grazing riparian areas vs. salmon

Milkwood Nick wrote:
We received a substantial grant to fence all the riparian zones on our 1000 acre farm here in the mountains of NSW Australia. One of the conditions was that we were only allowed to "crash graze" the areas for a maximum of 6 days per year.

Stocking densities weren't defined, but at least that branch of government has some idea.

So you fence off the riparian area, right?

And then you are allowed to run animals inside any chunk of the riparian area for up to six day, right? 

That sounds like a step up from "stay out!".  Although I would rather have something that says 30 days rest between visits and no visit is longer than 10 days.

Well they didn't specify a stocking rate.....  so we could use a very high density for 2 days 3 times a year.....  which would be my preference.

We are in a drought at the moment, have very poor soil structure and eroded banks with blackberry trying to recover the area.. at this stage I'm just going to keep stock out until we can get some more trees in there.

Nick,

My experience with paddock shift systems is that they seriously pump up the vegetation!  My own personal experience reflects this.  If you want more growth and lush next to the stream, include it in your rotation!

Gosh Paul and you have not written a paper on the allelopathetic effects of coniferas though you mention havign found out a lot about it maybe i have missed that forum.
 I know people who believe in simplifying and the simplify all sense out of things it is simpler for the authorities to say no live stock farming beside rivers but that sort of sumplifying in the end brings a lot of problems with it.
 
As i understood it from my father a usefull person when  it comes to sharing information he has read, though he kept me pretty ignorant on somethings, I now live among those who share no information which i think is bad for the country, you end up with fewer people knowing anything, a very protective atitude to information seems to be normal   here in Spain.
 My father read and i have read too that the problem with NPK for fish is that if there is a lot of nitrogen in the water a lot of weed starts to grow in the water and the weed takes up all the oxygen leaving none for the fish, a bit odd if you consider that plants release oxygen. The life in one of the great lakes got killed in this way if my memory serves me.

     The truth is that putting too much NPK on land is a problem on all land, too high solutions of nitrogen burn out microorganism, be it nitrogen from manure or from chemical fertilisers i suppose that chemical fertilisers are more famouse as being bad for micro organisms because it is easier to get too much of them.
    You could say what is wrong with having no microorganisms, you can grow plants with the right chemical fertilisers microrganisms or not. Who knows what difference it makes to the earth that it vibrates with life or that it does not, it was microorganisms that created the atmosphere in our planet.
  We know that micro organisms are necessary for the natural processes that put nitrogen at the reach of plants if they aren't in the soil we depend on chemial fertilisers and we know that recently they have discovered that having a full set of microrganisms and fungi helps plants ward off disease.  
 I dont know why turbid  water is bad for fish you would have thought they had evolved to handle it as water gets turbid if there is any big rain event that carries a lot of mud into ponds. .agri rose macaskie.

Susan Monroe wrote:As for pigs not utterly destroying a landscape... I used to drive to work every day past a five-acre place that new owners had bought.  They fenced off an area that was about 80x150' and brought in two small white piglets and a shelter, apparently to clean up the area, as a garden appeared afterward.  It took very little time for those two little pigs to rototill that entire area.  There was nothing left except two large trees at opposite corners of the enclosure.  They wiped out everything else, EVERYTHING.  And these were just little pigs, they disappeared before they got very big.  Can you imagine how much damage a half-ton, always-hungry hog will do?Pigs are destructive.

It is unfortunate when people make generalizations from too little data about things they don't really understand. Your example is extremism and you can't extend that to all pigs or proper pastured pig farming. We raise about 300 pigs on pasture. They don't destroy the land. They graze the grasses, clovers, kale, beets, nuts and other forages. We've been doing this for years and our soils are gradually improving each year. We use managed rotational grazing techniques with our pigs, the same as we use with sheep and such. Along with them we run chickens, ducks and geese. It's a system and it works. Pigs are not destructive. It is the way that the person you saw doing it that was destructive. Don't confuse things.

Leah Sattler wrote:I have read through threads where people used pigs to take out.

Actually, pigs are not very good at removing trees or stumps. This is more of a myth.

How do you measure/ qualify soil improvments? 

