A pilot program that pays farmers to restore wetlands and sloughs has been a success, say officials from the Assiniboine Watershed Stewardship Association in Yorkton, Sask.
But grain and oilseed producers were more reluctant to sign onto the program than forage producers, said watershed manager Aron Hershmiller.
He said grain and oilseed farmers generally felt the payments were not high enough to cover the value of lost production.
“The program was aimed at helping us get a gauge on what farmers were willing to restore and at what cost,” said Hershmiller.
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“We had bids from ranchers or forage producers and from grain and oilseed farmers as well, but at the end of the day, (all of the quarter sections) that were accepted in the program were in forage production.”
Grain farmers were less inclined to take cultivated land out of production and those who did submit bids sought higher compensation, he said.
The wetland restoration program was launched in 2008 as a joint initiative of Ducks Unlimited Canada and the Saskatchewan Watershed Authority.
Forty percent of the $200,000 budget came from Ducks Unlimited and the rest came from the provincial and federal governments and other public funding sources.
The program invited farmers in the Assiniboine watershed area to submit bids in a reverse auction.
The bids stated how much money a farmer would require to restore a drained or inoperative wetland and leave the restored wetland in its natural state for 12 years.
Roughly 30 farmers submitted bids in the program. Program administrators signed agreements with seven farmers, who restored 212 wetlands on 30 quarter sections of land.
Hershmiller said restored wetlands varied in size, with the smallest one covering one-tenth of an acre and the largest covering nearly 23 acres. The average wetland was one acre.
Payments were two times the land’s fair market value.
Hershmiller said the wetland restoration project is similar to other pilot programs, such as the Alternative Land Use Services, which pay farmers for providing an environmental service that benefits society.
“As a society, do we want to restore and maintain wetlands and if we do, can we expect the farmers to bear that cost and get nothing in return?”
He said research has shown that restoring wetlands increases ground water reserves, improves ground water quality, reduces the risk of nutrient loading and nutrient runoff, sequesters carbon, provides habitat for wildlife and waterfowl, enhances biodiversity and reduces the impact of downstream flooding.
The environmental benefits of maintaining wetlands becomes even more apparent in high runoff years, he said.
“When you talk to some big farmers, who are also councillors and reeves in their municipalities, they’re recognizing those benefits in a year like this with all the runoff,” he said.
“In some areas, the water is coming off those fields in high quantities.”
Ducks Unlimited used aerial photographs and satellite imagery to restore wetlands registered in the AWSA program. The images showed the original size and location of wetlands that were drained for agricultural purposes.
Artificial drainage channels were closed with a plug or an earthen berm on the downstream side of the wetland area.
The berms’ height allows runoff to still spill out of the wetland if water levels exceed a certain level.
Biologists suggested it will take two or three years for water to accumulate in restored wetlands and for the areas to revegetate and become fully functional. Some of the wetlands are already recovering, thanks largely to the heavy rainfall and excessive soil moisture of the past two years.
“Some of them are looking pretty lush,” said Hershmiller. “The vegetation is coming back nicely.”
The program’s second phase will be a multi-year study of the restored wetlands by University of Guelph researchers to determine the impact on water quality, ground water quantity and the wetlands’ ability to sequester carbon.
