The 2014 Farm Bill has opened registration for the following programs:
•Livestock Forage Disaster Program: compensates for eligible livestock producers who experienced qualifying grazing losses for covered livestock on native land, improved pastureland or land planted for grazing. Livestock of beef, dairy, buffalo/beefalo, sheep, goats, deer, equine, swine, elk, poultry, alpacas, emus and llamas are covered. Okaloosa county has qualified for grazing loss due to recent drought.
•Livestock Indemnity Payments Program: for deaths exceeding normal mortality due to adverse weather and attacks by animals reintroduced into the wild by the federal government or protected by federal law. Such losses are retroactive to Oct. 1, 2011.
•Emergency Assistance for Livestock, Honeybees and Farm Raised Fish Program: provides assistance for livestock grazing, feed and death losses; honeybee feed, colony and hive losses; and fish feed and death losses due to disease, adverse weather or other conditions such as wildfires.
•Tree Assistance Program: helps eligible orchardists and nursery tree growers to replant or rehabilitate trees, bushes and vines lost due to a natural disaster that occurred after Oct. 1, 2011. The individual stand must have sustained a loss or damage exceeding 18 percent. Trees grown for pulp or timber are ineligible.
Okaloosa producers must meet financial and other requirements to apply for Farm Service assistance. Leases are required for program participation.
Call the Farm Service Agency's Okaloosa County office, 934 N Ferdon Blvd., Crestview, at 682-2416, for more information.
This article originally appeared on Crestview News Bulletin: Registration opens for Farm Service requests