2021 Nebraska Cover Crop and Soil Health Conference - Panel Discussion

Deloris Pittman Author

03/29/2021 Added

11 Plays

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Speaker Panel Q/A

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[00:00:16.070]There were, quite a number of,
[00:00:19.880]quite a number of questions that, that came in for, for Ken. And I,
[00:00:24.270]I think so moving, moving right into the, moving right into the,
[00:00:29.180]the panel discussion, I'll, I'll read those questions can,
[00:00:33.710]and you can answer those, as best you can.
[00:00:38.720]there are
[00:00:44.180]I do know who submitted some of the questions this first one's from Fich
[00:00:47.510]Russell. I know Rich, Rich, thanks for joining today.
[00:00:51.320]Ken, Rich asks, how does the six year,
[00:00:54.830]or does the six year revenue include the value of grazing
[00:00:59.990]from gained AUMs or so, so basically did the,
[00:01:04.940]grazing value include any additional animal weight gain?
[00:01:10.190]No, it never,
[00:01:11.150]we just put a value on the AUM now,
[00:01:16.130]because that would, Oh, well,
[00:01:20.150]we're trying to keep things as simple as possible. you know,
[00:01:24.440]you can say, even in our range land,
[00:01:28.400]grazing day cost me so much out there.
[00:01:31.580]but I make money at that somehow.
[00:01:34.070]And so we just put a value for the grazing
[00:01:38.720]on there just to keep things,
[00:01:41.720]pretty simple on and not to complicate, what was trying to look at.
[00:01:48.500]Yeah. But then there's a, a, there's an I'll skip to the simple one first,
[00:01:52.730]and then I'll go to the complicated one. there was a question on the,
[00:01:57.140]the cover crops that were grazed for corn. the question is, is,
[00:02:01.630]is no till used or did you disk in the residue?
[00:02:05.900]I would assume after grazing.
[00:02:08.000]we have been no tilling since about 1990.
[00:02:12.410]so everything is no tilled.
[00:02:15.020]Okay. And then here's another question on the,
[00:02:20.120]on the, dollar comparisons. And again, I'm going to read the,
[00:02:24.470]read the question and not try to interpret it in a yet.
[00:02:28.010]does the value of animal unit months graze added
[00:02:32.900]value to the graves cover crop treatment,
[00:02:38.600]reference at an alternative feed value for the cattle was subtracted from
[00:02:43.520]the scenarios that did not allow grazing.
[00:02:47.720]if I understand the question is that,
[00:02:52.430]are,
[00:02:53.750]are we comparing the value of the cover crop raising to the value of a
[00:02:58.620]purchase feed? Is, is, is that just that, the question.
[00:03:04.110]That, that that's, that's the way I understand that. Yes.
[00:03:06.810]Okay. No, we didn't make any comparisons to that. We,
[00:03:11.070]we just use, try to use a generic,
[00:03:15.360]value of grazing what it costs in our area for animal unit months
[00:03:20.580]and assign that value to the cover crop. of again,
[00:03:25.440]of course,
[00:03:26.850]we expect to make a money,
[00:03:30.820]a profit center on the cattle, based upon those,
[00:03:35.460]greasing costs.
[00:03:38.220]Okay, thank you. You know, and I mean, and for everybody that that's out there,
[00:03:42.510]this, integrated systems work is,
[00:03:46.860]is pretty darn hard and difficult to do. It's, it's very time consuming.
[00:03:51.420]There's a lot of overlap and a lot of the management practices that are,
[00:03:56.580]are critical. And I know can just,
[00:03:59.130]when you think you've got things figured out the weather doesn't cooperate with
[00:04:03.780]you either, you know, and, and so I, I know there's been some, you know,
[00:04:07.950]Benson challenges, you know, no fault of anybody's other than the weather.
[00:04:12.450]So, you know, I,
[00:04:13.900]I certainly appreciate the time that you've devoted to helping us collect a
[00:04:18.720]lot of this information that otherwise we wouldn't be able,
[00:04:23.010]wouldn't be able to gather.
[00:04:24.870]Yeah. And Darren, I skipped over a slide, I'm sorry about that. But it,
[00:04:29.730]it, the slide was about, soil health.
