Reading Time: 3 minutes Producers can find the right buyers for their marginal lands — if they know where to look. “There is a market out there now for some of these parcels of land that producers might have a hard time off-loading because they’re wet,” said Warren Robb, provincial policy specialist at Ducks Unlimited Canada. And his organization […] Read more
This ain’t your grandad’s conservation easement
Easements are changing with the times, making it less restrictive for producers to protect their wetlands
‘Eco-buffer’ boosts pasture productivity for Alberta producer
Letting nature do its job got Don Ruzicka off a treadmill of clearing trees, draining wetlands, and poor returns
Reading Time: 4 minutes Some people look for signs — other people just find them. For producer Don Ruzicka of Killam, the motivation behind the past three decades of land management on his farm was quite literally a sign. Before he purchased his grandparents’ farm in 1983, Ruzicka worked in the logging industry. “The first day I flew into […] Read more
Keep watch for this wetland invader
Reading Time: < 1 minute Flowering rush has been spotted in a few locations in Alberta, including an infestation on Lake Isle, located in Lac St. Anne and Parkland counties. Flowering rush is a perennial of freshwater wetlands that is native to Africa, Asia and Europe and was introduced to North America as an ornamental plant species. It is a […] Read more
Making it better when it is wetter — and when it’s dry, too
Ducks Unlimited has two wetlands restoration programs drawing on $31 million in provincial funding
Reading Time: 3 minutes Whether floods in 2013 or drought this year, extreme weather has taken its toll on producers throughout Alberta in recent years. The good news is Mother Nature can help with that. And the provincial government is also chipping in, with $31 million in funding over three years to encourage farmers and other rural landowners to […] Read more
Rancher’s generous donation is a gift for all Albertans
Reading Time: 2 minutes Gottlob Schmidt had a dream of preserving the land that he has spent so much time on. And the realization of that dream will benefit all Albertans with the creation of the province’s 76th provincial park. “It has always been my wish that someday I could leave this land to someone else,” said the 90-year-old […] Read more
Both pros and cons to tile drainage
Being able to remove excess moisture is a big plus, but there are a lot of factors to take into account
Reading Time: 3 minutes It wasn’t long ago that if you asked most Alberta producers if they used tile drainage, they likely wouldn’t know what you were talking about. A common practice in Ontario and the U.S. Midwest, it’s only in recent years that Alberta growers have warmed to this system in which subsurface tubes remove excess moisture from […] Read more
Ducks Unlimited Canada opens Strathmore office
Reading Time: < 1 minute Ducks Unlimited Canada has opened a new office in Strathmore. It will house an expanded number of wetland restoration and conservation staff and will complement DUC’s current network of personnel who already work in southern and central Alberta with landowners, communities and municipal governments within the counties of Acadia, Cypress, Wheatland, Foothills, Newell, Paintearth, Taber, […] Read more
Running the ruler on what works best
Project takes a high tech appraoch to rate the value of wetlands
Reading Time: < 1 minute To answer the question ‘What is a wetland worth?’ the Alberta Land Institute will be going high tech in the Nose Creek watershed project. The province uses letter grades — A, B, C, and D — to rate the functional value of wetlands. To assign a grade, project officials will employ a type of aerial […] Read more
What’s it worth? New project aims to nail down the value of wetlands
Innovative new project features a reverse auction in which producers ‘bid’ on the compensation they’d want for giving up acres
Reading Time: 4 minutes Wetlands often present a difficult choice for producers — keep them for their environmental value or drain them for the sake of the bottom line. Until recently, converting wetlands to croppable land was commonplace, and even encouraged by government projects that paid farmers to drain them. Wetlands advocates know it will take compensation to reverse […] Read more
Alberta wetlands receive funding for conservation projects
More than 1,300 acres will be conserved or restored thanks to $11.6 million grant
Reading Time: < 1 minute Ducks Unlimited Canada will receive more than $11.6 million in grant funds for wetland conservation and restoration work to help reduce the impact of flooding and drought in Alberta. The funding comes from the Alberta government’s Watershed Resiliency and Restoration Program. Wetlands have the ability to store water and slow the release of water into […] Read more
Cyber-Savvy Farmer
