Pea soup in a bowl helps chase away winter chills, but it’s hard to get a warm, fuzzy feeling about the sickly green soup so many of our lakes and rivers become in summer. Beyond a shadow of a doubt, the primary cause of all that nasty algae growth is polluted runoff from agricultural lands. Phosphorus found in fertilizers and manure is the main culprit.

Starting next week, DNR is holding a series of public hearings on their update to NR 151, the state’s rules for preventing polluted runoff from farms, construction sites and cities.

Your support for the proposal is vital. There are two new sensible and simple requirements for farmers that none the less are being portrayed by farm organizations as the nail in the coffin for farming in Wisconsin. You can bet they’ll be packing the hearings with unhappy farmers, so we need a show of force to tell the story that clean water matters as much to the Wisconsin economy and culture as the dairy industry does.

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