Watershed Planning and ACPF

The ACPF provides a menu of conservation options in the form of output maps that can help facilitate conservation discussions on farms and in community halls. The ACPF can be used in area-wide watershed planning to determine critical areas to concentrate on, by conservation planners to determine which stakeholders to engage, and at the field-scape to help landowners decide which practices to implement where.

The ACPF team has hosted several state-level training on using the outputs of the ACPF in a watershed management context. The trainings are designed for NRCS staff, watershed practitioners, county conservation staff, watershed planners, and private consultants who are interested in learning more about using the ACPF to improve their small watershed-based planning and implementation projects. No GIS or prior ACPF experience is needed.

We have also developed a series of resources on using the ACPF in watershed planning:

• Using ACPF in Watershed Planning Videos
  The ACPF team has several videos from a virtual Wisconsin Watershed Applications of ACPF workshop that was held in August 2020. The videos listed below provide an overview of what goes into running the ACPF, an overview of ACPF use examples from across the Midwest, and gives an in-depth ACPF use example from Outagamie County, Wisconsin.
  • Overview of Running the ACPF or non-GIS users
  • ACPF Use Examples
  • In-Depth ACPF Use Example

 

• Using ACPF with Stakeholders
  Researchers at Purdue University spoke with GIS technicians, watershed coordinators, and conservation planners in six watersheds in Iowa and Minnesota between October 2016 and June 2017 to learn what has worked for them when engaging diverse stakeholders around conservation using the ACPF. Key takeaways from their interviews can be found here

 

• Using ACPF in Conservation and Watershed Planning
  The ACPF team, along with our partners, developed as series of graphics outlining how ACPF can be used in the NRCS Nine-Step Conservation Planning Process and the EPA Nine Element Watershed Planning process . These graphics are intended for  watershed and conservation planners exploring how the ACPF could help them in their work.
  • Using ACPF in Areawide Conservation Planning
  • Using ACPF in Field/Farm-Scale Conservation Planning
  • Using ACPF in US EPA Nine Element Watershed Planning

 

• ACPF in Wisconsin
  The ACPF team held a Watershed Applications of ACPF virtual workshop in August 2020. As a follow-up to this work, the team created a graphic illustrating how the ACPF can be used in tandem with other Wisconsin-based tools to meet area goals. View the graphic