Clean Water, Healthy Pastures

Virginia’s Loudoun Valley lies between the Blue Ridge Mountains and the Bull Run and Catoctin mountains. It is the heart of Hunt Country -- elite horses and Olympic riders canter along woodland trails and jump over low gaps in wooden fences. Nurseries and greenhouses, beef cattle, horses, berries and Christmas trees are typical enterprises of the valley’s mostly small farms. To the east, 300 years of agriculture give way to Dulles International Airport, outside of Washington, D.C., and a sea of suburban rooftops.

The rich Loudoun Valley is home to Cleremont Farm G.P. Brothers Carl Lindgren and Tony Horkan, with their mother, Ann-Mari Lindgren Horkan, manage 1,650 acres spilling down from the wooded heights of the Blue Ridge onto pastures grazed by their Angus herd. The soils here are silty, sandy and gravelly loams. The fields are liberally strewn with rocks, evident in the many miles of stone fences bordering county roads. Nutrient management and overgrazing are two of the larger conservation challenges in the county.

Cleremont is a 57-year-old farm known nationally for its permanently protected easements and its water quality and sustainable grazing practices. Jeffries Branch, a rocky stream wandering through Cleremont, has been completely fenced to exclude the cows and heifers, and their calves. Five miles of the Jeffries and its rivulets are now protected by fence. In all, 30 miles of fence protect Cleremont’s streams, wetlands and hardwood forests.

Conservation First. At its inception in 1957, Cleremont Farm was 300 acres and owned by George Horkan Jr. His heritage is one of conservation, putting to early use opportunities to protect the farm with conservation easements. The farm today includes more than 600 acres of pasture and 1,000 acres of hardwood forests, the trees managed on a 20- to 25-year rotation. Its 400 acres of flatland timber represent the single largest stand in Loudoun County.

The conservation work has not inhibited this high-performing cattle operation. In fact, Lindgren says, “Conservation has led us to a more manageable cattle operation.”

That’s because the brothers’ management goal is to put all their land to its most suitable economic use. There are closely managed pastures where cattle production is efficient and profitable. The forests are managed for long-term, sustainable harvests. Protecting the Jeffries and the farm’s other, more marginal areas produces an environmental benefit with regional significance. “It just makes sense,” Lindgren says.

Herd health has improved; especially noted is a decline of hoof disease. By fencing out the streams and woodlands, the brothers no longer search for cows and their calves in the tangled growth of bottomlands and forested wetlands. “Losing a newborn calf in a stream or wetland is a problem that we have completely eliminated,” Horkan says. “Now, we can calve in any of our fields,” Lindgren adds.

Cleaner Water. The stream buffers are up to 150 feet wide. They are populated with native stands of grasses and trees. Some have been supplemented with plantings of elderberry, mulberry and white oak, among other plants. The goal is to give shade to the Jeffries. The canopy cools the water and improves aquatic habitat. Two large ponds intercepting the Jeffries serve as settling basins for the creek as its waters flow through them. The water leaving the farm is cleaner than when it enters it, one local expert says.

“It’s wonderful to do something good for the environment,” Horkan says. “We’ve learned to sustain the land that sustains us.”

Cleremont’s 130 acres of buffers serve as wildlife corridors, connecting fragmented forest stands. Wildlife-friendly fences protect the buffers. These fences are strung a foot off the ground and stand only 47 inches tall. Wildlife moves easily over and under them.

Cleremont has benefited from a long history of working with Pat McIlvaine, an agronomist with the Loudoun Soil and Water Conservation District, and Larry Wilkinson, district conservationist with the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS), in Leesburg, Va.

“They’re fantastic to work with,” Wilkinson says. “[Carl and Tony] were a bit apprehensive in the beginning. They were always friendly, but they didn’t know me. Once they got that first project under their belts, they were the ones pushing me to do more work.” The farm has spent thousands on its own to install fence and complete other resource conservation work.

Cleremont has been recognized twice by the state of Virginia for its work in protecting the Jeffries. The benefits of the Jeffries’ clean water reaches far downstream—first, emptying into the nearby Panther Skin Creek and on into Goose Creek, a tributary of the Potomac River. The work at Cleremont—and similar efforts by other landowners along the way—is having a positive impact on water quality all the way from the Blue Ridge down to Fort Story and Cape Henry Lighthouse, where the Chesapeake Bay joins the Atlantic Ocean some 260 water miles away.

Aggressive Rotation. Cleremont’s program is designed to better manage nutrients and overgrazing. The herd is rotated every two to three days through several dozen fenced grazing units planted with fescue and a mix of white and red clover. Each pasture is rested for 20 to 30 days. Where cattle must cross a stream buffer or move through woodland, soil-covered culverts and permanent fencing form narrow alleys. The work has paid dividends. Cleremont’s herd grazed on stockpiled forage into early February this year. The cattle were back on grass by the first of April.

Like any cow/calf operation, the farm stockpiles pasture for the winter. Lindgren also stockpiles grass for Virginia’s hot and dry summer months. To do that, the cattle are moved every day in the spring. By “undergrazing” early-season grasses, the forage builds the energy reserves and establishes the root systems to maintain productivity during the stress of summertime. That work produces better pasture in the late fall and the winter.

Under an Environmental Quality Incentives Program contract, the farm’s fertility levels are being mapped in great detail. In each pasture, the most prominent three or four soils are sampled. The results guide them to more informed judgments about the farm’s fertility needs. Large round bales are deployed to those fields where nutrient enhancement would be beneficial. In time, the decomposing leftovers and manure bring the nutrient levels up to the desired level.

The farm is enrolled in the Conservation Stewardship Program (CSP). A CSP contract is written to address specific concerns. Cleremont is participating in the following areas:

Wildlife-Friendly Fencing. This allows for the free passage of resident wildlife and seasonal migration, as well as increases fencing visibility.

Low-Pressure Spraying. Use of low-pressure spray nozzles minimizes herbicide drift.

Precision Technology. Precision applications place nutrients according to site-specific conditions.

Native Grasses And Legumes. These improve pasture by increasing native grasses and legumes to 15% of herbage dry matter.

Concentration Areas. Regular movement of livestock concentration areas, such as feeding and mineral block areas, reduces soil disturbances and impacts on water.

Forest Riparian Buffer. This provides good cover and a tree canopy that shades the stream, improving habitat.

(BAS)

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