Wetlands have long been something farmers have struggled with.
In the past the struggle was straight forward, revolving around how to effectively eliminate them from a field.
A wetland was simply acres which could not be planted, and that was seen as a detriment to a farm operation.
There were of course reasons for that view, beginning with the quota system of delivering grain which used to be based on delivering an amount of bushels per cultivated acres.
It was a system which really forced Prairie farmers into setting the plow to hundreds of acres of land which would have better been left as wetlands, riparian areas, or woodland.
The quota system may have changed, but wetlands are still being drained from fields based on economic factors.
When grain and oilseed prices are high, as they are today, farmers reasonably want to grow the maximum bushels, and so they seek to claim every acre possible.
In low prices it comes down to maximizing bushels to maximize returns, and that again means wanting every acre possible in production.
Then there is the pressure of ever larger equipment.
Things such as potholes, sloughs, and even shelterbelts and tree bluffs become problematic in the face of ever larger equipment. Manoeuvring around potholes with a 60-foot-plus cultivator is not something farmers want to be doing.
So there have always been good reasons for farmers changing the landscape, but draining wetlands, while perhaps positive for an individual farmer, it is not good for the overall health of the land.
Ducks Unlimited Canada research scientist Pascal Badiou told a Prairie Flood Management and Mitigation Seminar in Yorkton the loss of natural wetland is having an effect of water quality on the Canadian Prairies.
"Globally we have lost 50 per cent of the world's wetlands in the last 100-years," said Badiou, who added in the Canadian Prairie region an estimated 90 per cent of naturally occurring wetlands have been lost.
Badiou details that wetlands protect waterways further downstream from taking on the full effect of nutrient load leeching from a larger area because of drainage.
The wetlands also offer additional storage in extreme rain and melt events, he said.
So there are now more stringent rules regarding new drainage projects. That is good for a watershed, but begs the question if a slough is good for a wider area, should not that area pay the farmer something for maintaining a wetland he could drain and farm.
Badiou said he wasn't sure farmers maintaining the status quo should be compensated, but it would seem if you legislate that you can't drain then society should pay some compensation.
It is a debate which scares government based on the cost they might face, when you hear Badiou talk about Lake Winnipeg being the sickest lake in the world, and nutrient load from the land being the culprit. What is the cost of such damage? In that context, paying farmers may be a small price to pay.
