USDA Accepting Applications to Help Cover Costs for Organic Certification

Contact: FPAC.BC.Press@usda.gov

WASHINGTON, Aug. 17, 2021 – Organic producers and handlers can now apply for U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) funds to assist with the cost of receiving or maintaining organic certification. Applications for the Organic Certification Cost Share Program (OCCSP) are due Nov. 1, 2021.  

“USDA is here to help all producers, including those who grow our nation’s organic food and fiber. Many farmers have told us that cost was a barrier to their ability to get an organic certification,” said Zach Ducheneaux, administrator of USDA’s Farm Service Agency (FSA). “By assisting with the costs, this program can help organic farmers get their certification along with the benefits that come with it.” 

OCCSP provides cost-share assistance to producers and handlers of agricultural products for the costs of obtaining or maintaining organic certification under the USDA’s National Organic Program. Eligible producers include any certified producers or handlers who have paid organic certification fees to a USDA-accredited certifying agent during the 2021 and any subsequent program year. Producers can be reimbursed for expenses made between Oct. 1, 2020 and Sept. 30, 2021 including application fees, inspection costs, fees related to equivalency agreement and arrangement requirements, travel expenses for inspectors, user fees, sales assessments and postage. 

For 2021, OCCSP will reimburse 50% of a certified operation’s allowable certification costs, up to a maximum of $500 for each of the following categories (or “scopes”):  

  • crops

  • wild crops

  • livestock

  • processing/handling

  • State organic program fees

Organic farmers and ranchers may apply through an FSA county office or a participating state agency.  

This funding will be complemented by an additional $20 million for organic and transitioning producers through the Pandemic Assistance for Producers initiative. More information on that funding will be available in the coming weeks.

More Information 

To learn more about organic certification cost share, please visit the OCCSP webpage, visit usda.gov/organic, or contact your local USDA Service Center. 

In the Biden-Harris Administration, USDA is transforming America’s food system with a greater focus on more resilient local and regional food production, fairer markets for all producers, ensuring access to safe, healthy and nutritious food in all communities, building new markets and streams of income for farmers and producers using climate smart food and forestry practices, making historic investments in infrastructure and clean energy capabilities in rural America, and committing to equity across the Department by removing systemic barriers and building a workforce more representative of America. To learn more, visit http://www.usda.gov. 

USDA is an equal opportunity provider, employer and lender.

Mr. Earrak & Mrs. Arnetta Cotton featured in Minority Landowner Magazine

Rhonda White-Bowman shared some amazing news with us today! The Wagoner County Conservation District nominated Mr. Earrak & Mrs. Arnetta Cotton for the 2020 Farmer of the Year and they were chosen to appear in the Minority Landowner Magazine. Click Here to for the full issue of the magazine. Congratulations to Mr. and Mrs. Cotton and thank you, Rhonda, for sharing this exciting news!

USDA Announces Dates for Conservation Reserve Program Grasslands Signups

Contact: FPAC.BC.Press@usda.gov

WASHINGTON, July 12, 2021 –– Agricultural producers and landowners can apply for the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) Grasslands signup from today until August 20. This year, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) updated signup options to provide greater incentives for producers and increase the program’s conservation and climate benefits, including setting a minimum rental rate and identifying two national priority zones.

The CRP Grassland signup is competitive, and USDA’s Farm Service Agency (FSA) will provide for annual rental payments for land devoted to conservation purposes.

“We are excited to roll out our new and improved CRP Grasslands signups,” said FSA Administrator Zach Ducheneaux. “Bottom line, CRP now makes more financial sense for producers while also providing a bigger return on investment in terms of natural resource benefits. The Grasslands signup is part of a broader suite of tools available through CRP to integrate key conservation practices on our nation’s working lands.”

Grasslands Signup

CRP Grasslands helps landowners and operators protect grassland, including rangeland, and pastureland and certain other lands, while maintaining the areas as working grazing lands. Protecting grasslands contributes positively to the economy of many regions, provides biodiversity of plant and animal populations, and provides important carbon sequestration benefits.

FSA has updated the Grasslands Signup to establish a minimum rental rate of $15 per acre, which will benefit 1,300 counties.