Mark Vander Meer wrote:How do you measure/ qualify soil improvments?

Species density, diversity, growth rates, soil tests, depth of top soil, etc.

  This is to make it weasy to see if your soil is getting better. Apart from tests by sccientists there are signs any non-expert can whatch out for. To make it very easy for beginers here all the information i have on whatching you soil get better .
     If the problems you had with the soil disappear is one. I had clay soils, too heavy to dig without gritting my teeth to go out and dig them and suddenly even quite quickly they have got lighter, and drained better, the clay has broken up so it must be full enough of organic matter not to stick together in a heavy and sticky messy mass. There are still bit of heavy clay in some parts of the garden and i can only guess why some places got better sooner than others. The bits that are highly planted with shrubs are the bits where the clay stopped being so heavy and plastic and horrible for anything but pottery. One of these is a spots where the soil got better quicker is where the plants got water in summer sometimes and  fertilizer .
       The colour changes as organic matter dirties it up. My soil used to leave our clothes red if we happened to sit on the ground in the first two years i owned the garden and now i would be hard put ot it to say where you could find red clay on the land.
      I have not tried with sandy soils maybe you would notice them getting more consistent and holding water better.  
    The presence of more earth worms in the soil is a good sign .
    In dry parts of the world it is ants that pull organic matter into the ground which is a reason to worry a bit about Paul Stamets miracle termite ants cure, will he kill the ants that bring the vegetation.

       The wild plants that grow in your garden change as the soil gets better, different plants are adapted to different conditions so when things get better some plants stop growing there and others start to appear.

    Also if the soil is poor the plants will grow up fast and high and stringy in spring and seed early. When they have a fairer chance to seed without being in a rush about it because the soil is better and stays damp longer. In better soils, they  will grow slower and less high and thicker and seed later in the summer. I have yet to get a very heavy crop of grass. i read about this in Heidi Gildemeister's book Mediterranean gardening a waterwise approach that is published in America.It is a three star gardening book book published in spainish and english, that mainly tells you how to grow plants that are right for your climate so you don't have to use much water and how to mulch so as to use less water.

    You can do a bit of easy home tests. You put a teaspoonfull of soil in a glass of water the organic matter will float and the sand will sink and the clay particles will leave the water looking cloudy for a long while, being to small to settle out quickly. The test to see if it is acid or not is easy it is like a pregnancy test it the test paper comes out one color it is one thing and if it comes out the other an other the test to see if you have pahtogens in the water is easy you put in some powder and if the water turns deep wine red colour it has pathogens in it. I have not studied this last in any depth.  
     You can taste the soil to see if it seems to you acid or alkaline but it might give you worms which is a good reason not to taste it.
   That it sticks together into crumbs of soil, sand or has broken up into crumbs, clay, is a good sign and it  has to do with the glomalin in the soil that falls of the hypha of mycorhyzal fungi and is sticky so it stick crumbs of soil together and full of carbon and can last forty odd years in the soil. If you see  soil that sticks together in to crumbs you will recognise it though you might think you dont know enough to recognise that sort of thing. .
 Scientists can of course find out a lot more things, how much glomalin you have in your soil, how much of what minerals, how acid or alkaline for example, how much humates you have in the soil as well as how much organic material.
    With carbon credits being paidn to farmers  it is worth collecting organic matter in your soil though i a m not sure they pay you enough to be worth the effort except that it is a worth while effort anyway. A soil with more organic matter in it apart from beign more workable absorbes and retains mor ewater reducing the need to water it. agfri  rose macaskie.

from: paul wheaton on 25-04-2009, 20:21:07
At his first presentation, there was a Q&A at the end.  I asked if he would run pigs in a riparian area.  "Absolutely!" and then somebody sitting behind me made some sort of snide remark about how that is not salmon safe.

