Soil Health Summit: Soil Panel

IANR Media Author

11/22/2021 Added

27 Plays

Description

Recorded Friday, November 19, 2021.

Searchable Transcript

Search:

[00:00:04.070]Pleased to introduce the moderator,
[00:00:07.800]Andrea Bass.
[00:00:11.500]Andrea is one of those, as I mentioned, a few minutes ago,
[00:00:15.940]one of those 23 soil and water faculty members
[00:00:19.010]that I mentioned, we hired.
[00:00:22.180]And she is busy directing her panel.
[00:00:26.770]Maybe we should have given her a baton.
[00:00:33.300]Oh you know they have a good conversation going on
[00:00:35.370]among themselves up there so we're pretty sure that's
[00:00:38.870]going to result in a really good panel discussion.
[00:00:43.900]So Andrea is an assistant professor in the
[00:00:48.090]department of agronomy and horticulture.
[00:00:52.440]Her work focuses on developing and supporting
[00:00:56.513]cropping systems that address profitability,
[00:00:58.350]resource use efficiency and climate.
[00:01:02.150]And these are of course are important factors
[00:01:04.380]in improving soil health.
[00:01:07.048]Increasing use of cover crops and perennial crops.
[00:01:12.230]And she also looks at policy dimensions.
[00:01:17.290]She's currently working with 17 on farm research
[00:01:20.840]projects, partners throughout the soil health initiative.
[00:01:25.220]And she explores how soil health related management can
[00:01:28.610]offset risk related to flooding.
[00:01:31.990]So, Andrea, thank you for moderating this.
[00:01:34.950]I've asked Andrea to moderate this panel
[00:01:38.500]because I think a lot of you have met her
[00:01:41.160]and interacted with her over the past several years
[00:01:46.045]since she's come on board at the university
[00:01:47.620]and the four panelists have been selected,
[00:01:50.580]as I mentioned at the beginning of our program
[00:01:53.410]for their expertise in particular areas
[00:01:56.230]of the soil complex system and
[00:01:59.470]Andrea has worked across those areas.
[00:02:02.736]So I thought she would be a good integrator of the,
[00:02:05.960]the four experts up here.
[00:02:07.960]So integrate away, Andrea.
[00:02:10.210]Well, thank you all for joining this morning.
[00:02:11.900]It's great to see so many of you here
[00:02:14.210]who are interested to talk about soil and soil health.
[00:02:17.160]And Ron, thank you for the invitation and that introduction.
[00:02:19.860]So I again am trained as an agronomist,
[00:02:22.180]not as a soil scientist, as all of our panel is here today,
[00:02:26.200]but I really, you know, work in a focused way in this space,
[00:02:29.870]thinking about the agronomy, the crop management,
[00:02:31.910]and how do we design cropping systems that are focused on
[00:02:34.100]conservation and soil health.
[00:02:35.450]And so we're going to spend time on our science panel today
[00:02:38.860]talking about a lot of the things
[00:02:40.360]that we do not know about soil health,
[00:02:43.090]but I thought I might share some of the things that we do
[00:02:45.610]know as we get started today to get the conversation going.
[00:02:49.620]And this is a similar message to what I gave when I
[00:02:51.640]presented the human lecture about two years ago this month.
[00:02:54.770]But I think it really bears repeating, right?
[00:02:56.340]So today is November 19th, 2021,
[00:02:59.686]whether we realize it or not, or want to accept it,
[00:03:02.620]we have 43 days until 2022.
[00:03:05.360]It's nearing the end of the year.
[00:03:07.200]And 2022 means we only have 28 years until mid century.
[00:03:12.350]So we hear a lot about 2050.
[00:03:14.060]We hear a lot about what our food demands are going to be.
[00:03:18.120]We hear a lot about warming temperatures or other climate
[00:03:22.580]changes that might occur by mid-century right?
[00:03:24.480]So we hear a lot about what's going to happen in 2050,
[00:03:27.430]but what I don't feel like we talk about enough
[00:03:29.970]is what might our soil resources
