(An IOWA CAPITAL DISPATCH report) – In southwest Iowa, the fields can be dry, sloped or have rough soil that is poor for growing corn or soybeans and is prone to erosion and runoff. A state-led program is helping farmers, like Bailie Walters, convert those less-than-desirable crop lands into pasture. This helps with soil and nutrient conservation on those acres and it gives farmers more places to graze cattle.

Walters, who farms and raises cattle with her father in Taylor County, has used the state Cattle and Conservation Working Lands Program to convert crop land to pasture and to add fencing and water sources to different parts of the farm to facilitate additional grazing opportunities. Walters said she’s not sure these conservation measures would have happened if it weren’t for the state program, which offers cost-share funding and technical support to producers in select counties.

The program began as a pilot project in 2016, administered by the Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship, and now serves farmers in eight counties: Adams, Carroll, Cherokee, Guthrie, Ida, Page, Taylor, and Woodbury. IDALS recently announced it was extending the program for an additional three years and renewing agreements in Taylor, Page, Carroll, Cherokee, Guthrie and Ida counties. The program will persist in the other counties, but they have a separate grant timeline.

The goal of the project, according to IDALS, is to “convert non-productive land to productive land while also providing water quality benefits to the state of Iowa.” According to a news release from IDALS, the program has facilitated the conversion of more than 16,000 acres of land from less-productive row crops fields to pasture and grazing systems. IDALS also said producers in the program have established more than 195,000 acres of cover crops, which can also be used as pasture for livestock. Secretary of Agriculture Mike Naig said the project shows that “conservation does not require taking land out of production.”

“Farmers take their responsibility to be good stewards of the land very seriously because clean water is non-negotiable,” Naig said in the news release. Naig said the project encourages farmers to evaluate their land and “determine what makes sense to farm and what makes sense to hay or graze.” Underperforming or highly erodible acres are areas targeted for conversion. Walters said she has seen the impacts of the program on her family land as areas that were prone to erosion are now stabilized and more fields get seeded with cover crops.

She said seeding a marginal field to pasture was the “best thing” the family could do for that ground, which she said had poor soil and was in a rough and hilly area. The program also allowed them to grade stabilize a ditch at the back of the property and put in a couple of cattle ponds, both of which have made it easier to move the cattle to different paddocks and have reduced the amount of soil that runs off the land.

Walters said her father and grandfather implemented traditional conservation measures, like terraces, but were harder to convince on things like cover crops. Walters, as the younger generation on the farm, said it has been easier to get her family to try out different conservation methods under the program, since it has some funding attached. Ultimately, the program has allowed the Walters’ operation to rotate cattle between different areas on the farm. Walters said this has been especially helpful toward the end of the summer — when the pasture starts to singe, she still has areas to move the cattle.

A total of $15 million has been invested in the program, according to IDALS, and $11.7 million of that has come directly from the state. Funding for the recent extension of the program comes from the state’s Water Quality Initiative. The Water Quality Initiative funds many projects across the state, in addition to the cattle and conservation program. According to a fiscal year 2027 budget recommendation, the initiative received $8.2 million in both 2025 and 2026 from the state’s Rebuild Iowa Infrastructure Fund.

Naig, speaking to lawmakers in a House appropriations subcommittee March 2, said the project could be a model for the federal Farm Bill because it promotes conservation without taking land out of production.  Plus, he said it gives the younger generation on the farm, like Walters, some assistance to add or build up a cattle herd if they want to diversify the family operation. Pallin Turner is another of the more than 1,100 producers in the state who have participated in the project. She runs about 300 head of cow-calf pairs and farms around 1,500 acres in Taylor and Page counties.

Turner said the program has allowed her operation to put cover crops on all of their farmed row crop acres, and even hay some of the rye they use as cover crops. Like Walters, she has also used the program to add fencing and ponds that make it easier to move cattle to different areas. She said there is a lot of pasture in southwest Iowa that was converted to crop land when row crops were more profitable than grazing cattle.

Those sloping or less productive lands are key targets of the program, which also partners with local Soil and Water Conservation Districts and the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Natural Resources Conservation Service. Turner said the funding and implementation of cattle-specific conservation practices come at a time when the “pendulum” in the ag economy is swinging from row crops over to cattle. The U.S. cattle herd is at a historic low, while row crop producers have faced several years of low crop prices and high yields.

Applications for the program, according to IDALS, are considered on a first-come, first served basis. Interested producers can reach out to their USDA service centers for application information in the applicable counties.