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• Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack, speaking recently to ethanol producers and lobbyists in Washington, said that despite the loss of conservation reserve lands, a record number of farmers and record number of acres are enrolled in conservation. In fact, the number of acres in those other programs, which occur mostly on active farmland, has nearly doubled, to 301 million acres since the ethanol mandate was passed.
• "There is some great work beyond CRP being done," he said.
• A close look at the Corn Belt reveals a more complicated picture. Agriculture Department data obtained by the Associated Press show that the amount of land enrolled in the grassland reserve program has declined in every state and in Iowa by more than 50 percent. That program keeps property in grass that can be grazed by livestock. In Kansas and Nebraska, total lands enrolled in these other conservation lands have dropped.
• A different program that protects wetlands permanently has increased by only 45,000 acres since 2006 with most of that land -- 30,000 acres -- in North Dakota.
• Steve Bublitz, a guide with Fair Chase Pheasants, said he and his groups have noticed a significant drop in bird numbers this year in the fields around the Huron area.
• "I'd say we've got about half the birds we had last year," he said.
• Bublitz, who's been hunting birds for more than a half century, said months of persistent drought followed by a cold and wet spring have contributed to the drop, but the loss of adequate nesting cover also had a huge impact, leading to more predators.
• "The skunks, raccoons and possums, they eat the eggs," Bublitz said. "Foxes and coyotes eat the pheasants."
• South Dakota brood counts have shown significant declines the past two years alongside the pheasants' loss of habitat. Minnesota, North Dakota, Iowa, Kansas and Nebraska saw smaller drops, and hunters there are having to work harder to reach their limits.
• "As long as you're willing to walk a bit, you'll find some," said Josh Divan, a northwestern Iowa wildlife biologist for Pheasants Forever. "But it's not like it was."
• Divan said his part of Iowa has seen a dramatic loss in cover since 2008 as farmers have converted more acres to corn and soybeans. Growers can help provide habitat by integrating some grassland on the outskirts of the fields, hills or wetlands, but he said most of what he sees are fields planted fence row to fence row.
• "If you're in a corn-bean rotation, you're doing little to no good for wildlife," he said.

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