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Protecting Habitat in Farmlands
With nearly two-thirds of the lower 48 states' land base engaged in some form of farming and ranching activities, agriculture is a dominant force on the U.S. landscape. The importance of vital agricultural production systems for the country and for the world as a whole cannot be over-emphasized. Most obvious are agriculture's immense contributions to both global and regional economies and food and fiber systems. Another often under-estimated value of agricultural lands is the essential habitat linkages well-managed farms and ranches can provide in maintaining healthy ecosystems.
It wasn't by accident that the most biologically diverse and productive lands were settled for agriculture. Choosing places with the best soils, access to water, and beneficial climatic conditions, U.S. agriculture spread from fertile river valleys to converted grasslands and woodlands and finally to more marginal lands and wetlands. By the mid-twentieth century, agriculture became increasingly mechanized and industrialized. Farms that previously combined row crops and livestock within a matrix of non-cropped areas gave way to specialized, monocrop operations that required ever larger areas to operate. Fencerow-to-fencerow conversion of hedgerows, shelterbelts, wetlands, and wildways greatly increased the separation between agriculture and the native landscape. The ever-expanding production of commodity crops led to decades of low prices. In an effort to survive in an increasingly globalizing economy, landowners resorted to overgrazing, overplanting, overplowing, chemical intensive monocultures, and other forms of land misuse.
Among the many devastating consequences of modern agriculture are habitat destruction and fragmentation, the displacement of native species and the introduction of exotic species, pollution of terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems, soil erosion, the persecution of predators, the release of genetically modified organisms, and the overexploitation of nonrenewable resources for food production and distribution. According to the US Department of Agriculture's own 1996 statistics, farming activities contributed to 46 percent of species listed as threatened or endangered, and ranching to 26 percent (USDA, America's Private Lands: A Geography of Hope, 1999).
Agriculture has also had disproportionate impacts on certain habitats over others. Floodplains-essential to all healthy river systems-have always been attractive to agriculturalists and have been usurped and re-engineered for farming in areas throughout the country. Tens of millions of acres of grasslands have been converted for the production of grains, while oak woodlands throughout the west coast were cleared first for fruit tree crops and more recently for vineyards. At the same time, those wildlands that we have managed to protect are not proportionally represented throughout our ecoregions. Instead, protected wildlands have primarily been relegated to high elevation coniferous forests and alpine regions rather than complete sweeps of the landscape.
Today, just under 5 percent of the land in the continental United States has been protected as roadless wilderness. Many of those protected areas have become too isolated and fragmented to support the diversity of native and migratory species that depend upon them for survival. With so much of the land now in farming and ranching activities, agriculture can and must provide vital linkages between fragmented wildlands and between aquatic and terrestrial habitats.
With the proper incentives, assistance, and resources, farmers and
ranchers could be supported to manage their lands more sustainably, and
profitably, while protecting conservation values. The integration of native
habitats and wildlife on farms and ranches can bring a number of agricultural,
economic, and conservation benefits, such as:
- Yield enhancement (pollination and biological pest control);
- Reduction of yield losses (wind protection, erosion control);
- Water quality improvements (sediment filtration, streambank stabilization, water table recharge);
- Biodiversity protection (seed dispersal, breeding opportunities, aquatic and terrestrial habitat linkages for native and migratory species);
- Restoration of previously damaged landscapes and the protection of remnant intact habitat types;
- Restoration of ecosystem processes such as flooding, lightning-ignited fire, nutrient cycling, and predation;
- Agrotourism opportunities (bird and breakfasts, fishing and hunting opportunities, farm visits).
In this section. . .
Much of the private land in the US used for farming or raising livestock can also provide habitat for many species of fish and wildlife.
Agriculture can provide vital linkages between fragmented wildlands and between aquatic and terrestrial habitats.
There is a direct correlation between our grocery lists and the endangered species list.
Inspiring stories and replicable models of conservation-based agriculture.
Recommended reading and web sites worth visiting.