[00:03:31.440]look like in that same amount of time, right?
[00:03:33.330]So we know some of the things we know that we can lose soil
[00:03:37.960]in one really bad rain event
[00:03:40.880]so quickly that soil would have taken, you know,
[00:03:43.310]many years or decades to have formed
[00:03:46.110]and we can lose it in an instant.
[00:03:48.110]We know that the intensification of our crop and livestock
[00:03:51.530]management has continued or contributed to soil degradation
[00:03:57.510]and really one or, or two generations or less even.
[00:04:00.310]And so all of these things in my perspective,
[00:04:02.550]make the conversations that we're having in this gathering
[00:04:04.810]even more imperative.
[00:04:05.790]And I see conservation as even more critical
[00:04:08.940]as we think about a changing climate.
[00:04:10.400]And so we also know that our management practices can have a
[00:04:14.550]large benefit for reducing degradation,
[00:04:17.240]improving environmental quality and profitability.
[00:04:19.640]And so what I'm really encouraged by again,
[00:04:21.220]is a turnout like this,
[00:04:23.280]all of the enthusiasm and the media and the attention,
[00:04:26.250]the policy conversations that are happening now that weren't
[00:04:28.690]even happening, you know, five years ago,
[00:04:31.320]it gets us thinking about,
[00:04:32.950]and lots of producer conversations.
[00:04:34.500]As we just heard about how people are rethinking their
[00:04:37.580]management systems for soil conservation,
[00:04:39.920]I'm encouraged by student enthusiasm in this space.
[00:04:43.390]So I teach undergrads.
[00:04:44.660]I just came from a new course that I'm teaching
[00:04:47.880]with multi-sites and we were all on zoom
[00:04:50.070]talking about cover crops, right?
[00:04:51.270]So there's, you know, hundreds of,
[00:04:54.450]we have about a hundred students across all the universities
[00:04:57.770]teaching this new class that I am a part of.
[00:05:00.291]And so I'm excited about all of that enthusiasm and
[00:05:03.660]really this recognition that soil health is more
[00:05:05.560]holistic maybe than the way that we've thought about it with
[00:05:08.150]a focus on soil chemical properties in the past.
[00:05:11.320]And so with that, I want to introduce our panelists.
[00:05:14.000]So we will follow a same format
[00:05:16.650]as what we just saw with our panel,
[00:05:18.800]they will each speak for a few minutes
[00:05:20.400]about their topic areas.
[00:05:21.730]And then we have some questions
[00:05:23.000]and then we'll open it up to all of you.
[00:05:24.840]So I'm going to introduce all of our panelists now.
[00:05:27.990]So our first panelists here,
[00:05:30.230]my colleague, Humberto Blanco,
[00:05:31.520]as you can see,
[00:05:32.353]is a professor in the department of agronomy,
[00:05:34.100]and he has a research and teaching appointment,
[00:05:37.010]his research focus include soil management,
[00:05:39.690]applied soil physics,
[00:05:41.126]including research topics on
[00:05:43.300]no-till crop residue management,
[00:05:45.140]cover crops,
[00:05:45.973]bio char energy crops,
[00:05:47.220]and other conservation oriented management practices.
[00:05:50.620]So Humberto will kick us off.
[00:05:52.410]Then we'll have Michael Kaiser
[00:05:53.640]who is an assistant professor in the department.
[00:05:55.770]He also holds teaching and research appointment
[00:05:58.770]and his focus is on soil organic matter dynamics,
[00:06:01.970]including studying the effects of land use management and
[00:06:05.140]soil type on soil organic matter,
[00:06:06.940]sustainable soil management,
[00:06:08.153]soil health
[00:06:09.360]and methods for the separation of
[00:06:11.090]ecologically meaningful soil organic matter fractions.
[00:06:13.950]Really important scientific work that he is a leader in.
[00:06:18.160]And then we'll have Virginia Jin
[00:06:20.450]who is the location coordinator and research leader
[00:06:22.710]of the agro ecosystem
[00:06:23.810]management research unit for the USDA ARS here in Lincoln.
