July 29, 2026
A decade after producers in the Tainter Creek watershed organized as a watershed council, a new study found that their efforts to increase managed grazing adoption in their watershed coincided with a 14 percent reduction in phosphorus concentrations in Tainter Creek relative to neighboring streams.
Lexi Wellman, who led the study as part of her masters program at UW-Madison, said her results not only demonstrate the power of perennial practices to drive water quality improvement, but also illustrate the critical role producer-led groups play in advancing transformative land use change.
“Productive agriculture landscapes and clean water are not incompatible,” she wrote. “Impediments to this type of transformative change are mostly socially constructed, so we need innovative sociological approaches…to bring positive ecological change to agricultural landscapes.”
Between 2019 and 2022, farmers in the Tainter Creek Watershed helped enact this positive change as participants in the Tainter Creek Farmer-led Water Quality Project, a partnership that brought together Tainter Creek producers, Vernon County’s Land and Water Conservation Department, Valley Stewardship Network, UW-Madison’s Grassland 2.0 program, and national collaborators with the Wallace Foundation.
Ultimately, the project distributed $173,000 to Tainter Creek producers to implement conservation practices across 98 ha. It did so with a focus on converting annual cropping systems to well-managed grazing, and a goal of reducing surface water phosphorus levels while also supporting farm viability.
Phosphorus pollution to Driftless streams poses public health risks, and fuels water quality degradation and habitat loss from local trout streams to the Gulf of Mexico. For farmers, Wellman said phosphorous runoff also means that costly fertilizer inputs and soil resources are washed away and wasted.
While a significant amount of excess phosphorus is already stored in Driftless stream systems due to erosion and sedimentation caused by generations of intensive agriculture, managing ongoing nutrient inputs can help prevent the problem from growing. Perennial agriculture, like managed grazing, is one way to protect soil and prevent nutrient loss.
During and after the Tainter Creek Grazing Project, volunteers, local collaborators, and university partners conducted water quality sampling in and around Tainter Creek to measure the impact of their land use transitions. By comparing trends in nutrient levels across these sites over time, in combination with other factors like precipitation, Wellman was able to relate the nutrient level reductions she observed in the Tainter Creek Watershed with the increase in grazing adoption occurring there over the same period.
“Our study suggests that focusing conservation investment in transitioning agricultural land to well-managed perennial grazing provides a higher return on conservation efforts by addressing the fundamental nutrient imbalances among annual systems that drive Phosphorus loss,” Wellman wrote. “Scaling well-managed grazing practices rather than incremental Best Management Practices is likely to have a higher impact on successful nutrient reduction at the watershed scale and therefore help reach Total Maximum Daily Load goals more effectively.”
To bring about these land use transformations at scale, Wellman called for a shift toward outcomes based incentives, as well as broader access to specialized technical guidance, financial planning tools, and adaptive collaborations that center producer relationships.
Wellman will share more results from her study at the Coon Creek Community Watershed Council’s (CCCWC) next general meeting, happening 6pm August 5th at the Munsch Farm (s995 Bagstad Ln, Coon Valley). She’ll be joined by producer leaders from the Tainter Creek Watershed; as well as the Munsch family, who helped develop the economic analysis tools that supported grazing adoption in Tainter Creek.
The CCCWC is a farmer-led watershed conservation nonprofit dedicated to increasing awareness of, access to, and adoption of practices that support flood resilience, soil health, and community well-being in and around the Coon Creek Watershed. Its August 5th meeting is made possible with special support from Valley Stewardship Network, via a Grazing Lands Conservation Initiative Grant. The event is free and all are welcome.
The Coon Creek Community Watershed Council is pleased to offer cost share for managed grazing adoption to producers in the Coon Creek, West Fork Kickapoo, and Little La Crosse Watersheds. To request cost share, complete the form linked here.
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