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In 1958, Congress amended the Migratory Bird Hunting and Conservation Stamp Act (the Duck Stamp Act), which authorized the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's Small Wetland Acquisition Program. Under this program, the Service has protected well over 2 million acres of wetland and grassland habitat.
In the Windom Wetland Management District, wetland and grassland easements protect more than 2,000 acres. Easements are a vouluntary program in which private landowners sell an easmenent to the federal government to permanently protect valuable wildlife habitat on their land. The landowner receives a one-time payment based on a percentage of current market value of their land and in return recieve perpetual protection on their weltands or grasslands. Wetland easements control draining, burning, filling, or leveling of protected basins. When these wetlands naturally dry up, they can be farmed, grazed or hayed. Grassland easements protect enrolled land from tillage or development so the land will always remain in grass. Depending on the grass easement type, other actions such as grazing or haying may also be controled. In all easements the land remains in private ownership, remains on the tax rolls, and the landowner controls access and hunting rights.
To learn more about wetland easements, 
please visit this link.
Easements help to prevent the loss of wetlands like these on private land.
