We ran back to Des Moines for the day. The first stop was the Iowa Environmental Council with Jenny Terry and her posse of female attorneys who sent us through a series of interview questions before we began. They were very aggressive in their strategy to push for policy. I understand why they are so defensive after visiting some of the places they are up against. Something that Jen said stuck with me “funding is fundamental”. I have seen that across the places we have visited, funding has indeed been fundamental. The groups with more money are having it their way and the ones with less are following along or trying to work around them. We went to an example of a group working around the powerhouses later in the day.

Upon the suggestion of a woman at the IEC, we went to Zombie Burger for lunch. Zombie Burger is probably exactly what you think it sounds like. It was a burger restaurant with a zombie theme. The décor did not make any of us less hungry. Four people got a burger with fried mac and cheese buns as big as their faces. No one finished the whole thing.

After our huge lunch we met with Omar de Kok-Mercado to visit the STRIPS project which stands for Science-based Trials of Rowcrops Integrated with Prairie Strips. The STRIPS were located on the Neal Smith Wildlife Refuge in Prairie City. I really liked being at the reserve it was awesome to actually see the landscape so many people have been talking about. The STRIPS that we looked at were really effective after the week of rain we have had. There was no runoff. Which was amazing because typically there would be tons. We also saw bison on our way out at their bison reserve where they currently have 67 bison living.

The Knutson’s made dinner at Morris’s and Mr. Knutson showed us a demonstration of how nitrogen leaks out of soil more than herbicides. We have heard a whole lot about this, but it was really helpful to visualize it.