A University of Illinois expert is making recommendations for restoring production in the 133-thousand acres of Missouri farmland damaged by last summer’s frontline and fuse plug flooding at Birds Point, Missouri. Kenneth Olson, of the Natural Resources and Environmental Sciences Department at the University, says the damage will be – long-lasting, if not permanent. Olson says – some of this lost cropland, adjacent to the patched levees, could be restored as wetlands and wildlife habitat.

In reclaiming the fields, Olson believes – the soils are likely to have lower productivity. The resulting land surface will have less soil aggregation, less organic carbon, and be more sloping, making it difficult to farm the land. Olson has recommended several actions, including: creating temporary water storage structures, changing crop rotation in the upland to include more forages rather than row crops, converting more of the agricultural land to timberland or grassland that can use or store more water, and building higher and stronger levees that are located farther from the riverbanks to widen the river flow channel.

Olson and his colleagues Mike Reed and Lois Wright Morton contend that strategically placed wetlands, settling basins, nutrient filtering, and levees are effective management for internal control of water and sediment.

Courtesy: NAFB News