To focus on important wildlife corridors, FSA also identified National Grassland Priority Zones, providing extra incentives to producers for enrolling grasslands in important migratory corridors and environmentally sensitive areas – the Greater Yellowstone Elk Migration Corridor and the Severe Wind Erosion – Dust Bowl Zone. Counties within these two zones get extra ranking points as well as $5 added to their rental rate. The CRP Grasslands Ranking Factors fact sheet has additional information.

How to Sign Up

To enroll in the CRP Grasslands signup, producers and landowners should contact USDA by the August 20 deadline. Service Center staff continue to work with agricultural producers via phone, email, and other digital tools. Because of the pandemic, some USDA Service Centers are open to limited visitors. Contact your Service Center to set up an in-person or phone appointment. Additionally, more information related to USDA’s response and relief for producers can be found at farmers.gov/coronavirus.

More Information on CRP

Signed into law in 1985, CRP is one of the largest voluntary private-lands conservation programs in the United States. It was originally intended to primarily control soil erosion and potentially stabilize commodity prices by taking marginal lands out of production. The program has evolved over the years, providing many conservation and economic benefits. The program marked its 35-year anniversary this past December.

Under the Biden-Harris Administration, USDA is engaged in a whole-of-government effort to combat the climate crisis and conserve and protect our nation’s lands, biodiversity, and natural resources, including our soil, air and water. Through conservation practices, USDA aims to enhance economic growth and create new streams of income for farmers, ranchers, producers and private foresters. Successfully meeting these challenges will require USDA and our agencies to pursue a coordinated approach alongside USDA stakeholders, including state, local, and tribal governments.

USDA touches the lives of all Americans each day in so many positive ways. In the Biden-Harris Administration, USDA is transforming America’s food system with a greater focus on more resilient local and regional food production, fairer markets for all producers, ensuring access to healthy and nutritious food in all communities, building new markets and streams of income for farmers and producers using climate smart food and forestry practices, making historic investments in infrastructure and clean energy capabilities in rural America, and committing to equity across the Department by removing systemic barriers and building a workforce more representative of America. To learn more, visit www.usda.gov.

USDA is an equal opportunity provider, employer and lender.

FreshRx launches program with the first delivery of locally grown food.

Press release

 

 

Tulsa, OK, July 13, 2021— FreshRx, a program to help fight diabetes in the north Tulsa community, is distributing their first delivery of locally grown produce to patients. FreshRx has been preparing for months to use safely grown food to assist Diabetes patients live a healthy life. While also inspiring healthy living through nature, FreshRx aims to combat the reality that people from the north Tulsa neighborhood are more susceptible to diabetes than any other neighborhood in the city. The 50 participants will pick up their first food prescription bags every other Tuesday at the Tulsa Dream Center between 2 P.M. and 4 P.M. starting on July 13th. The local farms and organizations contributing to this are:

 

Robinson Ranch

Joe’s Farm

Phocas Farms

R&G Foods

Resilient Growers

Earl Stripling

Craig Immel

GardenSmiths

 

For more information on the FreshRx program please visit:

conscienceagingsolutions.com/freshrx

Oklahoma Water Resources Center Open Positions!

The Oklahoma Water Resources Center has several open positions that will be headquartered in Stillwater, OK and serve as an integral part of a new collaborative research effort between the Oklahoma State University-OWRC, USDA-Agricultural Research Services (ARS) and the USDA-Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS).  This new joint effort, titled Dam Analysis Modernization of Tools, Applications, Guidance and Standardization (DAM-TAGS), will develop engineering tools, design guidance documents, and computational software and applications for monitoring, inspecting and rehabilitation of aging dams.

 

 

If you know of recent graduates or others who might be interested, please forward this message to them.

BLUE THUMB CALENDAR 2021 FEATURED PRODUCERS FOR JULY

News Release

Oklahoma Conservation Commission
2800 N. Lincoln Blvd. #200
Oklahoma City, OK 73105
405.521.2384
www.conservation.ok.gov


Kit and Josh Dinwiddie: South central Oklahoma family appreciates conservation examples shared with them and want to do the same for others 

“BLUE THUMB CALENDAR 2021 FEATURED PRODUCERS FOR JULY”

Editor’s Note: The Oklahoma Blue Thumb Calendar highlights important information about conservation, has a featured producer(s) in the months of February through October, and provides contact information for both Blue Thumb staff and Conservation Districts. Plus, this year’s project includes an in-depth producer(s) feature story, such as the one following. If you would like a copy of the free 2021 Blue Thumb Calendar, please contact Blue Thumb Program Director Rebecca Bond at Rebecca.bond@conservation.ok.gov.  