Did you run pigs in your riparian area and if so, how did it go?

rose macaskie wrote:carbon credits being paidn to farmers

This is an unfortunate illusion. I own a lot of forest and farm land. We do sustainable forestry and farming. I can not get any carbon credits. It is the carbon traders like Gal Ore who are making the money - not the farmers and foresters who are actually soaking up the carbon. It is deceit. And Gal Ore drives it with his hot air.

another huge problem with Salmon is sediments in their spawning grounds.  Clearcut logging, traditional logging, and public land grazing all contributing.  So officals decided to make buffer zones along streams.  Yes it is better not to have clearcut or traditional ag field come right up to stream (or have them at all).  Livestock not managed will often muddy one area of stream and degrade it.  Managed intensive grazing heals streams but public opinion has not caught up.  Lots of folks are skeptical of profit driven ideas (clear air act, healthy forests initiative etc).

Leah Sattler wrote:...if you want to do something with your land that will be detrimental to the waterway that also passes through mine I would be pretty ticked off.

Background:
My father is currently planting trees and fencing off (so-many??) feet from the creek the runs through the lowest canyon on our 1200 acres.  He only runs 35 head of cattle.  The creek is approx. 2 -4 inches deep during the summer, spring time run-off makes barbed-wire fence rebuilding at every creek crossing a PURE JOY every year!  But to the astonishment of the geniuses coming up with the riparian rights laws and programs...NOT ONE Native has pleaded with my father to set up gill nets along the banks of the creek for the HUGE Salmon runs. (please note the subtle use of sarcasm)  Fact is, a bigger "sponge" is needed upstream.  And if someone is doing something to their land that (a) increases depth of the water table further upstream, (b) regulates seasonal run-off so that there is LESS erosion downstream and (c) leaves the H2O in as good or BETTER condition leaving their property than when it entered...I'd say that you should probably bake a pie, walk upstream and deliver it to that neighbor with a "Thank You!" and a smile.

Here's a solution.

Take measurements....where the river/stream ENTERS a property AND where it LEAVES...at the same place each time.
Measure flow (at least twice a year...spring melt/run-off and end of summer)...in both places
Measure pathogens...in both places
Set an agreed upon acceptable level of scientific variation (when taking initial baseline measurements)

Then set up a reward and punishment system.

If what you do leaves things (in this case water) in as good or better condition than what you received it, you are either "even" or you earn a reward (maybe a significant tax break or something of that nature)...However, if what you do leaves things in worse condition, you will be penalized (not only for what you're doing to your downstream neighbors, but also for what you're doing to MOTHER...Earth).  Your punishment should increase exponentially and drastically the further "out of bounds" your activities leaves the water after it runs through your property.  In other words, a good law would make running a CAFO on your land (regardless of overall size) prohibitively expensive.

Mi dos pesos,
C.S. Reeves

riparian zones on salmon streams should be heavily wooded which would keep the stock off most of the stream bank without fencing, however if the riparian zone is screwed already keeping the stock off the banks is just one of the things needed to get shade and woody debris needed for healthy fisheries back.

National Geographic Wolf Wars was an article in March 2010 which attempted to show that the reintroduction of wolves to the Yellowstone area was beneficial to the entire ecosystem. There is a graphic in the article which shows the difference in the riparian areas before and after the reintroduction:
http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2010/03/wolf-wars/wolf-illustration

Would running pigs responsibly not produce somewhat similar effects. I have seen running pigs on my rented land that over the past year the diversity of plant species has greatly increased. Then I read in Holzer's Permaculture that he has observed the same thing and mentions a study done in Austria where they recorded an increase in plant species. Do we know anything more about that study? I'd like to see it. Perhaps I need to do my own study?

I realize pigs are not wolves, but the point is that they could provide a benefit rather than be a detriment if managed well. And that is the key difference, as when we put up fences we are taking on the total welfare of animals.

The reintroduction of the wolf in Yellowstone served to bring the balance back into order.
Wolves are keen predators, and as such have reduced the overpopulation of browsers that had taken over in an unnatural shortage of predators.  The pig, while quite useful in the proper management of open and wooded spaces, can never replace a well qualified predator in that role.