[00:04:34.140]And we were looking at, bacteria and the fungi in there.
[00:04:38.940]And, I don't know how I skipped over it, but I did,
[00:04:43.080]but in that, in the cover crop, that was grace. It had a much,
[00:04:47.730]much higher activity of bacteria and fungi in there
[00:04:52.470]than even what the cover crop that was on grace.
[00:04:55.290]So there's something about the livestock that really adds value to that
[00:05:00.000]cover crop, what what's happening out there.
[00:05:04.620]Well, you know, and that's, that's a good point because I, I, you know,
[00:05:07.260]where we're seeing some of that in some other research as well,
[00:05:10.590]we haven't really gotten a good handle on exactly the,
[00:05:14.460]what's the cause and effect of that,
[00:05:16.470]but that is a pretty common response to that. We're starting to,
[00:05:21.630]starting to see, there was a, another question, for,
[00:05:26.400]can you're off the hook for the time being, no, wait,
[00:05:30.770]you didn't one more question. did you encounter any problems,
[00:05:35.580]when you were planting, the,
[00:05:39.030]the subsequent crop after the cover crops,
[00:05:42.900]that the cattle had caused any,
[00:05:44.880]a disturbance or saw compaction of the, of the sole surface?
[00:05:50.070]Are there any planning difficulties of the subsequent crop after grazing the
[00:05:54.330]cover?
[00:05:55.620]no, there wasn't. and that was part of the,
[00:06:00.490]soil health that we did too. We, we, we took,
[00:06:03.640]I don't even remember the names of it, but we took,
[00:06:08.390]tests on the compaction of the soil. And there is no,
[00:06:11.540]no difference in any of the soils. So, no,
[00:06:14.750]there was no problems planning into there after the cattle grazed on there.
[00:06:20.200]Okay, perfect. Thank you very much. Jerry,
[00:06:24.580]there were a couple of questions for you that were along a similar,
[00:06:30.010]similar thought process, and it was about the,
[00:06:33.730]the hybrid genetic affects on the yields,
[00:06:37.960]for the two studies you referenced, and in particular, the,
[00:06:41.890]the one from, 2003,
[00:06:45.760]to 2018, the example that was provided was,
[00:06:50.740]Aquamacs.
[00:06:53.050]Yeah, I mean that, that part of that,
[00:06:56.290]and I did answer that back in the, in the chat box as well,
[00:07:00.070]but I'll answer it here. I mean, when we start looking at,
[00:07:03.310]anytime you deal across length of record,
[00:07:06.580]we have a changing set of hybrids. All of this, what we saw,
[00:07:11.320]was that there were multiple hybrids run across those fields. you know,
[00:07:18.130]we, I don't, I think we only had ACO max,
[00:07:21.850]one of the years and that really wasn't much
[00:07:27.250]of an effect. What we really see is that, that, that slope of that line,
[00:07:32.020]as we begin to change the soil and then improving that Seoul variation,
[00:07:37.060]is irrespective of hybrid that's out there. And so
[00:07:41.890]we, I mean, we look across other fields and we're not seeing a, a,
[00:07:46.580]a diminishing of the spatial variation within fields,
[00:07:51.280]over time.
[00:07:51.940]And so it really is that change in that soil health that's causing that,
[00:07:56.920]that variation to change. And so, you know,
[00:07:59.910]we can begin to look at it from that perspective as well.
[00:08:02.560]Plus the slope of that yield increases is much different than the County
[00:08:07.390]average, and you expect the suite of hybrids across the County as well. So,
[00:08:12.190]but it's an excellent question because it,
[00:08:14.410]it really does pause you to think about, you know, what are we doing?
[00:08:18.010]And there's all sorts of tweaks that we find when we do them. You know,
[00:08:21.220]Ken can always talk about the,
[00:08:22.990]the tweaks that he makes in his operation for year to year.
[00:08:25.750]We see the same thing in other field studies, and we, you know,
[00:08:29.350]we really have to look at it and that's why we took it against the County
[00:08:32.140]average, for a dynamic.
[00:08:34.660]Okay. Yeah. Thanks. And I, I, you know, I mean, it's, it's,
[00:08:38.380]there nearly all of the speakers today have been in the chat answering many of
[00:08:42.610]those questions. And so, most of you get, you guys went early,
[00:08:46.840]I'm going to ask you to provide a brief summary of, of some of the questions.
