The document summarizes the past 10 years of the Conservation Effects Assessment Project (CEAP), which aims to quantify the effects of conservation practices on watershed scales. Key findings include: 1) Conservation practices have been shown to work but gains have been made in some areas more than others and critical concerns still exist. 2) Comprehensive, targeted planning looking at suites of practices in critical areas is needed to improve effectiveness over single practices. 3) Looking forward, opportunities exist to better inform conservation planning to build landscape resilience against threats like climate change, drought, and land use change through tools to identify critical areas and enhanced modeling.

1. Ten Years of the CEAP
Watershed Assessment Studies
“People here in the United States – and
in many other countries – are learning
that we must have soil conservation if we
are to have continuous, abundant
agricultural production. We are fast
learning, too, that it must be effective
conservation…”
Dr. Hugh H. Bennett, 1946, JSWC 1 (1): 21-24.

2. SWCS Annual Meeting
July 29, 2014
Future of The
Conservation
Effects Assessment
Project (CEAP)
Watershed
Assessment Studies:
Opportunities for
New Advances Lisa F. Duriancik, NRCS
CEAP Watersheds Component Leader
Mark Walbridge, USDA ARS
Roberta Parry, US EPA

3. Looking Back
CEAP Goals Over Last 10 Years
(2003)
• Estimate conservation effects and benefits
at regional and national scales
• Develop scientific understanding of
conservation practice effects at watershed
scales
Duriancik, et al., 2008, JSWC Vol. 63, No. 6, pp.185A-197A.

4. • National / Regional Assessments
– Cropland -- Grazing Lands
– Wetlands -- Wildlife
• Watershed Assessment Studies
– ARS, NIFA, NRCS
– 2 Special Issues of JSWC on CEAP Watersheds
– Books: NIFA CEAP lessons learned, MAL I and MAL II
– 2 Special sections forthcoming this year
• Bibliographies and Literature Reviews
– 2 new dynamic bibliographies – Targeting & Modeling
– Recent literature syntheses: rangelands and pasture
CEAP Project Organization: Activities

5. Looking Back
CEAP Over Last 10 Years:
• Vision: enhanced natural resources and
ecosystems through
– more effective conservation
– better management of agricultural landscapes
• Goal: Improve efficacy of conservation practices
and programs
• Conservation Planning and Implementation
• Management Decisions and
• Policy
Maresch, et al., 2008, JSWC Vol. 63, No. 6, pp. 198A-203A.

6. What Have We Learned?
Slide 6
 Conservation practices work.
 Gains have been made in some cases, but
critical concerns still exist.
 Comprehensive planning needed
 suites vs single practices
 Targeting critical areas improves
effectiveness.

7. Goals of the Watershed Studies:
• quantify the measurable effects of
conservation practices at the watershed scale
• enhance understanding
of conservation effects
in the biophysical setting
of a watershed

8. Key Questions for CEAP
Watershed Studies
• Effects of timing and location of practices
• Interaction among practices (additive,
independent, or contradictory)
• Optimal suite and placement of conservation
practices (modeling)
• Socio-economic factors that facilitate or
impede implementation and maintenance

9. Challenges of Yesterday (2008)…
and of Tomorrow
• Drought & Water
Availability
• Climate Change,
Extreme Events
• Land Use Change
Maresch, et al., 2008, JSWC Vol. 63,
No. 6, pp. 198A-203A.
ARS image

10. • WQ tradeoffs or synergies
among practices
– Relationships among
practices
• Practices or management
to address nutrient
concerns
Water Challenges Remain
HYPOXIA
Eutrophication

11. Looking Forward: Opportunities
Challenges of Tomorrow
• Stream sources for
sediment loads
– Targeting riparian area,
stream restoration
– Ephemeral gullies
• Climate impacts on
practice effectiveness
Data courtesy of
Jean Steiner, ARS

12. Looking Forward: Planning
• Looking forward…to better
inform conservation planning
– Planning for watershed outcomes
– Mitigate climate impacts
– Build resilient landscapes
• Scale, transferability and
conservation planning
– Critical area identification
– Modeling enhancements

13. • Empirical evidence of the
outcomes of targeting
– Watershed/nested scale
evaluation of targeted
conservation
• Relationships among
practices for water quality
and impact on other
resources or ecosystem
services
Looking Forward: Benefits

14. Looking Forward:
“Translating Science into
Practice”
• Conservation Technical Assistance
• Conservation Initiatives - focusing conservation
• Easements and Landscape Planning
• Strategic Planning and Accountability
• Conservation Partners (Regional Conservation
Partnership Program (RCPP))
– Conservation Districts, RC&Ds, Watershed Coalitions,
Extension
• Other USDA (FSA, OEM) or environmental agencies

15. Support for Comprehensive
Conservation Planning
• Make the science base
of CEAP Watersheds
more accessible at
State and Field Offices
• tools
• Integrate into
comprehensive
conservation planning
• resource assessment
• conservation effects
(Graphic with permission from Mazdak Arabi.)

16. David D. Briske, Leonard W. Jolley, Lisa F. Duriancik, and James P. Dobrowolski.. 2011.
Introduction to the CEAP Rangeland Literature Synthesis. In Briske, D.,D., et al. 2011
“An expanded culture of collaboration among
USDA programs and agencies, and several
nonfederal partners, has contributed greatly to the
transformational influence of CEAP.”
“Continued collaboration is necessary both within
USDA programs as well as with the broader
conservation and agricultural communities to
further capitalize on the knowledge and
unprecedented capacity …”
Coordination and Collaboration

17. American Academy for the Advancement
of Sciences (AAAS) Recognition
• Exemplary Collaborative Case Study in
March, 2011
• Success stems from collaboration
between operational and research
conservation communities

18. Comments and Input
lisa.duriancik@wdc.usda.gov
“These tools [of soil conservation] are
sometimes used singly where the land is easy
to stabilize, but they are more often used in
combination, one supplementing another,
where the conservation needs are more
difficult or complex.”
--Dr. Hugh H. Bennett, 1946, JSWC 1 (1): 21-24.