Mankind's love of deer, and fear/loathing of predators such as coyotes and wolves has brought around a totally unnatural and destructive balance of too many browsers/grazers into many of our wooded regions.  If we keep killing every wolf/coyote we see, we can sit in our rocking chairs on our porches and watch our forests disappear.  Forests can only survive in a reasonably well balanced ecosystem.

predator pressure keeps deer and elk off the banks because the wolfs like to hang out by the water too.

pigs will increase diversity by creating disturbance, but stream banks are a bad place for frequent disturbance. pigs in particular due to rooting and wallowing need to not be on the banks of a salmon stream they will root out the woody veg that needs to be there.

Thanks to Brice and John - I can appreciate that it is a natural balance that has been restored.

That provokes my mind to ask the question where are pigs native to and what happens there?

Also, are there pictures of pre-post pigs in riparian areas anywhere? Any from Krameterhof?

It seems like it's not a difficult thing to determine stocking density, stocking rate and length of time in an area through a little experimentation.

And does any of this relate to pig breeds? Pigs are known for digging up pasture, but my Tamworths (un-ringed) only do minimal damage when rotated frequently.

The history of domesticated pigs dates to at least the first expansion of agriculture, when agriculture expanded beyond growing cereals/grains.  Pigs are scavengers by nature and quickly learned that a well fed human population would leave scrap piles.  The humans, likewise learned that scrap piles were a good place to hunt boars.  The family living closest to the scrap pile quickly became providers of meat to the village, and a symbiotic relationship began.  As agriculture expanded beyond the plains into the woods, it was found that the pigs could clear land for the human expansion beyond the edges.  Garbage was thrown deeper and deeper into the brush, and the pigs continued to provide new farmland for an expanding human population.  The domestication of the pig was as important to agricultural growth as was the domestication of draft animals which came later.

Very interesting.

Hi all,

This is a complicated issue, and from what I gather over the life of the thread, we are badly served by attitudes that shut down the discussion of solutions to such a problem. I think, personally, that a sausage-link formation of hugelhedges made up of fruit and berry shrubs and trees, perhaps some nut trees as well, lying parallel to the river's edge would act as a filter to catch any fecal matter heading via runoff to the water, and as an impediment to larger, destructive animals, domesticated or wild. My personal approach will likely be to create a pond and stream system fed from the existant watercourse, but physically decoupled and forcing me to deal with my own pollution problems within the system.
Adding willows, or one's poop beast(s) of choice along the waters' edge would mean shading of the river, and the cleaning such trees do in the course of feeding, meaning a river that leaves the property cleaner than it entered, especially if downstream from big ag, past or present. But to say that an issue must be avoided entirely simply takes away our ability to use ingenuity to make things better. Besides, if we don't figure out land-use models that fix problems of water pollution, what do we do with our waterfowl, stop keeping them? I thought it was an axiom of permaculture, that we don't have problems or excesses in our systems; we simply have a dearth of those things within the system that feed on those problem things. Too much nitrogen? Add poop beasts. Too many moles and voles? A richness of pig food. An overabundance of insect life in your garden patch? Mmmm, chicken feed! There are no problems, only solutions (who knew John Lennon was a permie?).

As a commercial fishermen deeply into salmon issues. I would say keep the livestock out of the streams. not for the reasons folks think; over the last 60 years an idea was floated hat if we got rid of all the obstructions in rivers, streams and creeks we could get rid of flooding, keep mosquitos at bay and make things better all around. so we removed obstructions killed off the beavers in the upper creeks, deepened channels and all the other stuff that would make our rivers flow fast and pure. Of course no one told any of us that by doing all this we would be killing off the salmon habitat by stripping all the pools out of the system. then we decided that we needed to increase sport fishing in the west so we had to introduce better game fish into some river systems, striped bass, pike, pickerel, muskie, bass, Etc. We wanted these sport fish where the most of the out f state anglers where coming; from port orford oregon north to tacoma, right in the best most productive spawning grounds on the continent. now all these game fish like to eat little fish and all of them will eat any little fish they can as many as they can. Salmon runs that might have survived the dam's and clearing of the rivers of obstructions soon fell to lows so low they have almost become extinct.

