Wildfires

USDA to Provide $1 Billion to Flood and Wildfire-Impacted Livestock Producers

Mon, 15 Sep 2025 14:16:07 GMT

U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Brooke L. Rollins announced Sept. 12 eligible livestock producers will receive disaster recovery assistance through the Emergency Livestock Relief Program for 2023 and 2024 Flood and Wildfire (ELRP 2023 and 2024 FW) to help offset increased supplemental feed costs due to a qualifying flood or qualifying wildfire in calendar years 2023 and 2024. The program is expected to provide approximately $1 billion in recovery benefits.

Sign-up begins on Monday, Sept. 15. Livestock producers have until Oct. 31 to apply for assistance.

“We are providing continued support for livestock producers whose livelihoods and way of life have been disrupted by catastrophic floods, wildfires, and poor forage conditions in 2023 and 2024. Under President Trump’s leadership, USDA is standing shoulder to shoulder with America’s farmers and ranchers, delivering the resources they need to stay in business, feed their families, and keep our food supply strong,” Rollins says. “This announcement builds on the Supplemental Disaster Relief Program (SDRP) and the historic levels of assistance we have rolled out over the last few months, once again proving that this administration is working as quickly as possible to get help out the door and into the hands of livestock and dairy producers. USDA will continue to put farmers first and ensure they have the relief they need to weather storms and build for the future.”

Qualifying Disaster Events

To streamline program delivery, FSA has determined eligible counties with qualifying floods and qualifying wildfires in 2023 and 2024. For losses in these counties, livestock producers are not required to submit supporting documentation for floods or wildfires. A list of approved counties is available at fsa.usda.gov/elrp .

USDA explains for losses in counties not listed as eligible, livestock producers can apply for ELRP 2023 and 2024 FW but must provide supporting documentation to demonstrate that a qualifying flood or qualifying wildfire occurred in the county where the livestock were physically located or would have been physically located if not for the disaster event. FSA county committees will determine if the disaster event meets program requirements.

Livestock and Producer Eligibility

For ELRP 2023 and 2024 FW, FSA is using covered livestock criteria similar to the Livestock Forage Disaster Program (LFP) which includes weaned beef cattle, dairy cattle, beefalo, buffalo, bison, alpacas, deer, elk, emus, equine, goats, llamas, ostriches, reindeer and sheep.

Wildfire assistance is available on non-federally managed land to participants who did not receive assistance through LFP or the ELRP 2023 and 2024 for drought and wildfire program delivered to producers in July of this year.

Payment Calculation

Eligible producers can receive up to 60% of one month of calculated feed costs for a qualifying wildfire or three months for a qualifying flood using the same monthly feed cost calculation that is used for LFP.

ELRP 2023 and 2024 for drought and wildfire and ELRP 2023 and 2024 FW have a combined payment limit of $125,000 for each program year. Producers who already received the maximum payment amount from ELRP 2023 and 2024 for drought and wildfire will not be eligible to receive an additional payment under ELRP 2023 and 2024 FW. Eligible producers may submit form FSA-510, Request for an Exception to the $125,000 Payment Limitation for Certain Programs, to be considered for an increased payment limit of $250,000.

Supplemental Disaster Assistance Timeline

The press release says USDA is fully committed to expediting remaining disaster assistance provided by the American Relief Act, 2025. On May 7, USDA launched its 2023/2024 Supplemental Disaster Assistance public landing page where the status of USDA disaster assistance and block grant rollout timeline can be tracked. The page is updated regularly and accessible through fsa.usda.gov . Contact your local FSA county office for more information.

When Farmers Can Expect the Next Round of American Relief Act Payments

Tue, 03 Jun 2025 13:51:12 GMT

USDA is currently in the trenches of issuing the nearly $31 billion in total disaster and emergency relief aid to farmers and ranchers in four stages. That money was appropriated by Congress as part of the American Relief Act, which was passed in December of 2024. In an exclusive interview with Farm Journal on Monday, USDA Deputy Undersecretary Brooke Appleton said the next round of disaster aid payments could be coming the first full week of July.

USDA began issuing the $1 billion in emergency livestock relief program payments last week, which is the latest in a series of disaster and emergency relief. Appleton told Farm Journal that instead of holding the money and issuing it all at once, USDA decided to issue the payments in four phases, as USDA wanted to get assistance out to producers as quickly as possible.