[00:08:50.590]So, Jerry, thanks for, thanks for talking about that response,
[00:08:54.550]because I don't think anybody's
[00:08:58.320]got enough hands and eyes to keep up with all the moving pieces of this in
[00:09:02.700]particular with all the, the questions that the,
[00:09:06.990]that are coming today, you know, so that's, we never know what to expect,
[00:09:10.950]but you know, questions for the speakers are, are certainly good.
[00:09:15.270]there was another question on, on measuring,
[00:09:18.120]carbon sequestration on an annual basis versus thinking more
[00:09:22.740]long-term can you address that, Jerry?
[00:09:25.940]Yeah. I mean, you, that's, that's probably the question of the day.
[00:09:30.290]that's been the question of the last week when we're moving more into a
[00:09:35.750]carbon markets and everything, and, and I,
[00:09:39.280]and Kristen might have some opinions about this as well,
[00:09:42.530]because she's been looking at techniques, but, you know,
[00:09:45.140]when we start looking at soil organic matter,
[00:09:47.270]it is difficult to look at that change on a yearly basis. But I think that part,
[00:09:51.980]what we see is that we do see,
[00:09:55.760]changes in, particular organic matter.
[00:10:00.290]we see other parts of it in terms of looking at the aggregate systems.
[00:10:05.180]I think we're going to have to look at different measurements of how we're
[00:10:08.840]putting carbon into that soil. Do we look at biomass, look at microbial biomass.
[00:10:13.670]We know that there's been an impact on CO2,
[00:10:17.480]which is reflective of adding biomass into that soil.
[00:10:21.740]so I think in, in next year,
[00:10:25.640]we're going to have a lot of different ways in which we look at our soil.
[00:10:29.210]I think the soil health indices are kind of moving us towards,
[00:10:33.740]being able to look at different pieces of this, but there always be a debate,
[00:10:39.170]about, you know, how much carbon we've really stored in that soil.
[00:10:44.240]And I think we're going to have to come up with some really good answers on this
[00:10:48.110]for the whole carbon markets that, that want to re-emerge. Right.
[00:10:52.550]Yeah. Kristen, do you have anything to add to that?
[00:10:56.870]Well, I think he summed it up very well. You know,
[00:10:59.600]measuring solid carbon really is the gold standard for what's in
[00:11:04.400]that, in that pool. So how much slow carbon do we have?
[00:11:08.660]And when it,
[00:11:10.790]when it comes to understanding those long-term impacts of agriculture,
[00:11:16.100]I'll just make a plug for long-term research and I can apply those
[00:11:20.600]results. Every site, everywhere,
[00:11:24.560]some of these changes happened pretty slowly and are hard to detect.
[00:11:29.150]And so, you know,
[00:11:30.050]we have to look to those long-term studies to give us some general information.
[00:11:35.540]And then when it comes to specific sites,
[00:11:38.000]there's some level of inference that you have to make there.
[00:11:40.550]And it's not as easy as we'd like it to be, I guess.
[00:11:46.040]Yeah, no, that that's exactly true. Andrew, do you have any comments,
[00:11:50.210]on that topic?
[00:11:55.470]The only thing that I might add,
[00:11:58.140]Kristen and Jerry are probably much more familiar than I am. I mean,
[00:12:01.080]I'm interested in some of the things we're looking at in our project include
[00:12:04.890]some of the more lay bile or more rapidly turning over pools of carbon.
[00:12:09.720]That could be, you know, not necessarily long-term sea quotation,
[00:12:13.830]but some indicator of increasing soil carbon from,
[00:12:18.960]things like cover crops. So I think that, yeah,
[00:12:21.360]there maybe some other indicators and just whole
[00:12:25.890]profile soil carbon that could be, you know,
[00:12:28.680]giving us some indicator of what's happening in those pools. So,
[00:12:34.290]yeah.
