ESPN  

Time to save the farm bill

Don't bother hunting or fishing this fall if you can't take time to help save the conservation programs in the federal farm bill.

The conservation programs of the federal farm bill need your help.

• The Wetlands Reserve Program
• The Conservation Reserve Program
• Sodaver
• The Grasslands Reserve Program

These major farm bill conservation programs produce more fish and wildlife for hunters and anglers than anything else.

Don't believe it?

How about 2.2 million more ducks a year from Conservation Reserve Program land in the Prairie Pothole Region?

How about 13.5 million more pheasants?

How about thousands of miles of restored and protected streambanks?

Clean water for fish.

And 2 million acres in the Wetlands Reserve Program teeming with ducks, geese, wild turkeys, black bear, squirrels and deer.

The Wetlands Reserve Program is dead if the president doesn't sign a new farm bill by September 30. It's also important to change the appraisal process now used, so landowners get a fair price to conserve their wetlands.

The Conservation Reserve Program needs to pay a competitive price, so farmers will continue using it instead of turning their poor cropland into a vain attempt at corn for ethanol.

Sodsaver and the Grassland Reserve Program will protect the prairie grasslands so critical to duck production.

The House of Representatives passed its version of the farm bill in late July. Now it's the Senate's turn.

Congress is on vacation through Labor Day. Your senators are home for the next few weeks. Take time to visit or call them. Let them know you want strong conservation programs in the farm bill. You can make a difference.

Don't have time? Then don't hunt or fish this year.