“We had ECAP (Emergency Commodity Assistance Program) , we now have the Emergency Livestock Relief Program, we’re going to have supplemental disaster relief, and then we’re going to have another emergency livestock relief program to cover the flood losses that we saw in ‘23 and ’24,” Appleton said. “So, we’re kind of doing it in stages, it should stream out all through the summer really, and so I’m hoping that that kind of can relieve some of that financial stress.”

Appleton said USDA has issued $7.7 billion out of the appropriated $10 billion in direct payments under ECAP so far, which was the first stage of payments. Sign-ups for that program began in March. USDA initially issued 85% of a producer’s projected payment, with the remaining 15% expected after sign-ups close on Aug. 15.

Just last week, USDA announced the details surrounding $1 billion in Emergency Livestock Relief Program payments , which is the second phase of the American Relief Act. Those payments are being dispersed now, and it covers grazing losses due to eligible drought or wildfire events that happened in 2023 and 2024. That round of the program doesn’t require producers to sign up, as USDA is using existing information. Since the program was announced on May 29, USDA says it’s dispersed more than $641 million in payments to livestock producers who suffered grazing losses during that time.

“FSA is leveraging existing livestock forage disaster program data to streamline these payments and calculations to expedite that relief. So this was unlike most of our programs, farmers and ranchers didn’t have to go into the office to sign up,” Appleton said. “We already have the information. So those emergency relief payments were automatically issued to producers who had already had their data into their FSA office. And those payments started going out in earnest last week, so May 30.”

The next round of American Relief Act disaster aid payments is the Supplemental Disaster Relief Program, which is the larger amount appropriated by Congress. Appleton told Farm Journal details surrounding those payments are being prepared now, and USDA expects to issue those payments next month. The amount of money that will go out during the next round isn’t known at this time, as a USDA official says the agency is still “working diligently to balance the needs with the available funding.”

“The larger supplemental disaster program that is part of that is making its way through the process right now at USDA and other government agencies,” Appleton said. “The timeline for that, we’re targeting to sign up farmers by the first full week in July, so maybe the week of July 7. That will be literally every crop production loss that has happened for ‘23 and ’24, and that’s just additional disaster assistance that was legislated by Congress.”

Once those payments are released, USDA’s final phase of the American Relief Act will be another emergency livestock relief program, but this covers flood losses producers saw in 2023 and 2024.

Appleton says that’s been the most difficult program to outline and detail, as USDA has never administered a disaster program for livestock that covered losses due to flooding.

“We’ve never had a disaster program for livestock that triggered on flooding, so that piece of it is going to take us a little bit longer,” she said. “And that’s something that’s another piece of this larger disaster package. It’s going to roll out later this summer, but as these programs are ready to go and ready to roll out, we’re focused on doing it as soon as we can, rather than holding them all and doing it all at once. We want to make sure as soon is the assistance is ready to go, we are getting it out and we’re getting it to the folks who need it.”

Congress earmarked $2 billion for livestock losses due to droughts, wildfires and floods. The first livestock disaster aid announced last week totaled $1 billion, which means another $1 billion should be dispersed through the livestock disaster payments that cover losses due to flooding.

USDA says it is fully committed to expediting remaining disaster assistance provided by the American Relief Act 2025. On May 7, it launched its 2023/2024 Supplemental Disaster Assistance public landing page where the status of USDA disaster assistance and block grant rollout timeline can be tracked.

Rollins Says USDA Will Announce Application Process for $21 Billion in Disaster Aid Within Days

Wed, 07 May 2025 18:44:03 GMT

In her first hearing on Capitol Hill since the confirmation process earlier this year, Secretary Brooke Rollins faced the Senate Appropriations Committee on Tuesday, fielding questions on everything from USDA’s bold budget cuts and frozen funding to the fate of the nearly $21 billion in disaster aid.

Rollins fiercely defended the cuts, continuing to argue that it is a way to make USDA more effective and more efficient. She also told the committee that farmers will be able to sign up for the disaster aid by the end of May.

Congress approved the disaster aid on Dec. 21, 2024. While the $10 billion in Emergency Commodity Assistance Program (ECAP) was passed the same day, it was separate and came with a clear deadline on when USDA had to disperse those funds. In the hearing this week, Rollins admitted the disaster aid program has been more complicated to roll out.

“That one’s a little more complicated than the ECAP, the disaster or the emergency relief payments, but we’re really close and within a matter of days or weeks, certainly by the end of this month, that money will begin moving,” Rollins said on Tuesday.

