By: Nathan Dewing, Agricultural Team Leader
Conditions get tough for managing livestock in the winter.  It can be stressful for animals, farmers, and our natural resources.  Let’s consider steps to dramatically decrease cold snap stress.
If a farmer can cut the wind and give his animals a solid place to land their feet, our winter temps will cause little stress.  If relatively dry with a barrier against bitter wind, our animals like 15 degrees F, better than 90 degrees.

By: Jonathan VanNoy, Natural Resource Specialist
In 1972, the Environmental Protection Agency published regulations to reduce pollution through a new program; the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES, for short).  This new program took aim at reducing pollutants to waters of the United States.  In Pennsylvania, the NPDES program is administered by the State Department of Environmental Protection (DEP).  In Bradford County, the Conservation District has a delegation agreement with DEP to administer the NPDES program at the County level.  This allows people applying for earth disturbance permits in Bradford County to submit NPDES plans to the Conservation District for review and approval, speeding up the permit process.  Today we are going to look at the NPDES program in Bradford County as it relates to earth disturbance and the resulting stormwater from construction activities.  Stormwater, simply put, is runoff from precipitation, snowmelt, surface runoff and drainage.