy was going through a major upheaval. Most available funds were quickly being earmarked for farm subsidies with very little left for CRP. Finally, after two eleventh-hour floor fights, Congress heeded the concerns of sportsmen and conservationists from across the U.S. and responded by adding CRP to the 1996 Farm Bill, extending the program for another 7 years and providing $1 billion in funding.

This second generation of CRP is stacking up to be even better than the first. DU and others with interests in wetlands and waterfowl conservation have helped improve CRP's guidelines. The prairie pothole region is now a national conservation priority area, and cropped wetlands are eligible for CRP enrollment.

In fact, during the March 1997 sign-up, 4.2 million acres were enrolled in CRP in the prairie pothole region. This is more acreage than was due to expire, resulting in a net gain in CRP enrollment for the key waterfowl producing states of North Dakota, South Dakota, and Montana. Moreover, 750,000 acres contain high densities of pothole wetlands and were eligible for 15-year contracts rather than the standard 10-year deal.

Due to funding constraints the USDA has stated that there will not be a Fiscal Year 2002 CRP signup. Ducks Unlimited is working with the administration and Congress to authorize additional acreage for CRP in the 2002 Farm Bill. Many of our members who are farmers and private land owners have asked us to help enroll their land in CRP but we cannot do so without the support of Congress. For more information on the CRP program click here.