The

Spring 2018Volume 24, Number 2

South Platte Natural Resources District

NewsletterVisit our website www.spnrd.org

11

Protecting Lives, Protecting Property, Protecting the Future

The Pipeline is published quarterly by the South Platte Natural Resources District, 551 Parkland Dr. P.O. Box 294,

Sidney, NE 69162 (308) 254-2377Edited by Shelly Gerk

Information & Education Coordinator.For the latest NRD news and program updates,

visit our Website at www.spnrd.org

Rod L. Horn Galen Wittrock Don Davis NaManet Keller Travis Glanz Ryan Reisdorff Chris Kaiser Shelly Gerk Tyler Sanders Michelle McMillen Hilary Cook

General Manager/TreasurerAssistant ManagerAdministrative ManagerDistrict SecretaryWater Resources CoordinatorWater Resources SpecialistNatural Resources CoordinatorInformation & Ed. CoordinatorWater Resources TechnicianNRCS/NRD Field Offi ce SecretaryNRCS/NRD Secretary/Technician

Staff

Board of Directors Bill Halligan ChairTim Maas Vice-ChairJames C. Johnson SecretaryLarry L. RuttPhil GrabowskiKathy NarjesChris Meyer

G ro u n d Wa te r Pu b l i c H e a r i n g Sc h e d u l e d Th u r s d a y, A p r i l 1 9 , 2 0 1 8

Th e next Ground Water Allocation Period will be starting in 2019, and the SPNRD Board of Directors will be holding a Public Hearing prior to making any fi nal decisions on water allocations for the next 3-year cycle. Public Advisory Meetings were already held in all 3 counties in the District and the Board of Directors received feedback, ideas and perceptions of approximately 100 participants. When deci-sions are made based on informed feedback from water users the entire District benefi ts. All three Public Meetings started out with historical water information including water levels,

Example of the Western Water Use Management Model Soft ware

http://ari-gis.com/spnrd.html

water usage and water modeling. Adaptive Resources, Inc. presented modeling software [Western Water Use Manage-ment Model] that can show hypothetical estimates of what water levels may do over a period of time. Using informa-tion on what trends have been in the past could assist water users with determining the best man-agement practices for water con-sumption in the future. Th e NRD system gives local control to each District in Nebraska to manage their own water. Directors are elected by the District residents; they use both available data AND their neighbors needs to determine how to set procedure for Resource Conservation. Th ese practices ensure that our future generations can continue farming, living and operating successfully here in the South Platte NRD for years to come. While the Public Advisory Meetings are over, it’s not too late to get involved in the discussion on water allocations. Call any of the Directors and let them know what your needs are for water, visit the SPNRD offi ce to get more informa-tion and give the staff feedback on what you’d like to see for allocations in the next allocation period.

Th e Public Hear-ing has been set for Th ursday, April 19, 2018. Th e Infor-mation Session will be from 5-6 p.m. Th e Hearing will start at 6:30 p.m. A draft copy of the Rules and Regula-tions will be avail-able at the meeting.

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Western Region Envirothon

Congratulations to the Sidney High School Team 1! Team 1 from Sidney NE took first place this year at the Western Region Envirothon Contest held in Gordon Nebraska on February 9, 2018. 1st – Sidney High School, Team 12nd – Sidney High School, Team 23rd – Creek Valley

The Nebraska Envirothon is a competition for high school students (9th-12th grades). Up to fi ve-member teams compete by testing their knowledge in seven areas of environmental stud-ies: soil, aquatics, forestry, policy, wildlife, range, environmental policy and current issues. Students fi rst compete in a Regional Competition, winners progressing on to the State Competition. Each year 7 Regional Competitions coordinated by the Nebraska NRDs are held state-wide. The winning

team from each region is invited to represent their region at the Nebraska State Envirothon Competition, and an additional eight wildcard teams with the highest score are also invited. State Competitions add an oral presentation on a topic selected by the North American Envirothon Committee to the testing stations. State Champion teams progress to represent Nebraska at the National Envirothon contest. 2018 Nationals are to be held in Pocatello Idaho July 22 through July 25. Members of the top ten teams from that event will be awarded National Scholarships that can be used toward any four year university, two year college or trade school. While the NRDs and Future Farmers of America (FFA) work together to put these com-petitions on for our students, it takes coaches and leaders to get the kids prepared for the testing

Sidney High School Team Takes Top Honors at Western Region

Envirothon Contest

they go through to win. The hard work the stu-dents put in is obvious during the grading process, Envirothon competitions give our students an op-portunity to take their classroom education and apply it to life. They are given an opportunity to interact with resource professionals who use the knowledge they received in school every day in their careers, showing them the link between aca-demics and the business world. Higher placing students in these competitions take away more than just knowledge, they can win scholarships to help further their educations.

