Everyone has a right to clean water in Iowa

I am currently President of the Spring Creeks Chapter of Trout Unlimited and I have been seeing over the past 50 years how the continual lack of conservation practices has turned our precious streams in our state into a sewer system.

My father farmed from 1939 until he retired in 1976. He was a man who respected the land. We farmed and used very little commercial fertilizer. We spread the manure from 30 milk cows, 100 hogs, 25 head of stock cows and about 100 chickens for natural fertilizer. We also rented 200 acres where we planted corn, soy beans, oats, sorghum, and pasture. We were a true “family farm” operation.

Dad always rotated crops so we didn’t need to dump lots of fertilizer on cornfields to maintain yields. Different crops demand different nutrients so crop rotation and natural fertilizer from our livestock balanced out the soil’s ability to produce good crops. Dad did a lot of work building terraces, planted on the contour and leaving large buffer strips so soil erosion and manure applied to the fields did not wash into streams. I had no fear of drinking water from the fields dad tiled that was installed on our land.

Now move ahead 50 years and what is the current farming practices? Foremost we see the end of the family farms. We now have many “factory farms “ owned by investors whose only concern is to make a profit at the expense of your drinking water. Our Department of Natural Resources will not severely penalize polluters because the current governor does not want to upset her big ag constituents. The price we pay is areas of the state where you can barely stand the smell of these large animal operations on certain days and a state with one of the highest cancer rates in the United States.

Factory farms are encroaching now in one of the last areas of the state that has cold water streams pure enough for species of trout to live. An example is Supreme Beef’s large cattle operation built at the headwaters of one of the most pristine cold water streams in Iowa. The stream is already showing higher levels of toxins from such a large concentration of animals.

The approval of this operation by the DNR was based on data that was challenged and proved to be incorrect. Conservation groups like ours are not anti-farming. We work closely with many farmers who want to improve the quality of water by not over farming the land, provide adequate buffers zones of green ground cover to prevent soil erosion and manure runoff. We work closely with the DNR, helping with building fish habitats on streams and plant trees and cover grasses to stabilize soil next to streams.

Demand your representatives do something to clean up this crisis of our state’s waters. That means punishing the polluters, not slapping their hands or changing the compliance rules at the expense of the environment. Our children and grandchildren deserve a better environment than where we are heading.

Ray Thys is president of the Spring Creeks Chapter of Trout Unlimited.