 

 

BURNEYVILLE, Okla. – If there’s a book within every family, how will you write your chapter?

Kit and husband Josh Dinwiddie are examples of those who appreciate the earlier authors.

For example Kit, who was born and raised in the western Kansas community of Hays, really respects her grandmother's era of life when farming practices out on the big plains didn't involve chemical assistance being introduced into the food supply.

Simply hearing the stories of her early life and how self-sufficient they were and how it really contributed to her longevity -- she lived to be 93 – have left an enduring impression on Kit.

Also, Kit’s mother did a great job in teaching her that we have an impact on all living things around us.

Josh Dinwiddie was born in Oklahoma City and raised in southern Oklahoma between Carter and Love Counties.  Josh's grandparents come from Clinton and Arapaho, Okla., and settled in Piedmont, Okla.

“While gathering cattle in the Spring on the big open sections of wheat, my papa would point out every year that the yield, quality and soil condition were degrading due to overworking ground and leaving it bare for big portions of the year,” Josh said. “I remember him telling lots of younger farmers that we gathered cattle for that ‘If you take care of this ground, it will take care of you.’ I never knew what he meant until I started farming for myself, and all of a sudden those words make all the sense in the world.”

So we turn to today’s chapter. The Dinwiddies live in Love County in south central Oklahoma where they raise cattle and farm on the "Cross Timbers line." 

“This place is an amazing part of Oklahoma to farm/ranch because we have a little bit of everything here,” Josh said. “From tree cover for cattle, to lush river bottom grasslands with native pecan trees, good sandy loam farm ground, and plenty of water most years” this is a great area.

     Kit has always been a proponent of environmental awareness. Early steps into their conservation minded farming practices as a couple started with doing things on their own differently than their neighbors.  Perhaps the most significant early step would have been reducing or omitting the use of herbicides on ground they grazed.

“Over the years I realized that not only did it make my wife happy that I was significantly reducing my chemical footprint farming,” Josh said, “I was simply spending less money and creating more nutrient dense crops.  So the development of how we farm has only become more economical, which in the end, we found to be the right answer.  If we can not only produce crops that are richer and more beneficial nutritionally for our livestock, but also produce those crops with less inputs, I believe we have found a way to be profitable, while improving the integrity of the land.”

The Dinwiddies have done several projects that helped to control erosion and bring water retention up on their land. They also use minimum tillage practices and always try to incorporate something green and growing into their tillage seasons while never leaving the soil bare.

“We also apply microbes to our crops, fruit trees, and produce,” he said. “We grow and maintain families of non-GMO produce and fruit.  We have also switched to feeding our poultry non-GMO feed for egg production.”

Benefits from their tillage practices dramatically increase the quality of the soil “as well as dramatically decrease the level of commercial input needed to grow those crops,” Josh said. They grow pearl millet, sugar-dense sorghums, and forage corn to bale to feed their livestock over the winter giving them a very nutrient dense forage.

“The main benefits we receive from feeding non-GMO is maintaining a non-scientifically altered diet for our stock, and all of those who consume our meat and eggs, including ourselves,” he said.

Their commitment to environmental awareness reaches beyond the farm/ranch. Kit sits on the Board of Directors for the Love County Conservation District. This role is important to her because she wants to do her part to leave the next generation healthy land, clean water, and a diverse ecosystem.  Josh and Kit are also members of the Registered Texas Longhorn Beef Producer Program.  This program is important to them to provide healthy meat into a market for today's health-conscious consumers.  They are members of the Texas Longhorn Breeders Association of America, the International Texas Longhorn Association, and Josh is the President of the Indian Territory Texas Longhorn Association. 

“We believe our role in all of these organizations are important to furthering the conservation of America's first cattle, the Texas Longhorn,” he said.

The couple also make an effort to continue learning.

“The area and state meetings are always inspiring because you're in a room full of peers that care about conservation,” Kit said. “It is rare to find a concentration of individuals that are on the same page and believe in the gravity of the role we play in ensuring that we have healthy land and water.”

They were asked what it is that they enjoy most about being around those who champion water quality and soil health.

“It gives us hope that there are people out there that understand that conservation is the baseline of where healthcare begins,” Kit said. “We also appreciate people that have compassion for the organisms that we share this earth with.”