[00:12:34.710]Darren had,
[00:12:35.790]I just like to add a little bit of that is when we come back to,
[00:12:40.470]our Eddy flux measurements,
[00:12:41.910]because we did take a field and we converted it from a
[00:12:46.560]conventional till system to a no till cover crop and with the,
[00:12:51.480]Eddy correlation systems,
[00:12:53.250]we could see an increase in carbon storage somewhere around
[00:12:57.900]500 pounds.
[00:12:59.670]Now you'd have a hard time finding 500 pounds of carbon and when we start
[00:13:04.440]making soil measurements, but when we see that with the flux measurements,
[00:13:08.310]you know, it's,
[00:13:08.720]it's pretty indicative that we are making a positive change in terms of the
[00:13:12.450]dynamics that are going on.
[00:13:13.920]So I think we're going to have to look at maybe combinations of,
[00:13:17.090]of different things that we get there. And as Andrew pointed out,
[00:13:20.790]a lot of this are very fast moving pools.
[00:13:24.090]microbial systems are extremely flexible and they're extremely
[00:13:28.890]dynamic. And so I think that there's,
[00:13:31.830]there's a lot of opportunity to figure out what what's going on. So.
[00:13:37.500]No, yeah, thanks for thanks. That was a good discussion.
[00:13:40.080]One of the things I neglected to do is,
[00:13:42.150]is give instructions to our satellite sites.
[00:13:45.900]You seven guys that are scattered out across the state that have a,
[00:13:50.580]population of, attendees at this meeting as well.
[00:13:55.140]If you guys have any questions, I think the best thing to do might be to,
[00:14:01.080]use that little, raise your hand icon, and then I'll call on you.
[00:14:05.460]And you can ask that question.
[00:14:10.890]Kristen, could you answer a few questions after your,
[00:14:15.810]after your presentation, that were in the chat?
[00:14:19.380]Can you give a very brief summary on,
[00:14:23.280]how you responded to a question or two?
[00:14:26.370]Yeah. Well, one,
[00:14:27.060]one question was about the costs of these infield
[00:14:31.750]spectroscopy methods and what that would look like if,
[00:14:36.090]if somebody were to try to pay for them to see the service basis.
[00:14:40.740]you know, right now there,
[00:14:42.390]I know there are some vendors out there who offer this service.
[00:14:46.740]it's usually targeting organic matter and there are some other similar
[00:14:51.380]properties that perhaps are available, from,
[00:14:56.030]from needs that commercial operations. But when it comes to total costs,
[00:15:00.770]you know, the, the machinery,
[00:15:03.230]the equipment is really expensive upfront.
[00:15:06.950]And then if you're a researcher or someone who own it and you take it out,
[00:15:12.050]there may be costs associated with travel. So if there's not one nearby,
[00:15:16.700]you know, who's gonna bring it out. Who's been operated,
[00:15:19.580]who's going to get the data and process it.
[00:15:21.980]So currently I think those costs are probably higher than they would be,
[00:15:27.350]you know, way down the road when we get better at doing this. And my,
[00:15:32.110]my thought is that right now, you know,
[00:15:34.070]there's still a lot of room for improvement,
[00:15:35.930]especially when we look at the other soil properties that we're interested in.
[00:15:39.560]So there's total carbon, but that's not,
[00:15:42.740]that's not the be all and end all and soil health,
[00:15:45.150]although it's really important. So, you know, currently right now,
[00:15:49.310]I guess I don't have an answer for what the cost would be for someone to do like
[00:15:53.600]a full soil health assessment. Cause I don't think that's really available.
[00:15:58.700]And the only other question I had was about,
[00:16:01.490]the university of Missouri has this little health assessment center.
[00:16:05.090]It's in the same city where I'm located,
[00:16:06.950]but it's a different lab and they offer a lot of soil health
[00:16:11.690]tests, on a service basis, but not.
[00:16:18.250]Perfect. Thank you, Andrea. You had a question,
[00:16:22.240]I don't think you responded to you. You could have, and if you did, I apologize,
[00:16:27.220]but there was a, a question on, on any,
[00:16:30.970]research responses that are related to, crop nutrient levels,
[00:16:36.370]as they affect human health.
[00:16:40.900]Do you have any comments or, or knowledge along those lines?
[00:16:44.920]Kristen may have some idea about that as well, or, or Jerry might.
