Press Release
Through the Mississippi River Basin Healthy Watershed Initiative (MRBI), NRCS and its partners help producers in selected watersheds voluntarily implement conservation practices that control nutrient runoff, improve wildlife habitat, and maintain agricultural productivity.
Wisconsin Demonstration Farm Networks
NRCS Demo Farm Networks showcase the best, leading-edge conservation practices to reduce phosphorus and sediment from entering watersheds vital to our nation's drinking water supply.
Past Projects in Wisconsin
Wisconsin Program Contact
Melissa Bartz - Assistant State Conservationist for Programs
melissa.bartz@usda.gov
(608) 662-4422, ext. 232
MRBI Success Stories
Learn more about the impact of MRBI through our success stories.
A Recipe for Success: Improving Water Quality in the Indian Creek Watershed
Voluntary conservation efforts focused in small watersheds can yield big results for locally important waters. See how NRCS, landowners, and partners are working together to improve water quality in Illinois.
Learn MoreStepping Up for a Cleaner Mississippi River
Meet Iowa's 2015 Soil Conservation Farmer of the Year Award recipient, Tim Smith, one of the many conservation farmers participating in a USDA program designed to reduce nutrient and sediment loading in the Mississippi River Basin.
Learn MoreReady to get started?
Contact your local service center to start your application.
How to Get Assistance
Do you farm or ranch and want to make improvements to the land that you own or lease?
Natural Resources Conservation Service offers technical and financial assistance to help farmers, ranchers and forest landowners.
To get started with NRCS, we recommend you stop by your local NRCS field office. We’ll discuss your vision for your land.
NRCS provides landowners with free technical assistance, or advice, for their land. Common technical assistance includes: resource assessment, practice design and resource monitoring. Your conservation planner will help you determine if financial assistance is right for you.
We’ll walk you through the application process. To get started on applying for financial assistance, we’ll work with you:
- To fill out an AD 1026, which ensures a conservation plan is in place before lands with highly erodible soils are farmed. It also ensures that identified wetland areas are protected.
- To meet other eligibility certifications.
Once complete, we’ll work with you on the application, or CPA 1200.
Applications for most programs are accepted on a continuous basis, but they’re considered for funding in different ranking periods. Be sure to ask your local NRCS district conservationist about the deadline for the ranking period to ensure you turn in your application in time.
As part of the application process, we’ll check to see if you are eligible. To do this, you’ll need to bring:
- An official tax ID (Social Security number or an employer ID)
- A property deed or lease agreement to show you have control of the property; and
- A farm number.
If you don’t have a farm number, you can get one from USDA’s Farm Service Agency. Typically, the local FSA office is located in the same building as the local NRCS office. You only need a farm number if you’re interested in financial assistance.
NRCS will take a look at the applications and rank them according to local resource concerns, the amount of conservation benefits the work will provide and the needs of applicants. View Application Ranking Dates by State.
If you’re selected, you can choose whether to sign the contract for the work to be done.
Once you sign the contract, you’ll be provided standards and specifications for completing the practice or practices, and then you will have a specified amount of time to implement. Once the work is implemented and inspected, you’ll be paid the rate of compensation for the work if it meets NRCS standards and specifications.
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