Thank you! Ag producers and landowners, doing their part

Ag Day is approaching, and the Grand Lake/Wabash Watershed Alliance is extending our thanks to producers in the watershed.

Press Release
GLWWA Thanks Producers
In honor of National Agriculture Day, March 21, 2008, the Grand Lake/Wabash Watershed Alliance
(GLWWA) would like to extend gratitude to all landowners and operators who use best management
practices (BMPs).  Utilization of BMPs is important for many reasons.

Planting strips of grassland around a field will slow surface water runoff and filter water, keeping sediment
and nutrients from entering the water.  Thank you to the producers in the Grand Lake St. Marys watershed
who are participating in the 2007 Agriculture Incentive Program or have signed up for the EQIP
Demonstration Project.  Both of these programs offered an incentive to plant filter strips that can be cut for
hay.  A special thank you goes out to producers who install filter strips on their own.

As winter continues, we want to thank producers who followed winter manure application guidelines.  By
following setbacks and application rates, nutrients are kept on your fields and out of the water.  These
practices take time and the extra effort is noticed.

As spring arrives, the GLWWA wants to send an early thank you to producers and landowners who test
their soil and follow the analysis recommendations.  As we have seen, many lawns and some fields do not
need phosphorous on a regular basis.  Keeping the phosphorous to only the level needed for healthy plants
will reduce the phosphorous carried away by runoff.

A big thank you goes to the producers who tried a cover crop this winter.  Cover crops are planted during
the fall, capturing nitrogen and other nutrients.  These nutrients are held on the field, instead of running off
during winter freeze and thaw.  In the spring, these plants will decompose releasing the nutrients for the
summer crop.

The last big thank you is extended to agriculture landowners and operators who have considered bettering
water quality with their practices.  Only a few are specifically mentioned above, so many of the very
important practices are not mentioned.  Wetlands, riparian buffers, Conservation Reserve Programs and
many more BMPs are vital for improving water quality.  The GLWWA will continue to search for
incentives and cost share programs to make BMPs more cost effective.  There are many facets to our
watershed action plan and it will not be a success without action from the agriculture stakeholders.

If you are a stakeholder in the Wabash River Watershed, please consider attending the Public Advisory
Board meeting on March 25, 2008.  This meeting will start at 7 p.m. in the Fort Recovery Village Hall.
The topic of discussion will be a grant application for agriculture practices that will improve water quality
in the Wabash River Watershed.  These practices must be in one subwatershed, as seen in the attached
map.  If you have questions about this meeting or the above information, please call Mercer County Soil
and Water Conservation District at 419-586-3289.
 Ag Day 2008

In 2008 the GLWWA is planning to submit a 319 grant application for agriculture practices in one of these hydrologic codes:
1.Wabash Headwaters to below Bear Creek
2.Wabash River above Bear Creek below Stony Creek
3.Wabash River below Stony Creek above Beaver Creek
4.Beaver Creek from Grand Lake to above Little Beaver Creek
5.Little Beaver Creek
6.Beaver Creek below Little Beaver Creek to Wabash River
7.Wabash River below Beaver Creek to New Corydon
8.Limberlost Creek Headwaters to below Bull Creek

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