New Purpose for Hunting Ground: CRP May Be Too Low
- Brooke Bouma Kohlsdorf
- 3 days ago
- 3 min read
When long-time realtor Randy Oertwich listed a 220-acre property in northeast Nebraska earlier this year, he described it as a “hunter’s dream property” with a secluded cabin and rolling hills that overlook a river valley and lots of native grasses.
It had high pheasant numbers and was close to Norfolk and only about 80 miles from Omaha. A full price offer of $1,813,750 came quickly, which was no surprise. But what did surprise Oertwich was what the new owner planned to do with the land.
A local farmer purchased the property and decided to transition the land from a private recreational retreat into a traditional row crop farm. But to do this, he had to take the ground out of the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) where it had been for the past 20 years.
The most recent CRP contract paid out $238 per acre each year for the owner to keep the land out of production to prevent erosion.
Oertwich thinks the sale of this land, and its new owner’s plans for it, may suggest that the CRP per acre payment -- known as the rental rate -- was too low to entice people to keep it in this specific program.
“The profit potential for row cropping isn’t that high, but the rental rate is too low,” Oertwich said. “If the rental rate would have been higher, I am sure it would have been sold to someone who would keep it in grass because it was an exceptional pheasant hunting area.”
CRP Rental Rates Vary
Rental rates can differ greatly by state and even by county. According to Jennifer Prenosil with Nebraska Game and Parks Commission, the rate for crop ground is determined by the soil makeup of the land.
Programs for crop ground that require owners to take the land out of production get higher amounts of money. Grassland programs, some of which allow you to continue to raise animals while enrolled in the program, pay out a smaller amount.
Prenosil believes CRP cropland could be more enticing for some people, especially for owners who enroll their entire field. “I think if rental rates were a bit higher, we would see more interest and also be retaining more ground, too,” she said.
Even though she thinks more landowners could take advantage of the program, she sees firsthand how it is currently improving soil and the ecosystem. “We definitely see the value that it provides for wildlife habitat.”
Prenosil said there are currently roughly 2.4 million acres of Nebraska ground enrolled in CRP. That includes 600,000 acres of cropland and 1.8 million acres of grassland. But those numbers are down.
CRP Land Has Fallen Over Past 30 Years in Nebraska
According to USDA statistics, Nebraska is at about half of peak cropland enrollment levels reached in the mid-1990s. However, grassland, which was added to the program more recently in the 2014 Farm Bill, has been popular due to its flexibility to allow ranchers to continue raising animals while the land is in CRP.
National USDA statistics show the ebbs and flows of the program. When it began in 1986, enrollment grew quickly, reaching 33 million acres in 1990. After the initial contacts were awarded, the program expanded.
Between 1990 and 2008, enrollment fluctuated around 33 million acres before falling to a 30-year low in 2021. In 2022 the acreage rose to 22 million and then grew to 22.9 million in 2023.
The program spends about $1.8 billion annually, according to the USDA. Program acreage tends to be concentrated on marginally productive cropland that is susceptible to erosion by wind or rainfall.
Conservation Reserve Program Works to Grow Land Cover
The program is administered by the Farm Service Agency with a goal of re-establishing valuable land cover, which helps improve water quality, prevent soil erosion, and reduce loss of wildlife habitat.
A large share of land is enrolled in CRP in Texas, Montana, North Dakota, and across the Great Plains, where rainfall is limited, and much of the land is subject to potentially severe wind erosion.
Smaller concentrations of CRP land are found in eastern Washington, southern Iowa, northern Missouri, along the Mississippi River in Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, southeastern Idaho, and northwestern Utah.