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Terms commonly used in Conservation and

Water When working with conservation and water some terms are commonly heard, but do you really know what they mean? Take a look to see if any of these don’t mean what you think they mean.....• Stakeholder: For SPNRD purposes, a stake-

holder includes all water users or anyone with an interest in water; commercial, irriga-tion, residential, public power, etc. Individu-als/groups who participate in a process.

• Acre-inch: (unit) The volume of water that would cover an area of 1 acre to a depth of 1 inch; equivalent to 3630 cubic feet.

• CFS: Cubic Feet per Second. A rate of fl ow, equal to a volume of fl uid that is one foot high and one foot wide fl owing a distance of one foot in one second. Equivalent to 7.48 gallons of fl uid fl owing each second.

• Drawdown: The lowering of groundwater levels caused by pumping.

• Moratorium: delay or suspension of an ac-tivity.

• Potable water: Water that has suitable quality for drinking.

• Water Table: The top of the water surface in the saturated part of an aquifer.

• Xeriscaping: Landscape method using plants that are drought-resistant and well adapt-ed to the local area; uses less water than traditional landscaping.

It’s Spring!!!

Seasonal Reminders• Trees – It’s that time of year when all kinds of animals and plants are waking back up, keep an eye out for these things on your trees… o Disease o Fungus o Beetles• Gutters! Don’t forget to clean out your gutters early. Clogged gutters and drains can cause water overfl ow problems and possible damage on rainy days.• Add bark and mulch to your planting beds early to help save on weed maintenance and labor later.• Don’t forget to check your Pivots! Every farmer has a spring checklist for their equip-ment, but remember to look for rodent/animal damage, leaks, dents (large enough to cause function complications), and

water/freeze damage.• Check your licenses and certifi cation cards for expiration dates, you don’t want to get into the busy season and fi nd out your applica-tor license or chemigation training isn’t up to date!• Th e season of Spring Cleaning is upon us! It’s a good time to clean out the farmyard and clear away any winter trash that has ac-cumulated.

4

What are the Integrated Water Management Action Initiative and

PRECIP grants?

Integrated Water Management Action Initiative

The purpose of the Integrated Water Management Action Initiative, sponsored by the Nebraska Depart-ment of Natural Resources, “is to plan, implement and monitor activities that result in more effective water manage-ment and remediation for current de-pletions caused by past actions” [Ne-braska Environmental Trust – 2018 Application Summary]. The goal is to assist NRDs and their partners in pro-viding more benefits to habitat, surface water and groundwater resources. This initiative is a portion of the intended uses of the Water Resources Cash Fund (WRCF). Funds from this grant will go to-wards both new and in-progress proj-ects that include: surface water storage projects, groundwater retiming, leasing or purchasing water, conjunctive man-agement of water, conservation ease-ments, and other water use efficiency measures to optimize water use in the Upper Platte River Basin.

PRECIP The PRECIP, or Panhandle Re-gion Evaluation & Conservation Irriga-tion Partnership, was launched through

Recently the SPNRD was notifi ed they have received prelim-inary approval for two new Nebraska Environmental Trust Fund (NETF) grants for use in the District. Staff will be work-ing to put these grants to use for the benefi t our District soon.

a joint effort of The Nebraska Water Bal-ance Alliance (NEWBA), the Upper Ni-obrara White NRD (UNWNRD), the North Platte NRD (NPNRD) and the SPNRD. “The goal of PRECIP is to generate sustainable and measurable im-provement to Nebraska’s water resources by providing value at all levels to all stake-holders” [Nebraska Environmental Trust – 2018 Application Summary]. PRECIP use and management will be utilized over the next three years. Together the partners will be using the funds from this grant towards several projects, including what we call a “peer to peer” benefits. The PRECIP partners will work towards the following goals:• Equipping farmers with the appropri-

ate technology and the knowledge they need to sustainably manage their water resources

• Build a large peer-to-peer learning net-work to encourage better farm-scale water management

• Increase communication among water stakeholders to impove collaborative water resource management at a water-shed level

• Create on the ground demonstration sites for water conservation and man-agement highlighting the importance

of proper irrigation system health, soil health manage-ment, conservation tillage, soil moisture evaluation, ad-vanced irrigation scheduling and using real time weather data and remote imagery.

