8-2 SS CRP

  I will never forget my first pheasant hunting experience in South Dakota. It was bitterly cold, about 20 below zero, and I was with a camera crew from ESPN doing an outdoor show called Ultimate Outdoors with Wayne Pearson. It was going to be a drive and blocker hunt and we all loaded onto a bus and headed for CRP land. End of story? This was an experience of a lifetime with hundreds of wild birds. Let’s talk about CRP. The Conservation Reserve Program is a voluntary program where landowners enroll in contracts to take highly erodible or environmentally sensitive lands out of agricultural production. Ducks Unlimited, Pheasant Forever, Field and Stream just to name a few organizations highly endorses the CRP program because it provides fabulous habitat for all kinds of hunting. If combines and other huge harvesting and farming equipment aren’t present in fields, then that allows upland birds, waterfowl, deer, elk and who knows what else to be unmolested in natural habitat. Well, Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack  recently announced that the USDA accepted 1.7 million acres nationwide into CRP as a result of the 2013 general sign-up.  I called up USDA spokesperson Candy Moore: “ We work with Idaho Fish and Game in our CRP program specifically to set aside acres to help specific species. CRP Has a lot of different  practices, some of them just dealing with grasslands  but there are also specific practices dealing with preserving wildlife.”  So let’s give a big shout out to the USDA and the feds in general for putting a lot of land into play in order to serve outdoorsmen.