The Department of the Interior is expanding a voluntary North Dakota program aimed at resolving longstanding questions over older federal wetland easements on private land.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) launched the Prairie Pothole Wetland pilot this summer and will use feedback from farmers, ranchers and conservation partners as the effort expands.
The program will focus particularly on easements purchased before 1976, where differences have emerged between acreage recorded when easements were acquired and wetlands later mapped by USFWS.
Participation remains voluntary, and the agency will not finalize map revisions without landowner agreements.
