Life on the American steppes

Julene Bair writes about the farmland of the Plains and worries about water:

To look at the pale-green buffalo grass that covered the High Plains, you would never suspect that an aquifer holding as much water as Lake Huron lay beneath. But we knew about the aquifer. Its waters seeped to the surface in some otherwise dry creek beds, feeding rare ponds where we sometimes went fishing. And my pioneer grandparents had drilled down into the aquifer and erected windmills that we relied on to pump the water we needed to exist.

She’s wondering if the next Farm Bill will preserve the Ogallala Aquifer.