Local News

Montgomery Co Conservation Minded Farmers Score a Big Win

Mon, 15 Mar 2021 14:28:22 CDT
Montgomery County farmers are taking advantage of a new Illinois Department of Agriculture program, Fall Covers for Spring Savings. Established in 2020, the Fall Covers for Spring Savings rewards farmers, who plant cover crops for the IDOA program, receive a $5 per acre discount on their federal crop insurance. The IDOA program is limited to the first 50,000 acres enrolled. In this second year of the program, Montgomery County farmers reported 9,427 acres, or 5% of the IL total of 185,050 acres statewide. The Montgomery County acreage was the most acres applied for of any of the 86 reporting counties in Illinois. Montgomery County had 1,317 acres accepted into the program. These acres represent 2.6% of the 50,000 acres accepted state wide for the $5 savings per acre.

Fall Covers for Spring Savings is patterned after an Iowa DOA program established in 2019 of 1,000,000 acres. Kris Reynolds, local Rountree Township farmer and Midwest Regional Director of the American Farmland Trust, championed the initiative and moved the legislation through the IL General Assembly. Our Fall Covers for Spring Savings accomplishes a great deal toward conservation here in Illinois by reducing soil and water erosion and wind erosion, especially in the Spring. In addition, this program reduces the amount of fertilizer nutrients leaving farm fields, thus improving water quality. These facts are especially important for our drinking water lakes here in Montgomery Co.

If you take a drive around rural Montgomery County and see green fields in early spring, these are either fields of winter wheat or fields of cover crops. Take time to thank the farmer of these fields, they are protecting our two most valuable resources here in Illinois, our farmland and the water we drink. If you like what Montgomery County conservation farmers are doing with Fall Covers for Spring Savings, contact your local legislators and ask them to continue funding of this outstanding initiative.