“We’ve been applying for grants, but so far, nobody’s danced with us.”
– Clen Atchley, Marysville Canal Company president
PHASE 2 PUMP. At the edge of the northwest corner of the 5-acre pond is a platform with all the electrical circuitry that delivers water from the pond to about 6,600–6,700 acres of irrigated farmland.
of center pivots has significantly spiked. Pivots have become feasible in fields where they otherwise wouldn’t have been. “I like the environmental benefits because once you put a pivot on a field, it’s much less likely to go into development. It means it’s going to be more economical to keep it in ag,” Atchley says. Despite taking decades in order to
realize the first two phases, Atchley is grateful in some ways that it wasn’t funded the first time it was proposed. “Then we would’ve put in steel pipe,
which would’ve probably been rusting out about now. We’re putting everything that we’ve done so far into PVC, which should last forever,” he says. According to Beckmann, since EQIP
was first started in 1997, this is the largest project funded in the United States to date. “I was surprised at that,” he says. “But it
really was.” Even if it wasn’t the biggest project
funded by EQIP to date, the NRCS would still be pleased with it because the growers have been pleased with the results. “We’re happy with it,” Beckmann says.
“If the farmers are happy, we’re happy,” he says.
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