The Faces and Places of Conservation
The
purpose and passion for conservation is shared among many. It is shared between
NRCS employees and partners who help people help the land. And it is shared by
the landowners with whom we work. Our passion is manifested through the benefits
derived from stewardship of private lands—benefits we all enjoy, such as cleaner
water and air, improved soils and abundant wildlife habitat.
Learn about our stories, the stories of
conservation made possible through a shared purpose, a shared passion and a
shared commitment to conservation.
Meet Nevada's Featured Employees...
Bringing a Purpose and
Passion to work
Every day, NRCS employees bring a purpose and passion to
their conservation work. Learn what drives their passion for
conservation.
Conservationist Cory Lytle Gets Excited about Helping Landowners . . .
For the past two years, I’ve been helping a farmer, Ed Hanson, replace
his 50-year-old concrete ditches with an engineered pipeline system to
irrigate 40 acres of grass and alfalfa hay. This is probably the most
successful conservation practice I’ve helped implement. With his new
system, Ed and his family are saving water, time and energy, and have
made their farm a safer place to live.
It all started during one of our 2002 Farm Bill public meetings. Ed
asked me about updating his conservation plan. His concrete ditches were
failing and it was taking him about 19 hours straight to irrigate. In
Nevada, you get your irrigation water when it’s your turn, about every
12 days during the growing season. If you don’t open your gates, the
water flows down the ditch to your neighbor. At 70 years of age, this
was putting quite a strain on Ed. The old ditches were a safety hazard
as well, since it was easy for Ed or his children to fall into the ditch
when opening the gates, especially if they were irrigating in the dead
of night. To make matters worse, Ed could only water about ¾ of his
fields, less than that in the heat of the summer. Ed signed up for EQIP
in August 2005 and got right to work installing the new system in
January 2006.
Recently, I stopped by to check on the project and was impressed by the
height of the grass hay and the size of the windrows. Ed had to borrow a
swather so he could cut the hay. The hay had grown so heavy and thick
that his older swather couldn’t get the job done. This was his third
cutting of grass hay; he also got 5 cuttings of alfalfa this year. He
credits the added production to the new pipeline, and being able to
control the water and getting it where it was needed on the fields.
Plus, it takes him less about an hour less to water all of his land.
Ed told me that irrigating is a pleasure now. He opens a set of risers,
goes back to the house, sets an alarm clock, and when the alarm rings,
he goes out and opens the next set. The family has developed a numbering
system for the risers so that even Ed’s grandchildren, ages 12 to 19,
can help—it has made irrigating that simple.
Helping People Help the Land—yes, that’s what it’s all about!
Soil
Scientist Doug Merkler Helps Educate People about the Importance of Soil
. . .
It’s not
often that the work we do affects millions of people but that’s what’s
happening as a result of a phone call from Dr. Robert Graham, a
pedologist from the University of California, Riverside. Dr. Graham
contacted me in June to help obtain a soil monolith from
an
arid landscape in the Mojave Desert. A soil monolith is a vertical slice
of soil in its natural position that is removed from a soil profile in
the field and mounted. These models help soil scientists observe soil
properties, help explain how soils form, and serve as valuable teaching
tools. The University of California, Riverside is adding the monoliths
to their soils teaching collection.
I was already working on a cooperative soil survey with the US Fish and
Wildlife Service on the Desert National Wildlife Refuge so they gave the
NRCS permission to extract and collect the monolith. Paul Sternberg, Dr.
Graham’s staff research associate and an expert in collecting soil
monoliths, spent two days sculpting and extracting the monolith of Purob
soil. Purob has a formidable impervious layer or hardpan with the upper
layer starting between 14 and 20 inches. A Purob monolith had not been
collected before due to the serious challenges created by its
concrete-like hardpan.
As a result of this effort, the US Fish and Wildlife Service became
totally enchanted with the role soils play in defining the ecosystems of
their refuge, and are going to display soil monoliths in their new
visitor center that will be completed next year. Word spread and now,
through the Red Rock Canyon Interpretive Association, the US Bureau of
Land Management plans to have a soil monolith on display in their brand
new $23 million visitor center, located in the Red Rock Canyon National
Conservation Area. Approximately 1.2 million visitors pass through the
visitor center each year.
These are the defining moments where we refine the passion for the work
we do; an opportunity to enlarge the scope of our profession, our agency
and our science.
With any luck, what is learned in Vegas will not stay in Vegas...
How could you not love this job!
View the "Conservation...Our Purpose. Our Passion"
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Video: Conservation... Our Purpose. Our Passion (5:24 minutes)
Video Transcript
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Our Passion" video may take a few moments to download depending
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View the National Campaign site.
Conservation…Our Purpose.
Our Passion. The purpose
and passion for conservation is shared among many. It is shared
between NRCS employees and partners who help people help the
land. And it is shared by the landowners with whom we work. Our
passion is manifested through the benefits derived from
stewardship of private lands—benefits we all enjoy, such as
cleaner water and air, improved soils and abundant wildlife
habitat.
Our Stories: Read about landowners who have succeeded in reaching
their conservation goals with the help of NRCS conservation technical
assistance and other programs. These stories can be searched by State,
region, crop, conservation practice, and program.
Helping People Help the
Land
Last Modified:
04/25/2008
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