The Conservation Reserve Enhancement Program enrollment is scheduled to end this year, unless there is an extension.

Producers interested in CREP enrollment should inquire now at the Farm Service Agency office. This will enable an approved contract to become effective on Oct. 1, 2007, which is the start of the fiscal year.

CREP is a 10 or 15 year program that is available throughout the Ohio River watershed in Western Pennsylvania. CREP is a popular program that provides annual rental payments to participants.

CREP goals are to improve water quality, increase wildlife habitat and increase farm income on marginal lands. CREP acreage cannot be harvested or grazed for the life of the contract.

CREP has several conservation practices and most have cost-share assistance, some up to 140 percent.

Listed below are the current practices available for CREP. These practices have many different components that are eligible. For example: water troughs and fencing for CP-22, which is a riparian buffer, or drain tile for CP-8A, which is a sod waterway.

If interested in any of the following, it would be a good idea to contact the Farm Service Agency for more information.

Practices under the CREP program are as follows:

• CP1 — establishment of cool season grasses

• CP2 — establishment of native warm season grasses

• CP4D — permanent wildlife habitat

• CP8A — grass waterway

• CP9 — shallow water area for wildlife

• CP10 — grass already established

• CP12 — wildlife food plot

• CP15A — contour grass strips

• CP21 — filter strips

• CP22 — riparian buffer

• CP23 — wetland restoration

• CP29 — wildlife habitat buffer

• CP30 — wetland buffer

Tillage practices

USDA's National Agricultural Statistics Service Pennsylvania field office has completed its first survey of tillage practices for field crops in the Commonwealth.

The tillage survey was funded by the Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture. It was conducted in conjunction with NASS's annual June agricultural survey.

In order to address the problem of highly erodible soil and soil compaction, many farmers have turned to no-till and minimum till practices.

Previously there were no survey based estimates of how many acres had been converted from conventional tillage practices to alternative methods.

Over the past few years, several industry groups have requested that NASS's Pennsylvania field office provide information on the tillage practices used in the state.

In 2007, conventional tillage was used on 29.2 percent of the major crop acreage in Pennsylvania.

No-till was practiced on 50.4 percent of the major crop acreage, and other conservation tillage practices were used on the remaining 20.4 percent.

Corn and soybeans are the two crops with the highest acreages. Conventional till was used on 29.0 percent of the corn acreage, no-till was practiced on 49.7 percent of the acreage, and the remaining 21.3 percent of the corn acreage used other conservation tillage practices.

In soybeans, conventional till was used on 20.5 percent of the acreage, no-till was practiced on 63.6 percent, and the remaining 15.9 percent of the soybean acreage used other conservation tillage practices.

As with most of NASS's survey work, these numbers will be subject to revision in June 2008.

With more operators realizing potential advantages to no-till and other conservation tillage practices — including reduced labor costs and increased water filtration — and as technology continues to change production practices, we anticipate that the mix of tillage practices will change.

Luke Fritz is executive director of the Butler County Farm Service Agency.