COUNTY GROUND WATER ADVISORY PUBLIC HEARING:Questions regarding the County

Groundwater Public Hearing can be directed to the South Platte NRD at (308)254-2377.

MEETINGS:The public hearing date will be sched-uled soon, and a public notice will be

posted in the District newspapers.

2ND INCREMENT - UPPER PLATTE RIVER BASIN-WIDE PLAN DEVELOPMENT:

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SOUTH PLATTE NRD WATER NEWS

Th e types of items and practices aff ected in Water Management include: Meters, allocation, pooling, transfers, chemigation, and irrigation runoff .

Background - 1st Increment (2009-2019): On September 15, 2004 the Nebraska Department of Natural Resourc-

es (DNR) designated portions of the Platte River Basin that were upstream of the Kearney Canal Diversion as overappropriated. Nebraska’s Ground Water Management and Protection Act has a requirement for basin-wide planning when an area has been found to be overappropriated (Nebraska Revised Statutes § 46-715). A Basin-Wide Plan for the Upper Platte Basin was originally adopted in 2009 and will run through 2019.

Planning Process and Timeline for the 2nd Increment:Th e “Orientation & Planning” phase of the planning process was about

5 months, spanning from April through August 2016. Currently, we are in the “Plan Development” phase and it is scheduled for about 18 months, from September 2016 through February of 2018. Next will come the “Pre-liminary Agreement” phase of the plan and it will be about a 6 month process, from March 2018 through August 2018. Th e “Adoption” phase of the 2nd Increment Basin-Wide Plan is about 8 months long, September 2018 through April 2019.

Th e Individual NRD Integrated Management Plan (IMP) development timeline is a little diff erent, giving the governing agencies time to set up and complete the fi nal plan by September 2019. Th e IMP is required to be consistent with the goals and objectives of the revised Basin-Wide Plan.

Questions regarding the 2nd Incre-ment – Upper Platte Basin-Wide Plan can be directed to the South Platte NRD at (308)254-2377.

MEETINGS:Stakeholder/Public Meetings (for discussions on potential revisions to the plan for the 2nd increment) are being held the 3rd Wednesday of every other month in North Platte. Sched-uled meetings through July 2018 are:

March 21, 2018May 16, 2018July 18, 2018

DISTRICTWIDE GROUND WATER MANAGEMENT AREA RULES AND REGULATIONS:Background:

Th e District’s primary regulatory tool in the area of water management is the Districtwide Ground Water Management Area Rules and Regula-tions. Th e purpose of the rules and regulations are to implement the South Platte Natural Resources District’s Ground Water Management Plan. Th e goal of the Plan is to facilitate the proper management of ground water for quality, integrated (ground water and surface water) and quantity.

Th e South Platte NRD was among the fi rst NRDs in the state to create ground water quality and quantity management subareas. Th e rules and regulations are regularly reviewed and modifi ed in accordance with cur-rent laws and needs.

Questions regarding Area Rules and Regulations can be directed to the South Platte NRD at (308)254-2377.

WEBSITE INFORMATION:More information is published on the

SPNRD website.

http://www.spnrd.org/Html/rules_regulations.html

NRDs involved: South Platte NRD, Central Platte NRD, North Platte NRD, Tri-Basin

NRD, Twin Platte NRD

Background: During the Public Meetings in each District the following topics were

discussed: 1) Review of current allocations; 2) Possibility of adding sub-areas; 3) Opening up the Integrated Management Plan (IMP) for adjust-ments/changes based on the 2nd Increment Basin-Wide Plan.

All District residents were invited to attend these meetings.

Plan & Process Now:Th e Board of Directors will hold a Public Hearing for District Residents

and taxpayers to join the conversation on what the District needs for water management.

