The state of Iowa is expanding a water quality program to clean up a northwest Iowa river, one of the state’s most polluted waterways. The Deep Creek Water Quality Initiative Project was launched in 2014 with a focus on adding cover crops along the Floyd River and tributaries in four counties — Plymouth, Sioux, O’Brien and Cherokee. Ben Brady, a conservationist with the U-S-D-A’s Natural Resources Conservation Service, helps oversee the project.
Brady says a high number of livestock confinements in the region contributed to the Floyd River’s high pollution rates, but he says the water quality initiative is working.
Iowa’s secretary of agriculture recently announced a new grant for a larger area. Almost 700-thousand dollars is available for farmers to add buffers and bioreactors to help filter water from fields.
