Wildlife and soil conservation

Excerpt

WILD LIFE and agriculture exist together more harmoniously in Missouri thanks to a joint program of the Soil Conservation Service (SCS) and the Missouri Department of Conservation (MDC). An MDC wildlife biologist working in each of Missouri's seven SCS area offices sees that soil, water, wildlife, and fish management goals are becoming more attuned to each other. Missouri is the only state with this type of arrangement between SCS and a state conservation department.

Keith Jackson, MDC area wildlife biologist in the HanGbal area office, finds the program to be beneficial to both h4DC and SCS. “It allows MDC the opportunity to have impacts on land of farmers who would never come to us,” says Jackson. “It also helps with the misconception that deer, bunnies, and farming can't exist together.”

Before this program, Jackson says those farmers who came in contact with MDC and wanted to use the agency's resources tended to be hobby farmers or farmers who were willing to set aside a few acres of their unproductive land for …