A new facility in Marshall County could spark more conservation on Iowa farms

The Iowa chapter of the Land Improvement Contractors of America (LICA) officially opened a new facility on its 80-acre demonstration farm in Marshall County Thursday.

Iowa LICA President Scott Bohle said having classroom and meeting space will make it easier to educate the next generation of professional contractors, along with government employees, lawmakers and students, to help conserve soil and water in the state.

Bohle said the building “gives people a place to gather, collaborate and continue the important work that defines our association.”

Just outside the new space are wetlands, terraces, sediment control basins, bioreactors and other features, which members have built since LICA purchased the farm near Melbourne in 2000.

“We call it the one-stop shop, where you can see anything being put to practice by our landowners,” said Kelby Kiefer, executive director of Iowa LICA.

Together, these “edge-of-field” practices remove 50% of phosphates and almost 100% of the nitrates from the runoff of a 1,000-plus acre watershed, according to the association.

Adding more wetlands, saturated buffers and bioreactors across the state are a key part of Iowa’s Nutrient Reduction Strategy. It aims to cut nitrogen and phosphorus losses from farm fields by 41% and 29%, respectively.

The strategy is part of a broader effort to reduce nutrient pollution in the state’s waterways and the Gulf of Mexico by 45% compared to the 1980-96 baseline period. It does not include a target date.

Iowa Secretary of Agriculture Mike Naig said the state has accelerated edge-of-field practices in recent years, in part through the Batch and Build model. The approach bundles projects in a targeted watershed to reduce costs and save time for farmers and contractors.

Nearly 150 nitrate reducing wetlands and around 500 saturated buffers, bioreactors and multi-purpose oxbows had been built in the state as of 2024. Thousands more will be needed to meet the state’s nutrient reduction targets.

“[Clean water is] something we need to be focused on, and we can be proud of the work that’s happened, but we know that we need to do more,” Naig said. “Buildings like this help.”

Naig said scaling up conservation infrastructure across the state will require more skilled contractors. He described them as the “critical link” between concepts and “getting things on the ground.”

“It’s from that point where you say, ‘We have a design that’s ready to go, a willing landowner,’ but somebody needs to make it happen,” Naig said. “The land improvement contractor sits in that very important spot.”