Also, they have found that the demand is there for what they supply and “largely because of the quality and how it is grown.” 

“This has inspired others to implement some of the same practices,” Josh said. “We believe we are a working model of natural farming practices and showing how it works economically.”

USDA Opens Signup for CLEAR30, Expands Pilot to Be Nationwide

USDA Opens Signup for CLEAR30, Expands Pilot to Be Nationwide

Contact:
FPAC.BC.Press@usda.gov

WASHINGTON, June 15, 2021 – Landowners and agricultural producers currently enrolled in the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) now have a wider opportunity to enroll in a 30-year contract through the Clean Lakes, Estuaries, And Rivers initiative, called CLEAR30. The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) is expanding CLEAR30 – a water-quality focused option available through CRP – to be nationwide now.

Interested producers with CRP contracts expiring September 30, 2021, should sign up by August 6, 2021. CLEAR30 provides an opportunity for producers to receive incentives for a 30-year commitment to water quality practices on their CRP land, building on their original 10- to 15-year CRP contracts.

“We are excited to expand this option to enable more producers to take their conservation efforts to the next level,” said Zach Ducheneaux, USDA Farm Service Agency (FSA) administrator. “Offering CLEAR30 in all states enables durable maintenance of conservation investments and enhanced stewardship of the land and waterways on a larger scale.”

These long-term contracts ensure that practices remain in place for 30 years, which improves water quality through reducing sediment and nutrient runoff and helping prevent algal blooms.

About CLEAR30

CLEAR30 was created by the 2018 Farm Bill to better address water quality concerns. Originally, CLEAR30 was only available in the Great Lakes and Chesapeake Bay watersheds. Now, access is expanded to agricultural producers nationwide.

Eligible producers must have certain water quality benefitting practices currently enrolled under continuous CRP or through the Conservation Reserve Enhancement Program (CREP), under contracts that are expiring on September 30, 2021.

These lLong-term contracts will help ensure that conservation impacts and benefits remain in place for 30 years, reducing sediment and nutrient runoff and, ultimately, algal blooms. Conservation in riparian areas also provides important carbon sequestration benefits. Traditional CRP contracts run from 10 to 15 years.

Annual rental payments for landowners who enroll in CLEAR30 will be equal to the current Continuous CRP annual payment rate plus a 20% water quality incentive and annual rate adjustment of 27.5%.

How to Sign Up

To sign up for CLEAR30, contact your local  USDA Service Center by August 6, 2021. While USDA offices may be closed to visitors because of the pandemic, Service Center staff continue to work with agricultural producers via phone, email, and other digital tools. To conduct business, please contact your local USDA Service Center. Contact information can be found at farmers.gov/service-locator.

More Information

CLEAR30 is an option available through CRP, which is one of the world’s largest voluntary conservation programs with a long track record of preserving topsoil, sequestering carbon and reducing nitrogen runoff, as well providing healthy habitat for wildlife.

Under the Biden-Harris Administration, USDA is engaged in a whole-of-government effort to combat the climate crisis and conserve and protect our nation’s lands, biodiversity, and natural resources including our soil, air and water. As such, CLEAR30 contracts receive a water quality incentive and a climate-smart practice incentive. Through conservation practices and partnerships, USDA aims to enhance economic growth and create new streams of income for farmers, ranchers, producers, and private foresters. Successfully meeting these challenges will require USDA and our agencies to pursue a coordinated approach alongside USDA stakeholders, including state, local, and tribal governments.

USDA touches the lives of all Americans each day in so many positive ways. In the Biden-Harris Administration, USDA is transforming America’s food system with a greater focus on more resilient local and regional food production, fairer markets for all producers, ensuring access to safe, healthy and nutritious food in all communities, building new markets and streams of income for farmers and producers using climate smart food and forestry practices, making historic investments in infrastructure and clean energy capabilities in rural America, and committing to equity across the Department by removing systemic barriers and building a workforce more representative of America. 

To enroll in CLEAR30, please contact your local  USDA Service Center. For more information on CRP, visit the Conservation Reserve Program.

USDA is an equal opportunity provider, employer and lender.

Oklahoma’s upstream flood control dams working hard for Oklahoma’s people, land and infrastructure

News Release

Oklahoma Conservation Commission
2800 N. Lincoln Blvd. #200
Oklahoma City, OK 73105
405.521.2384
www.conservation.ok.gov

 

Oklahoma’s upstream flood control dams working hard for Oklahoma’s people, land and infrastructure

 

As the weekend night flickered with lighting, rumbled with thunder and flowed with intense late June rains, Oklahoma’s upstream flood control dams were working just as they were designed. That critical work has continued into the days to follow.

