The sage grouse population fell so low during the 1990s that the chicken-sized species was considered for protection under the Endangered Species Act. Now, two researchers say that restrictions on hunting the sage grouse have a mixed record when it comes to the bird's numbers.

The USDA intends by this fall to put in place a revised land management plan for the greater sage-grouse, once a candidate for protection under the Endangered Species Act.

"An unprecedented" public-private effort to preserve habitat for the greater sage-grouse "has significantly reduced threats … across 90 percent of the species' breeding habitat" and obviated any need to protect the fowl under the Endangered Species Act, said the Interior Department.

Interior Secretary Sally Jewell says the Bi-State population of the greater sage-grouse, found in California and Nevada, does not need protection under the Endangered Species Act.

In the final piece of The Farm Bill Fight, a series by FERN and Mother Jones on the changing nature of America's most important agricultural law, Bridget Huber makes the case for expanding a pilot program that gives Native Americans more control over their food supply.

Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke has reversed plans to transfer control of the National Bison Range to the Bureau of Indian Affairs. When tribes called for the change in 2016, they claimed the federal government had taken the land from American Indians without their consent.

In a case that could have ramifications for farms and ranches across the arid west, a Native American tribe in Coachella, Calif., has set a new precedent for tribal ownership rights to groundwater.

The Agriculture Department and the Small Business Administration agreed on Monday to increase investments in small and underserved rural communities, said agency leaders. The USDA has a portfolio of billions of dollars in grants, loans and loan guarantees for rural housing, business development, and electricity, internet, and water and sewer projects.

Minutes after taking the oath of office on Monday, Agriculture Deputy Secretary Xochitl Torres Small said the USDA should help farms of all sizes and types of production be successful. "That's why I'm so excited to have this job," said Torres Small, who received Senate confirmation last week for the No. 2 position.

By more than a 10-to-1 margin, senators confirmed Xochitl Torres Small, the granddaughter of migrant farmworkers who became a lawyer and a U.S. lawmaker, as Agriculture deputy secretary on Tuesday. She is the first Hispanic to hold the No. 2 post at USDA, overseeing day-to-day operations at one of the largest federal departments.

In a new report, the Chesapeake Bay Foundation calls on farms in the bay’s watershed to “urgently accelerate and scale up” their conservation efforts, not only to reduce water-borne pollution — a federal mandate — but to slash their greenhouse gas emissions and stoke local economies.

Potentially toxic algae blooms, which are caused by farm runoff and urban wastewater running into streams and lakes, have cost an estimated $1.1 billion over the past decade in the United States, and that "is almost certainly a significant undercount," said a report Wednesday by the Environmental Working Group.

Just as the spring rally in futures prices brightened farmers' outlook, the summer slump in corn and soybean prices pulled down sharply on the Ag Economy Barometer, say Purdue economists. The monthly survey of producer sentiment fell by 17 points in August for a reading of 95, the lowest since the end of winter.

A year after it closed most of its futures-trading pits in Chicago and New York, CME Group said it will close option pits in New York "as computerized trading claims another victim from the world's old-school financial system," said Reuters.

The operator of the Chicago livestock futures and options exchanges said it would shorten the trading day effective Feb. 29 to the period when trading volume is heaviest and the markets have their greatest liquidity.

The USDA has a permanent home for two research agencies, four months after announcing they would move to “the Kansas City region” and weeks after employees began reporting to work at temporary quarters.

The government has extended the deadline for bids from Kansas City real estate companies looking to house two USDA scientific agencies, while the current landlord for one of those agencies contests the relocation, reported Politico.

The USDA failed to follow federal guidelines when it determined it would save money by moving two research agencies to Kansas City, said a review by the Agricultural & Applied Economics Association on Wednesday.

If a House Appropriations subcommittee has its way, Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue would be barred from moving two USDA research agencies out of Washington.

The Farmers to Families Food Box giveaway program was the Trump administration's answer to hunger during the pandemic but it undermined its goal by mismanagement and abuse of the $5.5 billion program, said a report released by the House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis on Wednesday. The panel chairman, Democrat James Clyburn, suggested the USDA should pursue reimbursement, where appropriate, of misspent money.

Seaweed farming is being hyped as a major weapon in the fight against climate change — as a way to absorb atmospheric carbon, reduce methane emissions from cattle, provide feedstock for biofuels, and feed the world — no fertilizers, fresh water, or even land required. <strong>(No paywall)</strong>

Since the 1980s, as rising seas and storm surges started pushing saltwater through the banks of tidal rivers and ruining their crops, rice farmers in Bangladesh, backed by the government, began shifting to shrimp farming. As Stephen Robert Miller writes in FERN’s latest story, published with The Guardian, “It was a way to adapt, and for a while it worked. Commercial shrimp, known as ‘white gold,’ has become one of the country’s most valuable export commodities.” <strong>(No paywall)</strong>

The Maine Department of Marine Resources on Thursday killed a proposal by a Norwegian-backed company to build two massive salmon farms in the middle of pristine Frenchman Bay, next to Acadia National Park. The decision ended a long-running saga that had generated considerable opposition in the community over fears that the farms would foul the water and ruin the local fishing and shellfish industries.

A federal judge in San Francisco ordered the FDA on Thursday to take a new and stronger look at the potential consequences on native salmon if AquaBounty's fast-growing GMO salmon escaped from fish farms and established itself in the wild.

The Food and Drug Administration, the lead U.S. regulator of genetically engineered animals, issued two documents to clarify its risk-based oversight of the creatures and their developers. The agency exercises varying levels of scrutiny, ranging from full-scale review of an animal and its risk profile to instances in which developers can take an animal directly to market without consulting the FDA.

Three months after President Biden signed an executive order to accelerate biotechnology innovation, the administration formally asked stakeholders and the public on Monday to identify gaps, ambiguities and inefficiencies in federal regulation of the sector.

Farms in Puerto Rico are used in the research and development of up to 85 percent of the corn, soybean, and other hybrid seeds grown in the United States. “So the devastation wrought by Hurricane Maria in September stretches to the croplands of the Midwest and Great Plains,” reports Harvest Public Media.

Rural Virginia has trended Republican in the past two decades, and the statewide election this week underlined its political divergence from the state’s metropolitan areas, said the Daily Yonder.

A year ago, rural America voted two-to-one to put Donald Trump in the White House. Rural Virginians are certain to vote heavily for Republican gubernatorial candidate Ed Gillespie in today’s election, and “the margin ... may affect the statewide result,” says the Daily Yonder.