whelp now we got folks want to run livestock in rivers and creeks, spray livestock down with bug dope, clear brush out of streams to let livestock drink, Etc. and what little salmon habitat we have left gets tore up. its not just the introduced predatory fish, or turbidity or vegetation removal, or toxins, or runoff from clear cuts, or warm run off from cleared farm land, or creeks used as junk yards, or lack of obstructions to make spawning pools, or livestock turning the few pools into mud wallows, or goats stripping the trees of bark, or lack of beavers, or dams, or over fishing with nets, or mine leachate, Its all of this combined. You can bet each and every river, stream, creek, and riparian area now days that has any thing thats going to damage it even a little bit is going to add to the whole mess of problems the salmon runs already have heaped on there plates.

want to run cows down to the creek for water then recreate the riparian environments that the cow, trapper and plow have removed. restore the watersheds so the land can again purify water and make habitat for salmon. the sooner this is done the sooner folks can run livestock into riparian zones with out worrying about some fed hammering them for it.

Ernie, that's exactly what I'm saying. I'm obviously not the only one who thinks that some well-considered natural reconstruction is necessary, and that we can't afford to even simply abandon the damaged land; it has the ability to heal itself, but I think that to bring back the salmon, some deliberate effort is required. We can't afford to mess it up, though, and so I feel that if it is riparian grazing that we want, we need to dig artificial ponds and streams in a circuit separate from the natural watercourse. That way, any accidents happen within our own systems, and they can be handled. Once an isolated system of ponds and streams is being managed to the point where a salmon population or analog species is thriving, it can be inferred that the same steps taken to make the artificial system healthy will work for reconstruction and rehabilitation of the natural system. I don't believe in a hands-off policy with nature, as if the pollution and degradation are ongoing, we need to take whatever steps on-site to rectify the situation, creating those water features salmon need for spawning and feeding, cooling water temperatures by encouraging a riparian canopy whose root systems clean the excess nitrogen and other nutrients out of the water. I was also wondering if there were natural predators for introduced fish species that, by virtue of the niche they occupy, would eat their spawn without touching the salmon. Any ideas?

-CK

this is a big discussion that only touches on the riparian areas. look into the step program that the fishermen them selves came up with. it was outlawed by the government after it was found to work. introducing anymore species into our rivers would be bad.
there are very few things that eat pike and pickerel as adults and those we dont want. the best we could do is have open season on every introduced sport fish and remove them from the habitat. however that will not happen as long as the states and BC. make money on the sport fishery.

one thing to understand in this is that our respective governments dont want small commercial fishing boats on the water. they nly want big boats. Small boats and a healthy salmon fishery are much to difficult to track and they think all small fishing boats are smugglers (in part because we wont lay down and starve for our countries) Where farmers and ranchers come into the mix is that the damage has been so great that the governments are forced to do something and most farmers seem to think that the land can handle 5 times more stock than it can. it becomes a mess when stewards on the land cant see that those who rape the land are the actual targets of the regulations.

Be it understood now that apart from what I've read about the salmon habitat problems out west and about attempts to restart salmon runs here in the great lakes, I know nothing about fishing other than the ones that tear your rod out of your hands are the pike, and the ones I almost never even feel that swim towards the boat are pickerel, and even less about the fishing industry. I think, though, that the way to proceed might be as I suggested earlier. Create a system of ponds and streams that mimic the optimal spawning environment on one end of the cycle and proceed through a system designed to mimic what would be required to support a naturally landlocked (no access to the river, no route to the ocean) population of salmon. I'm sure some sort of application to whatever level of government regulates environmental impact, but I suspect if it was allowed, the system could be selectively opened to release and accept migrating salmon populations, matured to the necessary size in an environment free of competition from sport fish and in a healthy polyculture. I realise that a closed-loop aquaculture is taking on about as much as a hothouse greenhouse, but that makes it difficult, not impossible. Worthwhile things usually are.