[00:06:27.306]She's also the co-leader of the
[00:06:29.150]Platte River high Plains aquifer longterm
[00:06:31.592]research agro ecosystem site.
[00:06:34.140]That's operated in partnership with the university.
[00:06:36.920]And her research in soil science is focused on
[00:06:40.410]conservation and conventional management strategies,
[00:06:42.500]how they affect soil,
[00:06:43.690]carbon, nutrient cycling, soil, microbial communities,
[00:06:46.990]and greenhouse gas emissions.
[00:06:49.310]And then Andy Suyker is a
[00:06:51.280]micrometeorologist associate professor in the
[00:06:53.330]school of natural resources here at the university.
[00:06:55.780]He has been quantifying the exchange of carbon and water in
[00:06:59.360]natural and agricultural systems for 30 plus years.
[00:07:05.030]And these techniques allow for the long-term monitoring and
[00:07:07.690]movement and increasing our understanding of an increasingly
[00:07:11.220]important topic of carbon and water
[00:07:13.160]in and out of an ecosystem.
[00:07:15.150]So I think I'll leave it there and turn it over to all of
[00:07:17.510]you starting with Humberto
[00:07:19.432]to give your introductory remarks.
[00:07:23.150]Great.
[00:07:24.150]Can you hear me great if not, I can yell.
[00:07:28.230]I teach a large class and I yell at them first in Spanish
[00:07:33.170]then in English.
[00:07:36.270]Great.
[00:07:37.900]Thanks for having me.
[00:07:39.820]I heard about that famous word, experts,
[00:07:43.650]so I feel quite important.
[00:07:47.427]You might be disappointed by the time, you know,
[00:07:51.340]I finished saying things,
[00:07:53.400]but feel free to kick me out of the room.
[00:08:02.420]Andrea mentioned about a lot of things that we have been
[00:08:05.090]doing in our group for the past,
[00:08:08.740]I would say 10 years stay
[00:08:15.830]5 years, Ohio state,
[00:08:18.300]another 5 years before that Missouri,
[00:08:22.743]another 10 year plan.
[00:08:23.950]That 30 year's work on soil health.
[00:08:27.210]So measuring not all the parameters,
[00:08:30.480]but looking at the soil, physical properties mostly.
[00:08:36.260]Then we are linking that now with soil sequestration.
[00:08:42.320]As Jerry mentioned earlier, you know, carbon, I mean,
[00:08:45.950]we lost 50% of carbon, but challenge is,
[00:08:52.740]how can we get that back?
[00:08:54.670]It's up there and it belongs to, you know,
[00:08:59.367]the soil not up there, right.
[00:09:02.580]And that is critical.
[00:09:07.220]It is important to consider not only soil health,
[00:09:13.080]but also I'm going to talk a lot about that
[00:09:15.180]resiliency of the system.
[00:09:17.904]So against extreme weather, you know, fluctuations.
[00:09:23.414]Leave it there and that we respond more when you have a
[00:09:26.490]specific question later.
[00:09:29.590]Hello, can you hear me?
[00:09:30.780]Okay, good.
[00:09:32.060]Hi, so my name is Michael Kaiser.
[00:09:33.560]I am originally from Germany,
[00:09:35.290]so I worked a couple of years in Germany,
[00:09:37.948]a couple of years here in the US
[00:09:41.070]so here in Nebraska in Lincoln,
[00:09:42.940]but also in California.
[00:09:47.410]Better?
[00:09:48.270]Okay.
[00:09:49.790]So basically soil problems are more or less
[00:09:52.957]the same in Germany as here.
[00:09:55.248]So expertise since 20 years, I working in soil,
[00:09:59.220]organic carbon source,
[00:10:00.230]organic matter stabilization destabilization.
[00:10:02.630]So we are looking into mechanisms.
[00:10:06.030]What keeps carbon or soil organic matter in the soil?
[00:10:09.230]Where do we lose soil organic matter,
[00:10:11.909]soil organic carbon.
[00:10:13.080]Why is it important to keep it?
[00:10:15.010]Which function site-specific functions we get out of it?
[00:10:20.570]We were working in a different methods to analyze it.
[00:10:24.970]We are looking in land use effects,
[00:10:27.270]especially forest, grassland, airborne,
[00:10:30.370]but also in,
