Farmers – Please Take Our Survey!
Windham NRCD was awarded grant funding by the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation through the Long Island Sound Futures Fund to work with partners and agricultural producers to identify the most effective best management practices (BMPs) for reducing Nitrogen runoff into the CT River Watershed. This is a bi-state project covering all of the upper Connecticut River Basin including portions of Vermont and New Hampshire.
This three-year project will enable us to gather a bi-state team of farmers and representatives from state and federal agencies, nonprofits and universities to identify the most effective BMPs for reducing Nitrogen runoff. The most critical aspect of this work will be hearing from a representative sample of farmers throughout the upper river basin to make sure we are selecting agricultural practices that are compatible with the unique needs of all of the different types and sizes of farms in the region.
This project is being directed by a steering committee of farmers and partners. The members of the steering committee are:
Marie Caduto and Marli Rupe – Vermont DEC
Ted Walsh and Steve Landry – New Hampshire DES
Guy Crosby, Jake Guest and Tom Beaudry – Connecticut River Watershed Farmers Alliance
Judson Peck – Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food and Markets
Amanda Littleton – Cheshire County Conservation District
Abbie Augarten – University of Vermont Extension
Carl Majewski – University of New Hampshire Extension
Nikki Kolb – NOFA NH
Kathy Urffer and Kate Buckman – Connecticut River Conservancy
Olivia Uyizeye – Connecticut River Joint Commission
Tom Aiken – NRCS Vermont
Don Keirstead, Tabith Edwards, Chad Cochrane, Jeremy Fowler – NRCS NH
Geof Dolman – Windham County NRCD, Vermont.
Naomi Detenbeck – EPA
We have three subcommittees working on various aspects of this project:
Survey Design Subcommittee – is working to design the survey we’ll use to gather info from farmers on BMPs and barriers to implementation.
Producer Outreach Subcommittee – is working to create a plan for outreach to make sure we reach farmers that are representative of the types and sizes of agriculture in the upper basin.
Secondary Source Review Subcommittee – is working to find and evaluate existing research to inform the design of our project.
If you are interested in joining any of these committees, please contact us at [email protected]. We have grant funding dedicated to providing producer stipends for participating in this project.