-CK

the great lakes has a fishery for several species its just not very big. for the land locked fish in the mid west the problem is mostly development and pollution not to mention contamination from ships pumping out after they pass from the ocean via the St. Lawrence.

if you want salmon habitat in the mid west then you have to begin at the basic level of stop dumping industrial chemicals into the rivers. its not Ag that kills off the fish so badly its manufacturers that have been grandfathered in with traditional disposal allowances.
next step is to simply restock the lakes with native fish. actually the entire biome needs to be reestablished from the bugs up. until this is taken care of your returns on spawn is going to be low no matter the stream conditions.

however you are correct to point out that the plant structures in the head waters/ riparian areas need to be protected for destruction; Currently those riparian areas are the only reservoirs of biota that you have. the stream and river beds need to be allowed to meander and brads, the trees need to be replanted along the entire length of the rivers. irrigation practices that drain the rivers to trickles need to stop. Etc.

the amount of changes that need to happen are massive and no one wants to fund anything.

I think all we can do is be good stewards to the land in our individual possession, and be vocal advocates of measures and practices that do what you're saying. But a boycott of those industries you mentioned, a pr campaign of the sort the Alberta Oil Sands are experiencing might work, but the fishing industry needs to be on the front lines of that fight. Or a class-action lawsuit on behalf of all negatively impacted parties. Landowners, fisheries workers, fishermen, get them on board and sue until it becomes impossible for them to continue without ceasing all harmful activity. Pipe dream, I know.

By the way, thanks for all your work on RMHs. I plan on buying and reading your book before I ask any inane questions. Where can I find a copy?

Actually you can go to our web site and follow the link to the store page we have a link.

This is my first post on this forum and I have a way to go before I understand the system. I wanted to comment on pigs and other animals in riparian areas. I think the problem is set stocking on these areas. Any animal will damage riparian areas or waterways if left there too long. This is a new understanding for me. I am just learning about, and starting to apply, holistic management on my farm. This involves mob grazing all species together and moving them daily. Electric fencing is used extensively. The animals go on to mature pasture as a mob, graze, pee, poo, trample. They are then moved to a fresh area and the previous area is left to fully recover. This system fertilises, pushes seed into the ground, flattens pasture old and new to act as mulch for the soil. It replicates how the savannah of Africa and all other natural grasslands work or used to work naturally. The predators moved the herds on in the natural systems. Two of the sites I am researching this method is www.ManagingWholes and The Savory Institute. This method brings back land from desertification. The before and after evidence of this method is amazing and inspirational.

The correct answer is: i'm not sure!!!
Locally the best Murray Cod are court where the most nutrient runs into the rivers (feedlot muck)
25 years ago i visited Peter Andrews farm he was excluding cows from his creeks,(aparrantly horses dont like getting their tootsies wet) The end result being that reeds etc grew in the creeks resulting in greater silt harvest and more water spreading into the flood plain creating a more robust system
Peter Is well regarded in floodplain management here (hes kinda like an angry Sepp Holtzer) If you see him give him a hug!

i think you should hold back the hogs a few yards from the river!
The do nothing method can become problematic eg when trees near the river begin to supress each other and the riparian ground cover.Rowan Reid one of the worlds formost agroforestry lecturers has demonstrated on his site limited logging in riparian zones may infact be beneficial!!!

Regardless of the reasoning behind regulations, there are great reasons for protecting riparian corridors and their buffers, and the links are not direct enough for us to suss out, at least the way we're trying to here in this forum. The National Geographic link about the Wolf Wars nails it: there are larger processes in play than the ones we think we directly manage, and we all share responsibility to help restore balance in a time of great imbalance by allowing those processes to reestablish themselves without us. Permaculture is biomimicry at base, but it is highly artificial relative to nature doing whatever it does. Permaculture is fabulous but there are things best left to the wild, and riparian corridors give a high value return for little "sacrifice." The book that sheds the most light on this, and that will restore the humilty that turns one from a so-called landowner to an actual (biocentric) steward is Rewilding North America, by Dave Forman. It provides a window onto the geological-time-scale picture that Conservation Biology is helping us see, and provides clear guidance on where we can help the return of the wild begin helping us. I think it deserves to be a book that is used to frame and contextualize what is done under the banner of Permaculture.