The nearly $21 billion in disaster aid targets agricultural losses from natural disasters in 2023 and 2024, which includes:

Droughts
Hurricanes
Floods
Wildfires
And other extreme weather events.

Of those funds, $2 billion is earmarked for livestock losses attributed to droughts wildfires and floods. There is also an allocation of $220 million that will be distributed through block grants to smaller agricultural states with limited farm income and acreage.

“We are within days of announcing the application process,” Rollins said. “Of course, that’s a little more complicated because we don’t have the specifics, and it isn’t, as [Sen. John Hoeven, R-N.D.] mentioned, in North Dakota, 15,794 of your farmers and ranchers have received money through that first tranche, through the first $10 billion, the emergency aid. On the weather-related programs, that application opens in the next week or two. And we will be moving very, very quickly.”

.@SecRollins testifies before Congress: "When farmers prosper, rural America prospers." pic.twitter.com/rXwV12JPDD
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) May 6, 2025

According to Pro Farmer, the disaster aid is intended to cover losses in revenue, production quality, and infrastructure for crops, livestock and timber. And most of the aid is expected to be administered through USDA’s Emergency Relief Program (ERP), which has been used for similar disaster relief in previous years. However, USDA has indicated the new program will be more farmer-friendly than the Biden administration’s implementation of the last ag disaster funds.

Rollins says the rollout of the disaster aid funds is “a long time coming,” bacause it is related to disasters that happened as long as two years ago.

“And so ensuring that we get that out as quickly as we possibly can with the team that we have in place,” Rollins said. “I’m really proud of, I believe, how efficiently and how quickly the team moved out that first tranche. And I believe that you’ll see the same sort of efficiency and effectiveness with the second tranche, so it’s within the coming weeks.”

Rollins Fiercely Defends Cuts at USDA

Also in the hearing, Rollins defended recent budget and DOGE cuts, saying her team is eliminating what she called wasteful DEI spending, fraud and abuse in all USDA programs. She argued the plan is to rebuild USDA to put farmers first.

Rollins also discussed some frozen funds at the agency and when a review of them will be completed.

“We are working around the clock, going line by line, we’re down to the final 5 billion out of, I believe, almost 20 billion of frozen funds, but $5 billion is a lot of money,” Rollins said. “And when you think about that in terms of grant or contract and moving that out quickly, we’re very helpful to keep moving through that very, very quickly and have that done very soon.”

Rollins was also asked about the 15,000 USDA employees who have taken buyout offers from the federal government . Reports show that accounts for nearly USDA’s total workforece, and impacts farmer-facing agencies such as Natural Resources Conservation Service and Farm Service Agency.

“The 15,000 number, it is less than 15% of our total workforce,” Rollins said. “I realize that’s still a very, very big number. But I think it’s important to realize in the context that every year USDA, through attrition loses between 8,000 and 10,000 employees. So, it’s a massive government agency, but they’re refilled. Well, and that’s what we are looking to refill. The front liners, that’s I was talking about right now. So whether it’s FSA, APHIS, the Wildland Firefighters, those are through a memorandum I just signed, we are actively looking and recruiting to fill those positions that are integral to the efforts and the key front line.”

Senator Patty Murray, D-Wash., followed up and asked, “So, you let people go, and you’re looking for new people to fill the positions that they had experienced in?”

“We’re having those discussions right now,” Rollins said. “We are working with all of you around the country, in your states. We believe our firefighters are operationally ready for wildfire season. Our FSA offices, we are making things more efficient, but bringing on new people that could potentially be a game changer in those offices.”

The workforce reduction is part of the federal government’s current Deferred Resignation Program (DRP), which is the voluntary program that allows eligible federal employees to resign in advance while continuing to receive pay and benefits until Sept. 30.

Rollins then clarified and explained the 15,000 USDA employees who accepted the buyouts, weren’t employees who were fired, they were resignations.

“None of those people were fired,” she added. “So, if they want to come back, and if they were in a key position, then we would love to have that conversation.”

Rollins said the latest round of DRPs, which happened in April, USDA didn’t accept some of the resignations, specifically if those employees were in what Rollins called “key positions,” which includes APHIS, FSA, etc.