[00:16:50.380]Yeah. I mean, I'd like the, the answer is,
[00:16:52.910]I feel like it's an emerging field and a topic that there's a lot of interest
[00:16:56.560]in. And to be honest, like I think those links are hard to draw.
[00:17:01.360]Like I just think like all of epidemiology and human health is hard to
[00:17:06.490]create those links, but,
[00:17:08.140]so I'm not really as familiar as I probably could or should be on some of these
[00:17:11.560]things. I know that there's a lot of interest in demonstrating it. I might,
[00:17:16.060]and I appreciate it. I would just add that.
[00:17:17.620]I appreciate the spirit of that question because I do think, you know,
[00:17:20.650]and for all, you know, two to 300 people who joined this meeting,
[00:17:24.340]I think we can all see the need for metrics beyond yield and
[00:17:29.230]thinking about quality and human health are all good ones.
[00:17:33.310]So I appreciate the spirit of that question.
[00:17:34.960]I think that it's a sort of new and emerging area.
[00:17:37.700]So I don't know Jerry or Kristen might have more to add and more familiarity.
[00:17:44.050]It's become a really.
[00:17:46.700]As Andrea pointed out. I mean, it's become a hot topic right.
[00:17:50.070]Now in terms of what's the linkage between soil health,
[00:17:54.660]human health,
[00:17:56.100]particularly from the standpoint of nutrient density of crops.
[00:18:00.240]We know that there's some effect out there, but you know,
[00:18:04.020]you get back a lot of this, that,
[00:18:05.880]that nutrient dynamics and concentration in
[00:18:10.800]grain, there's a major weather component and, and that as well,
[00:18:15.660]I mean, it's just use protein is an example. if you want high protein crops,
[00:18:20.520]just have a drought, you know, it doesn't get you yield,
[00:18:24.360]but it gets you high protein. you know,
[00:18:26.670]and so I think that we're going to have to deep unravel some
[00:18:31.590]of these linkages, in terms of these dynamics. And,
[00:18:36.180]and one of the things that we do see in there going back to the why soil health
[00:18:40.290]is so important during the, the latter part of the growing season,
[00:18:43.680]because if we can increase that,
[00:18:47.230]that photosynthetic canopy and that duration that's when we see a lot of
[00:18:52.170]the quality products really go into the green.
[00:18:55.380]And so I think there's some aspects of that, that we need to discover as well.
[00:18:59.910]But it's, it's not a simple process. I mean,
[00:19:02.760]there's been a lot of discussion lately with several of us around the
[00:19:07.320]globe thinking about this and it, you know, I,
[00:19:11.630]I only need to work another 40 or 50 years probably to figure that one.
[00:19:20.420]Thanks, Chad,
[00:19:22.410]are you still hanging with us bill here? Hey,
[00:19:26.870]so I know we, you were,
[00:19:28.500]we're pretty early in the process today and you had quite a number of questions,
[00:19:33.380]that you responded to during the early part of the conference.
[00:19:36.950]Could you give us a brief summary of a few of those questions that you
[00:19:41.660]responded to, in particular, if there were any that overlapped?
[00:19:47.450]Yeah,
[00:19:47.930]there was a one that I found fairly interesting
[00:19:52.850]and it had been brought up to me before in the past.
[00:19:57.290]but the question was, have I tried planting cereal right?
[00:20:00.980]With the direction of the cornrows and then,
[00:20:04.340]splitting them with the crop.
[00:20:07.190]And my answer was that I had thought about that before,
[00:20:11.780]but,
[00:20:13.490]my current equipment set up as far as GPS goes,
[00:20:18.200]I'm just using a free signal.
[00:20:19.550]So the accuracy of using the GPS to split 15 intros,
[00:20:24.170]isn't something that I feel I'm capable of at the moment, but at the same time,
[00:20:29.150]if I could upgrade to RTK,
[00:20:32.510]that would allow me to do that as well as,
[00:20:35.540]I'd have to have a little more instructed,
[00:20:39.290]or some more instructions for the operator of the cover crop planner in the
[00:20:43.790]fall. Cause it would essentially be, I would have to lay it,
[00:20:47.920]lay the field out as I would be wanting to plan it the following spring.
