Agricultural News
Broad Efforts by Farmers, Ranchers and Landowners Put Oklahoma On Top of Pollution Reduction
Fri, 05 Apr 2013 16:42:41 CDT
For the second year in a row, Oklahoma ranked at the top of the list among states which have cleaned up their waters significantly with the help and support of farmers, ranchers and landowners.
Shannon Phillips, the Director of Water Quality Programs with the Oklahoma Conservation Commission, has been very involved in the highly-successful efforts to clean up Oklahoma's once-fouled waters. She spoke with Radio Oklahoma Farm Director Ron Hays about the amount of work necessary to get the job done. (You can hear their full conversation by clicking on the LISTEN BAR at the bottom of this story.)
She said the Conservation Commission has supported broad efforts all across the state to help farmers and ranchers address their local needs rather than focusing on one or two major problem areas. She said this broad focus seems to be paying off.
"This is really an effort statewide and although there are some priority watersheds where there are more intensive efforts like the Illinois River, Eucha-Spavinaw, Grand Lake, the North Canadian River, this includes estimates to all the streams and rivers across the state as well."
In terms of actual reductions in the amount of pollutants reaching Oklahoma's lakes and streams, Phillips says the numbers are staggering.
"We contributed about 2.4 million pounds of phosphorous reduction to streams and about 2.6 million pounds of nitrogen reduction to streams. So, this is compared to EPA's goals for those programs which include 4.5 million pounds of phosphorous and 8.5 million pounds of nitrogen. So, we really helped the program meet more than half its phosphorous goal and at least 20 percent of its nitrogen goal."
Oklahoma also topped the list of states that significantly improved their water quality last year. Phillips says it's not a matter of coincidence that the state continues to do well in pollution-reduction efforts.
"I think what that shows is our programs are continuing to work and be effective. We certainly haven't done everything we need to do, but, comparatively, the programs that we have in place, the investments that we're making, are really paying off and continuing to do so. This is the second year we're Number 1, but we've been in the top five for a number of years now."
Now is not the time to rest, Phillips said. Even with all improvements from year to year, she said, "There are certainly water bodies that need to be cleaned up. There are other people that we can continue to work with and provide support to implement conservation practices. We still have a number of streams that remain on the 303D list. We have a number of water bodies that provide drinking water to our communities that have too many nutrients. So, we have to keep working on this because we're not finished yet."
She said agricultural producers have been enthusiastic and helpful by employing a number of tactics to help reduce pollution.
"The practices that are really most effective are anything that we can do to naturalize along water bodies-to create a natural buffer in between a stream or along the edge of a field. That natural plant community really helps filter out those nutrients. So, practices like riparian buffers, also things like no-till planting as opposed to conventional tillage that really help keeping from disturbing the soil surface and keeps those nutrients out of the water body."
She said increasing pasture quality has a big impact on water quality as well. She also said that poultry producers have been very supportive of efforts to move poultry litter from some of our most critical poultry-producing areas like the Illinois River and the Eucha-Spavinaw watersheds.
"We've reduced poultry litter application in those watersheds by 80 to 90 percent. So, it's been a very effective program in that litter is moving, for the most part, outside of poultry-producing wathersheds in this state.
WebReadyTM Powered by WireReady® NSI
Top Agricultural News
More Headlines...
