Governor Jay Nixon (D) has called on the Missouri Soil and Water Districts Commission to allow livestock farmers to let their herds flash graze temporarily in so-called “exclusion areas.”
Flash grazing involves letting large numbers of livestock briefly graze in pastures, as a means of helping farmers battling drought conditions. And exclusion areas are lands where livestock are normally prohibited. The move is in response to the ongoing drought and extreme heat that’s plagued the Show-Me State for the past several weeks. The governor’s office says around 140,000 acres could be used for flash grazing.
The entire state has been declared a federal disaster area by the USDA, which is making emergency loans available to farmers and livestock owners.
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