The Coon Valley Watershed Project

Photos by Jon Lee

The red barns, green pastures, and quiet trout streams of Coon Valley, Wisc., were nearly wiped off the map in the 1920s and ‘30s.

Beginning in the 1840s, early settlers prospered, growing bumper crops on fertile prairie soils. In the long run, however, European farming methods practiced by the communities of Norwegian and German settlers proved ill-adapted to the steep slopes and sometimes violent summer thunderstorms that help define the region.

In contrast to the native prairie plants that built the deep, black, organic-rich soil, crops like wheat, tobacco, and corn left the soil bare for much of the year. Furrows were plowed straight up and down slopes, allowing soil to wash easily downhill during rains.

As the soils lost their stability, huge gullies grew big enough to swallow houses as they chewed away at upland farms. Rainfall washed off of the ridges “as from a roof,” and floods grew in frequency and magnitude—sweeping across the valley floor and ravaging farms and villages that had proved safe for generations.

By 1930 it had become clear to all except the ecologically blind that southwestern Wisconsin’s topsoil was slipping seaward. In 1933 the farmers were told that if they would adopt certain remedial practices for five years, the public would donate CCC labor to install them, plus the necessary machinery and materials.
Aldo Leopold, “The Land Ethic”

In 1933, Coon Valley became the nation’s first watershed conservation project. Spearheaded by the Soil Conservation Service, the Coon Valley project employed experts in agriculture, soil erosion, forestry, and engineering, as well as hundreds of young men via the Civilian Conservation Corps.

Aldo Leopold was brought onto the team to advise about restoration of wildlife habitat in the watershed. The project also involved the eldest Leopold children, Starker and Luna, who began to put their college studies to practice.

Independent farmers were wary of government intervention, hesitantly signing up for incentive programs and grants that gave hope of saving the soil they depended on. In return for cooperation, the federal government offered supplies and services for free.

Experts classified farmland for different uses based on slope—crops would be grown on flat or gently sloping land, then pasture on mid-slopes, and woodland on the steepest slopes.
New fences, grass and alfalfa seed, and tree seedlings were provided for free. Bulldozers carved terraces to redirect the flow of water. Farmers learned to plow across the slope rather than up and down. In the rush to get the demonstration going, the project employed 200 young men at a time through the CCC. In the first year and a half, 418 participating farmers enrolled 40,000 acres of land.

At times during the rush, experts in different disciplines sometimes worked at cross purposes; Leopold noted that the big picture was hard to grasp, and that coordination and communication were key. Writing “The Land Ethic” in the late '40s, a decade after the rush, Leopold lamented that once the incentive period had passed, some farmers had chosen to give up conservation practices that were not clearly profitable.

Perhaps Leopold spoke too soon. Contour plowing and fenced woodlots are the norm rather than the exception today, and the residents of Coon Valley are enjoying many of the benefits of stabilizing the soils and restoring health to the damaged landscape.

On the other hand, rising prices for corn tempt farmers to change their crop rotations and put steeper land back under cultivation. As dairy farmers retire or go out of business, their diverse farms—which can make use of permanent pasture, as well as hay plantings rotated with corn and oats—are likely to change.

For proof that the conservation measures practiced in Coon Valley over the last 75 years have been astoundingly successful despite their imperfections, we need only “look to the land” as Leopold advised.

Last year, the watershed received its greatest test since the 1930s. In August, over 16 inches of rain fell in Coon Valley in less than 10 hours. UCLA hydrologist Stan Trimble, who has studied Coon Valley for over 30 years, estimates that such an intense storm might develop just once in a thousand years. While many farms suffered from erosion and flooding, history reminds us that in the 1920s, two-inch rainfalls caused damage and danger to the communities in this valley.

Watershed conservation projects include efforts in and along the streams themselves—replanting eroding banks and creating habitat for fish—to the soil and forest conservation measures that slow runoff. Water now seeps down into the soil, feeding countless springs.

The streams are less prone to damaging flash floods, and have a colder and more regular flow. By the 1930s, brook trout had vanished from many of the region’s streams. Today, native brook trout once again reproduce in the streams. Trout fishing is estimated to contribute as much as $1.1 billion to the region’s economy.

More to Explore

The place: Coon Valley is located near La Crosse, Wisconsin, in the scenic Driftless Area. Unlike the surrounding region, this area was missed by Ice Age glaciers. Rather than being ground down by mountains of ice, the land retained a more rugged character, with rock outcrops, steep ridges, and winding valleys.
Cold, spring-fed streams team with trout thanks to watershed conservation measures, and precarious cliff-top prairie remnants known as “goat prairies” also lend diversity to the region. Coon Creek runs 18 miles from its headwaters to the Mississippi River. Our staff visited Coon Valley last summer to explore Leopold's legacy.

Read more about the history of the Coon Valley project from the Natural Resources Conservation Service.

Visit the Bookstore:
“Return to Coon Valley”
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biologist “Tex” Hawkins tours the Coon Valley watershed and provides an insightful look at the gains made over six decades, as well as the future challenges to conservation on private lands. Hawkins’ father was also a biologist; a graduate student of Aldo Leopold’s, Art Hawkins first visited Coon Valley in 1935. (The Farm As Natural Habitat, 2002)

“Coon Valley: An Adventure in Cooperative Conservation”
Aldo Leopold composed this essay in 1935, as the initial conservation efforts were unfolding. (Reprinted in the Leopold anthologies The River of the Mother of God, 1991, and For the Health of the Land, 1999).