 

Oklahoma leads the nation with 2,107 upstream flood control dams. Regardless of the hour of the day or the ongoing hours of work needed, these flood control dams are doing their jobs to protect the people, land and infrastructure of Oklahoma.

 

In a five-day period -- 6 a.m. Friday, June 25 to 6 a.m., June 30 – flood control dams spread through 14 Oklahoma counties resulted in $10.1 million in monetary benefits in terms of damages that did not occur because of the presence of these dams. There were 121 DamWatch system “Rainfall Alerts” in  those 14 counties – Caddo, Comanche, Creek, Custer, Kiowa, Lincoln, Logan, Noble, Oklahoma, Pawnee, Payne, Rogers, Washington, Washita – and 12 “Auxiliary Spillway Flow Alerts” in three of those 14 – Lincoln, Noble, Payne counties. There were 22 different watershed that received alerts within the 14 counties.

 

Chris Stoner, Natural Resources Conservation Service State Conservation Engineer said on Wednesday that there have been, “No reports of damage to any of the dams inspected to date.” 

 

“I never complain about a significant Oklahoma summer rain,” said Tammy Sawatzky, Oklahoma Conservation Commission Director of Conservation Programs. “The rainfall over the past week is a real reminder of the importance of the local, State and National investment in Oklahoma’s flood protection and flood prevention infrastructure. The 2,107 dams built under the USDA Small Watershed Program are a real asset when we have a weather week like the one we are in this week. The repeating rainfall reminds us of the importance of the financial and human resources Conservation Districts invest in maintaining the protection. This June rain will help us stretch grazing on our pastures, green our gardens and make for an extra mowing or two out on the front lawn. The flood protection provided to Oklahoma through the Small Watershed Program will protect life and property as well as reduce potential damage from uncontrolled flooding. Those are all wins if you ask me!” 

 

“The storms we get here in Oklahoma can and do strike anywhere at any time,” Stoner said. “Of the 14 high hazard potential dams that received rainfall alerts, only two of those dams were originally constructed to meet high hazard potential criteria.  Luckily, four others have been rehabilitated and now meet current dam safety criteria.  However, the remaining eight that received heavy rainfall in this event along with over 200 other high hazard potential dams in the state are still in need of rehabilitation.  They did their job, this time, but all of Oklahoma’s flood control infrastructure continues to age and will need continued support from the federal, state, and local partners.” 

 

 

Watershed projects were based on the conservation principle of holding the raindrop high in the watershed as close to where it strikes the ground as possible. 

So, nine out of 10 Oklahomans are living within 20 miles of a flood control dam. Oklahomans live, work and play daily under their protection every day. Flood control makes modern Oklahoma life possible in many rural communities.

 

The watershed programs are one of the best examples of federal, state and local partnerships to address natural resources issues. Watershed projects are federal-assisted, not federally owned. NRCS provided funds to plan, design, and construct the dams. Project sponsors, typically local conservation districts, are responsible for operation and maintenance of the dams to assure they continue to function as there were designed,

 

Oklahoma’s flood control dams have established a $2 billion infrastructure that provides benefits to thousands of citizens. In fact, it’s estimated that the dams and accompanying conservation practices in the watersheds provide approximately $96 million in benefits each year.

 

That’s where the DamWatch system comes into play.

 

A Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) “National Watershed Benefits” computer model estimates the daily monetary benefits resulting from watershed projects for a specific storm. These “benefits” are essentially the damages that would have occurred from that storm had the dams not been built. 

 

“DamWatch is my ‘Go To’ site for all things related to our dams,” Stoner said. “I have file cabinets full of drawings and documents related to the dams literally steps away from my desk, but I go to DamWatch first. The graphical display easily takes me to the dam or dams of interest. I can see the current condition of the dam, based on the most current aerial photo, and look at things going on both up and downstream.”

 

From his USDA NRCS state office on the campus of Oklahoma State University in Stillwater, Okla., Stoner can access the As-Built drawings for all dams across the state and zoom in on areas that may be hard to interpret even from the original documents.

