Protect your property with riparian buffers

Protecting Virginia’s waterways starts right here on you property. Riparian buffers, strips of trees, shrubs, or grasses planted along streams and
rivers.

Help keep our water clean by filtering runoff, trapping sediment, and reducing pollutants before they reach local waterways and the Chesapeake Bay.

These natural buffers also:

  • Help stabilize streambanks and reduce erosion
  • Filter excess nutrients and improve water quality
  • Provide valuable habitat for wildlife and support biodiversity

The Virginia Agricultural Best Management Practices Cost-Share Program can help landowners install these conservation practices through financial assistance:

  • Forested buffers – Up to 95% cost-share reimbursement, plus incentive payments of up to $580 per acre.
  • Grass filter strips – Up to 100% cost-share reimbursement, plus an additional $80 per acre incentive.

Healthy streams mean healthier communities, thriving farms, and a stronger Chesapeake Bay.

Contact your local Soil and Water Conservation District to learn how you can participate.

For more news from across the Shenandoah Valley, click here. 

VSP warn of frozen waterways

VSP official patch and logo used by permission by Information Officer Brent Coffey

Virginia State Police are urging the public to stay off frozen ponds, lakes, and waterways as cold conditions continue across the region.

Officials checking ponds found ice approaching, but not exceeding, four inches thick.

Officials say four inches of clear ice is the minimum generally considered safe, and even then, it can be deadly.

Authorities warn conditions are especially dangerous on moving water.

Parts of the James River may appear frozen, but flowing water makes ice unpredictable and unsafe at all times.

Police report an increase in calls involving people, especially juveniles, on frozen waterways, and they’re asking parents to talk with children about the risks.

The safest choice, officials say, is to stay off the ice entirely.

For more news from across the Shenandoah Valley, click here.Â