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Some Dates to Remember:

More onFlowmeters

April 10April 13April 19May 8 May 10 May 28July 4

SPNRD Board of Directors MeetingWomen in Agriculture ConferenceGround Water Public HearingBoard of Directors MeetingWestern Nebraska Childrens Ground Water FestivalSPNRD Offices Closed for Memorial DaySPNRD Offices Closed for Independence Day

It’s that time of year again when farmers start prepping for irrigation season to begin! We have been taking notes this year and have some helpful reminders and tips for you as you gear up for another year. Flow meters are required for all wells in the district pumping more than 50 gallons a minute. Make sure as you prep for the year your meter is operational. While rare, there are instances where malfunctioning me-ters can really impact your ability to irrigate your crops, causing financial losses to your operation. Take advantage of our knowl-edgeable staff here at the NRD. If you have concerns about whether your meter is correctly reading your water usage you can either call the SPNRD office or your certified flow meter maintenance contractor. Don’t know what contractors are certified? A list is available through our office and our website to help you out.

Did you know.......Cows can break your flowmeter? Livestock is often run with irrigation equip-ment in this area. Some animals lean and rub on equipment including flow meters. Check for visible damage to areas like the register before the season starts.

Have you used NeRAIN

One of the tools Nebraskans have is the Nebraska Rainfall Assessment and Information Network. Information gathered across the state is available at https://nednr.nebraska.gov/nerain. A public website, NeRAIN pro-vides access to precipitation informa-tion and weather events across Nebraska. This data helps our state and residents make important daily decisions for agri-culture, industry, home water use, utili-ties, insurance, and education purposes. The site makes getting information easy, as they have maps and reports that al-low users to view up to date data anytime and anywhere.

Have any questions or want to get in-volved? Call Tyler at the SPNRD of-fice at 308-254-2377 or email him at tsanders@spnrd.org.

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C H E M I G AT I O N

Food Plot Seed

Remember:

Chemigation: The injection of any chemical like nitrogen, phosphorus and pesticide into irrigation water; applied to the crop/land using an already installed ir-rigation system.

A term used frequently in agriculture may not be one all farmers are familiar with; common in many parts of Ne-braska, Chemigation is a chemical ap-plication method used to benefit crop production. Chemigation is an effective meth-od to apply the right amount of chem-ical at the right time it’s needed for a successful crop to be produced while also protecting our resources. Proper chemigation methods save a producer time, money and yield better crops all while ensuring their soil and water is a clean resource that will support them for years to come. Nebraska has the Nebraska Chemi-gation Act (Act) to protect ground and surface water in our state from fertil-izer/pesticide contamination. The Ne-braska Department of Environmental Quality (NDEQ) has developed the rules and regulations that irrigators are required to follow in order to utilize the application method. Under these rules the NRD’s were given the responsibil-

Chemicals are NOT pumped into the water supply. A holding tank is installed near irrigation equipment, then care-fully calibrated valves and hoses transfer the chemical to the irrigation equipment.

ity of managing the permit component. NRD’s ensure that irrigators maintain proper safety equipment and that the equipment functions properly. In addition to their specialized equipment irrigators MUST attend and pass a certification program that trains them on the rules and regulations that NDEQ developed. The NDEQ has contracted with the University of Nebraska (UNL) to deliver the training for this program. Certification cards are only good for 4 years, and then in-dividual chemigation applicators must recertify. While the permit for the irriga-tor may be good for 4 years, equipment permits are only good for one year. A chemigation permit to indicate that the system includes all required devices and safety equipment is issued by the local NRD. Applicants MUST apply for a permit each year to use their chemiga-tion systems. Local NRDs have inspec-tion checklists that they follow to en-sure that all safety equipment is in good

repair. Spot checks are done periodical-ly to ensure that the best protection can be offered to water sources.

The SPNRD has Food Plot Seed available. Seed supplied for

food plots is free, so stop by or call the office to find out more.

The

NewsletterSouth Platte Natural Resources District

South Platte Natural Resources District551 Parkland Dr. P.O. Box 294Sidney, NE 69162

NONPROFIT ORG.

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OGALLALA, NE69153

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In This Issue

Ground Water Public HearingThursday, April 19, 2018

Western Region EnvirothonSpring Seasonal Reminders

Upcoming GrantsSPNRD Water News

FlowmetersNeRAIN

Chemigation

Nebraska’s NaturalResources Districts

Protecting Lives • Protecting PropertyProtecting The Future

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