Do you farm or ranch and want to make conservation improvements to the land that you own or lease? Some examples of improvement could be planting a cover crop and/or no-till your fields to prevent soil erosion, performing forest stand improvement on your forest land, providing pollinator habitat, and completing an energy audit on your farm. Follow these five steps for assistance:

 

1. Planning - To get started with the NRCS (Natural Resources Conservation Service), stop by your local NRCS field office to discuss the vision for your land.  NRCS provides landowners with free technical assistance or advice on your land.  Technical assistance includes: resource assessment, practice design, and resource monitoring.  Planning is available for practices such as: energy audit, cover crop, conservation tillage, forest stand improvement, pollinator habitat, and soil health (just to name a few)

 

2. Application - NRCS staff will walk you through the application process if you would like financial assistance.  Applications for most programs are accepted on a continuous basis, but they’re considered for funding in different ranking periods.  Be sure to ask NRCS staff about the deadline.

 

3. Eligibility - As part of the application process you must meet eligibility.  To do this, you’ll need to provide: an official tax ID (Social Security number or an employer ID), a property deed or lease agreement to show you have control of the property; and a farm tract number.  Your local NRCS office can walk you through the eligibility process.

 

4. Ranking - NRCS will rank your application according to local resource concerns, the amount of conservation benefits the project will provide, and the needs of the application.

 

5. Implementing - If you are selected for funding, you can choose whether or not to sign the contract for work to be done.  Once you sign the contract, you’ll be provided with standards and specification for completing the practice or practices and the specific amount of time you will have to implement the work.  Once the work is implemented, inspected, and meets NRCS standards and specifications, you’ll be paid the rate of compensation.