[District Letterhead]
NEWS RELEASEContact: [Name]
For Immediate Release [Phone Number]
[Date] [Email Address]
Stream Fencing Improves Herd Health, Productivity
(Your City, VA) –Fences make more than good neighbors. With help from their local Soil and Water Conservation District, Virginia farmers are discovering that fencing the streams on their property makes for healthier, more profitable cattle–as well as cleaner local waterways.
That’s because excluding livestock from streams helps keep their banks from eroding and decreases the amount of sediment that they carry. It also eliminates the bacteria associated with livestock waste that cause illness in both humans and animals
“Improved herd health, and a corresponding decrease in veterinary bills, are definite economic benefits of streamside livestock exclusion,” said [Name, Title] of [Name] Soil and Water Conservation District.
A single case of environmental mastitis, for example, can put a dairy cow out of production for days and cost $150 to treat. In addition, stream fencing prevents leg injuries that cattle may suffer on muddy banks and eliminates the possibility that cows will calve by the water, where newborns are more likely to suffer hypothermia and death.
Farm productivity increases, too. Studies have shown that when farmers provide clean water instead of letting their cattle drink from streams, animals gain more weight, more quickly. Some Virginia dairy farmers have reported that cows on alternative watering systems produce milk that has a higher butterfat content, [Last Name] added.
Funding from the Virginia Agricultural Best Management Practices Cost-Share Program is available to offset the costs of installing fences and alternative watering systems.In the 2010 program year, that means 75 percent of the cost of all eligible components, along with a 25 percent tax credit.(Districts in the Bay watershed should use the previous line highlighted in yellow.) In the 2010 program year, farmers in this area can have 75 percent of the cost of all eligible components reimbursed, or they can opt for a 50 percent reimbursement with only a 10 foot set-back required. In both cases a 25 percent tax credit is available. (Southern River Districts should use the previous lines highlighted in blue.)
Farmers can enhance the economic benefits of stream fencing by creating wooded or grassy buffers, which can qualify for a combination of state and federal agricultural incentives that reimburse from 50 percent to 115 percent of installation costs.
Streamside livestock exclusion is one of five sets of priority agricultural best management practices promoted by the Virginia Department of Conservation and Recreation, which administers the Virginia Agricultural Best Management Practices Cost-Share Program. The Commonwealth’s 47 Soil and Water Conservation Districts carry out the Virginia Cost-Share Program at the local level.
District staff can help farmers apply for many different cost-share funding programs to help implement streamside livestock exclusion best management practices. They also can identify other conservation programs for which agricultural operations of all kinds can qualify.
For more information, contact [First Name, Last Name] at [Name] Soil and Water Conservation District, [phone number] or [email address].
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