11,300 N.C. acres designated for Quail Initiative


WILDLIFE

A new federal program pays farmers to set aside strips of native grasses and brush around their fields. These "bobwhite buffers" provide habitat for quail, songbirds and other small animals.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture on Oct. 1 began enrolling as much as 250,000 acres nationwide for the Northern Bobwhite Quail Habitat Initiative. North Carolina has been designated for 11,300 acres, more than any other state in the Southeast.

The idea is to help offset "clean farming" practices, which eliminate fallow fields and weedy ditches between field and forest that were a normal part of the farm landscape before modernization.


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Jack Horan