[00:20:52.240]So there'd be some additional management there and,
[00:20:56.530]getting things laid out properly,
[00:20:58.330]but that is something that would be a good concept to
[00:21:03.130]avoid, planting any crop over top of that. Right.
[00:21:08.560]And as well as, when strip tilling, I wouldn't have to,
[00:21:12.130]I wouldn't eliminate some of the stand running the strip till bar through there.
[00:21:15.730]So that was something I found as interesting with a
[00:21:20.710]question. another one was,
[00:21:25.030]as far as terminating of the cover crops,
[00:21:27.970]I know I probably bounced around a lot,
[00:21:31.480]with what I do versus, some management tips and factors and stuff like that.
[00:21:36.070]But, one was as far as terminating the cover crop,
[00:21:41.620]after planting corn, is this done 24 to 48 hours after planting?
[00:21:45.700]Or do I wait until the corn crop has emerged and how late have I gone,
[00:21:50.650]with termination after planning?
[00:21:55.180]so as far as the termination, after corn planting,
[00:21:58.950]I don't really have a set,
[00:22:01.870]timeframe is as long as it's before corn emergence is really what I'm
[00:22:06.730]after. and ideally,
[00:22:11.290]it would be just a date within a day or two following the planner.
[00:22:14.920]Obviously spring time,
[00:22:16.630]it can take several weeks even depending on the weather for the corn to emerge.
[00:22:21.070]And so I typically have a, a good amount of time,
[00:22:25.660]but at the same time,
[00:22:26.410]if it's taken two to three weeks or three weeks or more to emerge,
[00:22:29.920]usually there's weather issues causing that.
[00:22:32.740]So typically try to follow the planner as close as possible.
[00:22:38.320]So maybe I mentioned that, I try to do it.
[00:22:44.740]I tried to do it after plan. I do it after planning, but,
[00:22:48.880]I think I've mentioned,
[00:22:49.690]I asked or answered the question in the chat box that soybeans I'm
[00:22:54.700]been waiting till,
[00:22:57.280]V2 to B3 here in the last couple of years to terminate the rye,
[00:23:01.660]but that is against a cover or a crop insurance
[00:23:06.430]rules. So, not right, but that's the way I do it.
[00:23:11.610]Okay. We've got a one more question for Chad, another one for Ken,
[00:23:16.590]and then I don't want to short, Becca clay either.
[00:23:20.520]and we're running shorter discussion and man, I,
[00:23:23.950]I hate to cut a discussion off.
[00:23:25.770]So I think I'll bleed into our wrap up a little bit here. so Chad,
[00:23:30.600]Amy wanted to know his cereal rye, your highest recommended cover crop.
[00:23:37.110]I would say yes, for my geography now,
[00:23:41.370]depending on where you're at in Nebraska,
[00:23:43.140]I'm not a hundred percent familiar with the weather patterns out there,
[00:23:47.540]but as far as in a corn soybean rotation,
[00:23:51.830]I'd say cereal. Rye is probably the number one recommendation,
[00:23:56.420]easy to get established, easy to terminate.
[00:24:00.260]and it's one of the cheapest seeds out there.
[00:24:03.320]And it's very versatile for a lot of different goals. Now,
[00:24:06.890]obviously what you end up ultimately deciding on for a cover crop
[00:24:11.570]depends on the goal that you have in mind, but as far as in this area,
[00:24:15.490]cereal rise pretty well. The, the easiest best one for that for most things,
[00:24:22.400]it's a good place. Good place to start.
[00:24:26.600]Ken Paul, Hey, ask the question.
[00:24:31.190]what changes have you made,
[00:24:35.540]in your crop and livestock operations from the research effort that you've been
[00:24:40.220]working on with Jenny and Mary?
[00:24:43.390]yeah. Thanks Paul for the question.
[00:24:48.880]I'd like to say,
[00:24:50.290]this research to begin with this research is going to continue going on for a
[00:24:54.640]number of years longer. We are going to change our focus,
[00:24:59.320]instead of, a cover crop that,
[00:25:03.580]we're going to look more at, sorghum cover crops,
[00:25:08.470]and it looks like, we have a lot better results with that.
[00:25:12.190]So we're going to change that, focus. we,
[00:25:17.050]as I said, where, we have a systems approach,
[00:25:21.880]we really liked that in our operation.