“We are very intentionally approaching this,” she said. “Have we done it perfectly? No. Any type of whole scale change, and big effort to basically realign an entire government agency is difficult. And we know that, and we know it hasn’t been perfect, but we’re working every day to solve for a lot of this, and I think we’re making a lot of really good progress.”

USDA Spends $400 Million a Day on Food Assistance Programs

The other hot button topic during the hearing was food assistance. The secretary pointed out USDA spends more than $400 million a day on food assistance programs and said ending COVID-era funding programs doesn’t mean defunding food assistance.

You can listen to her pointed comments in the video below.

USDA alone spends $400+ MILLION each day on food assistance programs.

Ending COVID-era funding programs doesn’t defund food assistance. It ensures we’re good stewards of taxpayer dollars. pic.twitter.com/3lT7Fu6or9
— Secretary Brooke Rollins (@SecRollins) May 6, 2025

Poor Air Quality from Wildfire Smoke can put Livestock, Pets at Risk

Wed, 28 Jun 2023 19:02:11 GMT

Wildfire smoke from Canada returned to the upper Midwest and extended to the Mid-South and Mid-Atlantic this week, resulting in poor air quality in some regions along with reduced visibility.

The National Weather Service (NWS) issued a report on Wednesday, saying “wildfire smoke from Canada will reduce air quality over parts of the Upper/Middle Mississippi Valley, Great Lakes, Western Ohio Valley, Central Appalachians, and Mid-Atlantic, prompting Air Quality Warnings over the area.”

Unhealthy levels of pollutants from the smoke spread across states in those regions including most of Michigan and Wisconsin and parts of Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio, according to tracker AirNow.gov.

The NWS is encouraging anyone with underlying lung conditions or asthma – especially children and the elderly – to limit their time outdoors in those regions affected by wildfire smoke.

The American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA) advises monitoring pets and farm animals that could also be affected by the smoke.

“If you can see or feel the effects of smoke yourself, you also should take precautions to keep your animals – both pets and livestock – safe,” the AVMA encourages on its website.

Animals with cardiovascular or respiratory disease are especially at risk from smoke and should be closely watched during all periods of poor air quality.

Look for the following signs of possible smoke or dust irritation in animals, including:
• Coughing or gagging
• Difficulty breathing, including open mouth breathing and increased noise when breathing
• Eye irritation and excessive watering
• Inflammation of throat or mouth
• Nasal discharge
• Asthma-like symptoms
• Increased breathing rate
• Fatigue or weakness
• Disorientation or stumbling
• Reduced appetite and/or thirst

The wildfires range from British Columbia to Newfoundland and Labrador, and 239 were categorized by the Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Centre (CIFFC) on Tuesday as being “out of control.”

Reuters reports that Canada is wrestling with its worst-ever start to the wildfire season, which has already burned 6.5 million hectares (16 million acres), an area a little bigger than West Virginia.

Rancher Caused California’s Largest Wildfire

Fri, 20 Nov 2020 05:31:17 GMT

Cal Fire has determined last year’s Ranch Fire, California’s largest in history, was ignited by a spark or hot metal fragment created by a Potter Valley rancher hammering a metal stake into the ground.

According to Cal Fire’s 20-page investigative report issued Thursday (June 6, 2019), the July 27 fire was caused by a rancher attempting to erect a shade cloth above some ground water tanks on his ranch because a previous shade had blown down and the water was too hot for his cattle.

The rancher – whose name was redacted from the report – told Cal Fire investigator Eric Bettger that he was preparing to put up the sun shade when he agitated an underground yellow jacket’s nest.

The rancher said he was allergic to bees, and he waited about an hour to allow the insects to stop swarming. He then used a claw hammer to quickly pound a 24-inch stake 10-to-12 inches into the ground. It was then he smelled smoke and realized the tall grasses nearby had begun to burn, the report said.

Despite the rancher’s frantic efforts to extinguish the fire, it continued to grow and quickly spread out of control. Cal Fire’s deputy director, Michael Mohler, told the Fresno Bee that incident was a “complete accident,” and that no charges will be filed.

The resulting fire consumed more than 641 square miles, crossing the Mendocino line into Lake County and the Mendocino National Forest, eventually spreading into Colusa and Glenn counties. A firefighter, Draper Fire Department Battalion Chief Matthew Burchett, was killed fighting the blaze. The fire destroyed or damaged 280 structures.

Together with the 49,000-acre River Fire, which began an hour later near Hopland, the 410,203-acre inferno became known as the Mendocino Complex Fire.

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