 

“I can see if any trip reports or photos have been uploaded that may shed additional light on an issue,” he said. “And, I can write a ticket about a dam that gets to all the pertinent staff with the click of a button.”

 

  The flood control dams not only provide flood and erosion control to over two million acres of agricultural land in downstream flood plains, but they also provide sources of water for livestock and irrigation and habitats for wildlife. Forty-two of the flood control dams were constructed as multi-purpose structures, which provide municipal and rural water supplies and recreation areas for local communities.

Benefits provided by the flood control dams include: Protecting 2,756 county and highway bridges; Providing a reduction in flooding for 41,744 farms and ranches; Trapping 19 million tons of sediment each year, which would otherwise end up in major streams and lakes; and creating or enhancing 90,979 acres of wetlands.

 

The number of dams built each year peaked in 1965 when 157 dams were built.  During the decade of the 1960s, an average of two watershed dams were constructed each week. Many of the watershed dams in Oklahoma are reaching the end of their 50-year designed lifespan. Since most of the dams were designed with a 50-year design life, during the decade of the 2010s, two dams came to the end of their evaluated life each week. So, in addition to 1,423 watershed dams that reached the end of their evaluated life in 2020, an additional 172 dams will reach that mark within the next five years.

However, just because a dam exceeds its evaluated life, it does not mean that it won't safely function as designed for many years longer if properly maintained. However, funds are critically needed to maintain these dams so that they can function as designed and remain safe. As previously mentioned, watershed dams are a part of an estimated $2 billion of the public infrastructure that must be attended to. If funds are not provided for maintenance, not only will devastating flooding return in the areas prior to the projects being constructed, but lives will be at-risk.

 

Rehabilitation of these aging dams is a priority in Oklahoma so that they can continue to protect people's lives, property, and natural resources for the next 100 years. To date, 58 watershed dams have been funded for rehabilitation to meet current safety standards; 38 of these have been completed. The remainder are in various stages of design or construction. 

 

"Think about these intensive rains in Oklahoma," OCC Executive Director Trey Lam said. "Any loss of property and damage to land is a tremendous loss. That's exactly why the benefits of these dams are so important, and that's what these watershed projects do, they protect areas from flooding losses that used to occur frequently before the dams were built.  In addition to protecting crops and farmland, some of the dams also protect lives. They also are designed to reduce damages to buildings, agricultural products, roads, bridges and so many other vital aspects of our daily lives.”

 

Photo caption, PHOTO 1: Shown here is the Principal Spillway running full flow at Stillwater Creek Site Number 2 in Payne County earlier this week.

 

Photo caption, PHOTO 2: Shown in this photo is the Emergency Spillway of Dry Creek Site 15 in Lincoln County earlier this week.

Graphic: A look at several of Oklahoma's Flood Control Dams at Work from Friday, June 25 through Wednesday morning, June 30. 

 

 

 

Don Bartolina’s passion for conservation runs several decades deep

News Release

Oklahoma Conservation Commission
2800 N. Lincoln Blvd. #200
Oklahoma City, OK 73105
405.521.2384
www.conservation.ok.gov


Don Bartolina’s passion for conservation runs several decades deep

Would you like to see a genuine smile, one that originates from the heart?

Would you like to see what it looks like to invest your life in others and in conservation?

Just take a moment and watch Don Bartolina get into the lead car of a 250 car-bus-truck procession bound for the site of the National Land & Range Judging Contest. Behind him are nearly 700 4-H and FFA students and over 200 coaches from over 34 states. He doesn’t know them all by name, but he’s proud of every one of them; that’s the reason for the smile.

Over the last 60 years, Bartolina has served with the Natural Resources Conservation Service and the Oklahoma Association of Conservation Districts. For close to 17 years of that span, he’s worked as the District Manager for the Oklahoma County Conservation District. This month, the 85-year-old Bartolina retires.

In an interview for the Oklahoma Conservation Heritage Oral History Project, he was asked how he would like his career to be remembered. The answer was short and from the same place as the grin: “He made a difference and enjoyed it.”

From the start… 

Bartolina’s mother’s parents came from France and his father’s parents from Italy.

“They didn’t know each other but they took the same route to come here (Oklahoma),” he said. “They came from Ellis Island to southeast Kansas to work in that coal field. Then they moved to the Henryetta area in Okmulgee County to work in the coal field there. My parents were born there.”

His grandfather, on his mother’s side, was killed in the coal mines as the result of a rockslide.

