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USDA seeks farm land for wildlife habitatDES MOINES, Iowa (AP)--The government wants to turn more farmland into wildlife habitat. The U.S. Department of Agriculture is looking for landowners who will convert some of their cropland to wildlife habitat under the Conservation Reserve Program. Up to 27,000 acres of Iowa land could be set aside for projects approved by federal agriculture officials. The program is shrinking because landowners are returning idle acres to corn and soybeans and other crops as prices rise, and conservationists say valuable wildlife habitat is being lost. People who enroll in CRP get an annual payment for planting grass and trees and not crops. Conservationists say new CRP projects could be attractive to landowners with small, odd-shaped tracts. "We're just going to be have to be creative and proactive about how we can keep CRP on the landscape," said Dave Nomsen of Pheasants Forever, a conservation group. 2/4/08 Date: 1/30/08 Advertisement
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