CRP--is a concervation reserve program. Its a partnership with the usda and state departments of ag. They try to manage soil run off and rebuild forests.
Take my situation, I am enrolling 1.33 acrs of land. This land is swampy in one corner and field like in the other. I am tried of paying for gas to cut the grass. I am also looking for a way to plant trees to enhance the value of the land.
Crp is going to pay me 50% the cost of the trees and tree tubes plus 50% of the labor to install, they have a cost share formula. Since i am going to do the work myself i will get it paid for. I have two years to plant all the trees and i must manage invasive weeds. (i can spray them, and they will cost share the labor and price of the spray). I signed a 15year lease with them and it works out to over $100 an acre, depending on your soil type.
You must have 70% survival rate.
I will be planting about 170 trees, and 50 shrubs.
Like i said
the swamp white oak med grower, low moist forests and wooded swamps habitat
pin oak medium grower, low mosit or seasonally wet woods or swamps
black walnut, fast grower, open woods and meadows
shagbark hickory, slow grower, low moist woods and slopes (also a bat habitat in the bark)
butternut, fast/med grower, lowland woods
sugar maple, med mosit woods wooded slopes,
and my last
can be apples. i can only have a max of 6 apple trees. I have contacted a guy about grafting apples on the approprait rootstock so they will survive in the area.
My biggest concern is the deer, the deer eat everything, not sure if i can fence it all in. the tubes protect it against the voles, which eat the bark and cause winter kill. You must also have a min of 7 varities of trees.
shrubs a min of three
i will pick highbush blueberries,
american cranberrys
and filberts or american hazlenuts.
Its going to be some work putting them in, but over the long run, i will save on work cutting the field, and will bring some much need regeneration to the fields. Once they do start producing seedlings, i can transfer them to the wooded land we own as i cut the beech for firewood.
Its a lot anyother questions just let me know.
Some of the ones that I can keep track of went to 4-6 inches in 15 years. May eventually have some commercial value if the farm doesn't fall to development first.