[00:25:24.100]We know what we're going to plant every year. so we haven't,
[00:25:28.690]fully made any changes yet.
[00:25:31.720]we're still want to look at the little bit this research, but along that nine,
[00:25:35.830]we also, view,
[00:25:40.450]what we do with our range land. Because if,
[00:25:45.730]we think it's really important that if we can, pull those,
[00:25:50.590]some of those livestock off of some of that range land, late summer,
[00:25:55.480]give it a rest at that. also helps that range land quite a bit.
[00:26:00.430]I know this conference is,
[00:26:02.800]is talking about cover crops and the benefits from it,
[00:26:07.150]but a range land is a cover crop too,
[00:26:10.420]and we have to take care of it too. So we are in the process,
[00:26:15.250]Paul of,
[00:26:17.680]of running a shorter grazing season, pulling cattle off,
[00:26:22.810]late summer and,
[00:26:25.850]utilizing some crop residues.
[00:26:28.900]we would really like to know that,
[00:26:32.650]this cover crop we thought was going to work.
[00:26:36.670]some of the things that we we are looking at is that because of the
[00:26:41.320]variability of the weather, because what,
[00:26:44.100]how much cover crop you're going to be able to grow,
[00:26:46.620]you're going to have to have a contingency plan.
[00:26:49.200]And so that contingency plan is private going to be some crop residues
[00:26:54.120]that are bailed up that are sitting back there that in case it doesn't rain,
[00:26:58.470]we can use those. So, we are making incremental changes,
[00:27:03.480]but, we wanna get a really firm grip on,
[00:27:08.370]what we can expect with, going to a cover crop behind the wheat.
[00:27:14.420]Yeah. Can I, don't,
[00:27:17.090]moisture's at a premium down in your particular area for crops,
[00:27:21.410]cover crops and orange crops. So you have to balance a,
[00:27:26.360]have to balance the management on, on a lot of different avenues.
[00:27:29.690]So thanks for that response, back backup.
[00:27:35.030]you went through and answered your questions too back early in the conference.
[00:27:39.140]Would,
[00:27:39.770]could you give us a little summary on a couple of a couple of highlights that,
[00:27:44.240]that you responded to?
[00:27:46.520]Sure. Thing, Darren, one of the questions that I received was if,
[00:27:51.950]the changes in herbicide costs to the cover crop versus
[00:27:56.900]non cover crop, soybean was compared to this,
[00:28:01.790]was stacked on the seed and application costs.
[00:28:04.340]And the answer to that was no, the graphs that I shared was, was just the,
[00:28:09.680]the changes in herbicide costs.
[00:28:12.350]but I took a quick look and,
[00:28:16.340]out of the,
[00:28:18.530]219 people that had cover crops versus non cover crop. So weaving fields,
[00:28:23.630]15 people, after those herbicide reductions,
[00:28:28.550]had a cover crop, expensive,
[00:28:32.150]less than $10 an acre.
[00:28:34.190]And the specific program that we're working in is $10 an acre.
[00:28:37.280]And so with the cover crop cost share those people would actually be a net
[00:28:41.990]positive. but we'll also be publishing, that later on,
[00:28:46.850]on our website, most likely. So keep an eye out for that.
[00:28:50.210]another question that I had was on if,
[00:28:55.220]people are typically charging for custom grazing, which is when,
[00:28:59.690]say Chad's got, cover crops and I've got livestock,
[00:29:04.670]and like, is, does Chad wanna charge me,
[00:29:09.830]to, for my livestock to graze the cover crops?
[00:29:12.680]And typically we didn't, most people don't do that in Iowa,
[00:29:17.150]at least in the cover crop in a corn saving system,
[00:29:20.870]just because there's not that much growth out.
[00:29:23.720]I did talk to one producer in, Southeast Iowa who,
[00:29:28.460]was charging a dollar per head per day for grazing,
[00:29:31.460]a summer seeded cover crop just because there was so much more biomass out
[00:29:35.000]there. The feed quality was better, but, yeah,
[00:29:39.140]so those were the two questions that I had.

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2021 Nebraska Cover Crop and Soil Health Conference - Panel Discussion

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