Hi, I know this is an old thread gone cold, but I'm new here and found it by accident. It seems to me that one point hasn't been made in this matter (though it is late here and I haven't read all the posts thoroughly). And that is the fact that dams and big companies pumping huge amounts of water out of springs have not been taken into account as far as damage goes to natural waterways. Not saying that (over)grazing in riparian areas isn't problematic, but it seems to me that any government is always willing to "try" to improve nature by setting strict limits for farmers and get the focus on what a great thing they've done in doing so. The farmer always ends up looking like the bad guy who needs to be controlled by law. Granted for some where I come from this is true, I'll come back to this later. But what about the hydro dams that are just masters of destruction for nature and millions of people, or the big drink companies, who are pumping up water like there's no tomorrow and leaving streams to dry out and in extreme cases left people to suddenly live in drought and thereby hunger, while still pumping water. Watch the documentary "Flow" on this, though a few years old I think it is still very valid.
Yes, most often grazing in riparian areas is problematic, maybe it is better to leave it alone, or if already destroyed to help nature in speeding things along somewhat and then to let it be, and look to other alternatives. There are so many ways of water harvesting, why not let these areas be? But why is there no real significant spotlight on the big companies? I guess big companies make big money and have lots of lawyers...
On a side track, I'm European, we have some big farmers, but not as big as in the US. Here what I'm seeing is either the farmer is driven by money and is more of a CEO type than a farmer (and still struggling), or a farmer wanting to turn a profit or just break even, having a huge loan, prices going up and being forced by banks to go bigger in order to survive. Education is based on consumer's wishes, which is low prices on "traditional" food, as in dairy, meat, grain products. Diversity is what is missing from the culinary aspect, so education is based on mono culture cropping. My point here: don't just blame the farmer, most people are not educated at all or misinformed at best as for what is really going on and what is good for your body as far as that goes (don't even get me started on the food pyramid, whether or not fat is good, the power of advertisements and the media). With the things we do and the way we think, we won't see a change in general society in our lifetime, however we might be part of a foundation that will lead to a change in a future society. History always leaves an impact on society, whether good or bad. It's up to us which one we choose.
Also I think discussion is often a source of education, as it reminds us that there are all sorts of points of view. On a train of thoughts here, maybe that's what's missing in society and perhaps our education system specifically. Discussion. I once had a geography teacher who at the beginning of the school year told us that he would like to run through the curriculum a bit faster, so we would have time for practicing discussion, because he thought that was equally important if not more. I guess I am just now starting to truly see where he was coming from, coincidentally (or perhaps not) I am truly starting to understand permaculture and how it works or could work on so many levels.

Leah Sattler wrote:that seems like a reasonably safe and sensible solution...especially considering it was spawned from a government entity! I am impressed!

You shouldn't be surprised. One of the first places to commonly adopt Savory's early work on what he now calls "Holistic management" or "Holistic planned grazing" was Austrailia. It was even an influence on Mollison. Even where it isn't used for whatever reason, people understand and know about the concept. They might not know exactly how to do it correctly, or the types of proactive monitoring required to prevent overdoing it, but they get it in principle. A government entity there would have examples to show it is possible to do it right, unlike most of the Western US where almost without exception everyone does it wrong and damages the riparian area.

One thing I see everyone posting here so far has forgotten. The primary factor affecting the temp and water quality of the streams isn't shade or bank vegetation, but rather what you are doing on the rest of the land with regard to water infiltration and subterranean water flow. The surface water will always be warmer and full of more "contaminates". It's the springfed nature of the streams that is the secret behind what Sepp is doing.

You cant expect a healthy stream system where 90% of the land is mismanaged and a tiny ribbon of vegetation is protected beside the stream. That ribbon may help somewhat, but it is like bending over to pick up a penny while dollars are flying in the wind over your head. That subterranean flow is what permaculture understands and gets right, especially in keyline design.

We too have a very large riparian area here in the PNW.  The usda program we chose to rent to pays us not to allow any farm animals inside the fencing they put up on our lands.   180 feet from the water I believe is where the fence lies.  Most animals can get over or under it like the elk or the beavers.
Bottom line is the government paid us for a lease not to use this land for anything other than hunting and fishing.  It was marginal farm lands anyways so we felt it was a fair lease.
And I can attest that land is full of scat making it a true wildlife corridor.
The government should open the leases up to everyone in riparian areas not just the choice lands.   This might go a long way to mending fences and making a bitter rule less so.
Just my to cents.