Group works with landowners
MINERAL COUNTY – For more than 75 years, the Natural Resources Conservation Service has been helping private landowners develop and sustain natural resources on their land and the work continues to this day in Mineral County.
Operating out of Missoula, the NRCS field office has been actively working within the county to assist landowners in not only harvesting natural resources on their property but also in practicing responsible land management habits. District Conservationist John Bowe said the efforts within Mineral County have been widespread.
“The NRCS is a federal agency that works with private landowners to address resource concerns,” Bowe said. “We develop conservation plans. We offer some basic recommendations to concerns people have right on up to full blown resource assessments with a very comprehensive resource plan that would address a number of resource issues.”
Bowe said there was also financial assistance available in some cases.
“We do have funding available through different Farm Bill programs,” Bowe said. “We’ve been around for a long time. We recently celebrated our 75th year. We cover Mineral County from Missoula and we enjoy a very strong relationship there.”
Some of the specific concerns Bowe has heard from residents from Mineral County involved primarily forestry issues.
“That’s one of the primary land uses if not the primary land use issue private property owners have in Mineral County,” Bowe said. “That’s a large part of what we do. We also look at noxious weeds and cropland usage. We look at improving the overall health of the forest. A typical forest management project would have us looking at the regrowth of an area that has been logged. It tends to come back pretty thick and can be a wildfire threat.”
Bowe said the NRCS is aware of problems in Mineral County forests that are common knowledge to many residents and county officials familiar with land management issues in the area.
“We do a lot of work on forested acreages to improve the overall health,” Bowe said. “We work to develop thinning plans that are targeting overstocked, unhealthy areas and look to get the acreages to a place that can sustain enhanced growth.”
Bowe said the process works a number of ways. He said landowners are welcome to reach out to them but that they also go out into the field and identify locations that could use help.
“We are always available if someone is interested,” Bowe said. “They are more than welcome to contact us. We’ve had very good luck in Mineral County. We have conducted outreach activities to get the word out. We do target areas from time to time.”
According to the NRCS website, “for more than 75 years, NRCS and its predecessor agencies have worked in close partnerships with farmers and ranchers, local and state governments, and other federal agencies to maintain healthy and productive working landscapes.
On April 27, 1935 Congress passed Public Law 74-46, in which it recognized that “the wastage of soil and moisture resources on farm, grazing, and forest lands . . .is a menace to the national welfare” and established the Soil Conservation Service (SCS) as a permanent agency in the USDA. In 1994, SCS’s name was changed to the Natural Resources Conservation Service to better reflect the broadened scope of the agency’s concerns. In doing so, Congress reaffirmed the federal commitment to the conservation of the nation’s soil and water resources, first made 75 years ago that continues to this day.”