Besides the coal mines, he had family who owned a grocery store and did a little farming as well. His father worked at each of the latter two.

Bartolina was born and raised in the small community of Coalton and graduated from high school at nearby Schulter.

“I tell people that I graduated in the top 10 of my class,” he says, grins, and continues, “but I don’t tell them that there were only 12 people in my class.”

When asked about his earliest conservation memory, Bartolina rewinds to the early 1950s.

“When I was in 4H in the early 1950s, the feedstore in Okmulgee offered a bag of fertilizer to use for us 4H kids,” he said. “I took it home and my dad said, ‘We’ve been using manure for years.’ I said, ‘Yeah, but this is kind of something new.’ So, we took a little plot in our corn field and used that fertilizer and saw the difference it made. How green the corn was and better. We started using a little bit of fertilizer.”

Bartolina would go on to earn a bachelor’s degree in 1959 and master’s degree in 1972, both in Agronomy, both from Oklahoma State University.

Having married his high school sweetheart Darlene in 1958, life took them as far away as Montana for a short while, but in 1961 they returned to Oklahoma where Bartolina started his career with the Soil Conservation Service in Watonga, as a soil scientist. He spent a couple of years in Watonga working on the soil survey, then transferred to Chandler to help with that soil survey, and then it was on to Wewoka in Seminole County.

“I worked on that soil survey and I was the party chief, even though it was a party of one,” he said. After three to four years it was on to Tulsa to start that soil survey.

Then came an opening in Oklahoma City working with the state planning agency; a federal employee assigned to a state agency. In 1977 he became the District Conservationist for Oklahoma County, and served in that position for 24 years until his first retirement. During this time, he assisted a multitude of landowners in improving their land by installing several thousand conservation practices. He was also active in the State Soil and Water Conservation Society and served on the National Board for nine years.

However, even though the job titles changed, there’s been at least one aspect of Bartolina’s conservation career that has been a part of him for about six decades – the National Land & Range Judging Contest.

Opportunities everywhere 

Summing up Bartolina’s perspective of his career would go something like there’s a lot of soil, and a lot people so that equals a lot of opportunities.

Bartolina became involved with the contest when he started working for NRCS as a soil scientist in 1961. By the mid-1980s, he was contest coordinator, working diligently behind the scenes months before the pits were ever dug.

“The contest was part of my NRCS training,” he said. “When you’re out there and the kids are asking questions, that’s when you learn. It gives kids an appreciation for the land. When you think of all the state and local contests that lead up to this, the number of students and coaches involved, it’s rewarding to know you’ve had some impact on their lives.”

The national contest is comprised of three events held concurrently at the same secret location. In the land judging event, contestants enter several three to five-foot deep pits to evaluate the qualities of the soil and determine its potential for agricultural production. Range judging contestants rotate through roped off rangeland sites to identify plant species and determine the site’s value for cattle production and quail habitat. Homesite evaluation challenges contestants to determine the value of a site for residential development.

Sure, it’s true that COVID-19 placed the event on hold for two years, but weather doesn’t. There have been days of beads of sweat, drops of rain, and pellets of sleet, and the contest continued.

To touch so many lives every year requires the close cooperation of several public and private partners.

“It’s a labor of love,” said Bartolina, who points toward about 200 volunteers that see the event through in quality fashion. “There’s not another contest with this many people from so many places working for the same thing. I hope it continues and I hope new people can get involved and keep it going.”

Don’t take that to mean he’s worked his last event. Phil Campbell, chairman of the Oklahoma Conservation Commission and a director for the Oklahoma County Conservation District, said, “He has to remain a part of this. We need him.”

That goes back to Bartolina saying he wants to be remembered as someone who made a difference. That’s the case whether you are talking about the National Land & Range Judging Contest or working with NRCS or the Oklahoma County Conservation District.

“We did an emergency project one year out by Jones, and we got it done quickly,” Bartolina said. “Floodwaters were about to take out the road and we got in and rip-rapped and saved the road. A lady wrote a letter to a Congressman talking about the efficiency of government and what a quick and good job we did. Now that makes you proud when you can do something to help people, they appreciate it.”

Bartolina says that after this retirement he plans to continue to spend time with his wife of 63 years, his four married children, 10 grandchildren and six great grandchildren (to date) and continue to volunteer doing what he loves – serving the conservation community.