[00:10:31.910]in the coupling between mechanisms and processes and related
[00:10:36.620]to applied stuff likes the sustainable management options,
[00:10:40.040]cover crops, no till or reduced tillage intensity.
[00:10:45.470]I had diversity in, so I'm killing all the microbes.
[00:10:49.450]Okay, good.
[00:10:51.382]So what we really trying to do is we try to understand the
[00:10:55.060]mechanism and the processes,
[00:10:56.880]and then make getting feedback on the management options and
[00:11:03.270]try to predict under which conditions certain management
[00:11:06.880]options are most efficient or most successful.
[00:11:11.960]And so we are looking also a lot of in the soil
[00:11:16.867]characteristics like soil mineral characteristics,
[00:11:19.100]which is important for stabilization and destabilization
[00:11:22.290]of organic matter.
[00:11:23.560]Thanks.
[00:11:25.620]Oh man it just turned red as soon as I picked it up.
[00:11:29.100]How about this one?
[00:11:31.040]Thank you.
[00:11:32.140]My name is Virginia Jin.
[00:11:33.580]I'm a soil scientist,
[00:11:35.680]and with the agricultural research service,
[00:11:37.930]and I cannot tell you how valuable it has been for our
[00:11:41.840]agency to be co-located with the University of Nebraska.
[00:11:45.800]The research that we've conducted in cooperation with the
[00:11:48.520]University has been really, I think, transformative.
[00:11:54.230]We have resources through the federal government to maintain
[00:11:57.510]very long-term studies and we maintain those long-term
[00:12:00.910]studies on University of Nebraska land.
[00:12:04.000]And so the collaborations we have with faculty and the fact
[00:12:07.940]that we are able to have these very long-term studies helps
[00:12:11.710]us answer some of these questions about soil health,
[00:12:14.810]about crop productivity,
[00:12:16.550]about environmental quality in ways that we can't always do
[00:12:20.290]on farm and ways that we can't always do on a usual grant
[00:12:24.300]cycle that might not allow us to hold on to those lands for
[00:12:27.530]longer than 3 to 5 years.
[00:12:29.620]So we're very proud of being able to have these
[00:12:32.050]collaborations with the University
[00:12:34.090]and holding onto some of our field sites,
[00:12:36.520]which are rivaling some of the things
[00:12:38.850]that Paul had talked about,
[00:12:40.330]in fact right next to Paul's study,
[00:12:42.290]we've got also a 40 year rotation study where we have looked
[00:12:47.460]at tillage practices as well.
[00:12:49.570]And so being able to use both the,
[00:12:53.410]the resources from the federal side,
[00:12:55.490]as well as the state side,
[00:12:56.850]I think has yielded a lot of great information.
[00:12:59.180]And we're very excited to continue with those
[00:13:02.360]collaborations with the university.
[00:13:11.970]Morning.
[00:13:13.050]So my name is Andy Suyker.
[00:13:15.200]I am the site PI at a carbon sequestration project that
[00:13:19.902]we've been running at Enric,
[00:13:23.924]that's the farm research site Dear Mead.
[00:13:28.830]And what we've been doing is monitoring
[00:13:33.700]the net exchange of carbon and
[00:13:36.660]the net exchange of water vapor
[00:13:38.480]on a continuous basis.
[00:13:41.230]So what we're doing is we're measuring CO2 concentrations
[00:13:46.130]and we're measuring water vapor density and temperature,
[00:13:50.980]and we're actually measuring it above the crop.
[00:13:54.306]That's above the crop surface.
[00:13:55.470]And then simultaneously we're measuring
[00:13:58.180]the turbulent wind speeds.
[00:14:00.370]And by looking at the correlation of those two,
[00:14:03.660]it will tell you what the net exchange of the carbon dioxide
[00:14:09.190]or water or temperature,
[00:14:16.020]what that exchange is over the course of an hour.
[00:14:19.740]And then you can measure every hour of every day
[00:14:24.819]through the growing season, through the non-growing season.
[00:14:27.960]So what we're doing is we're getting a complete picture of
[00:14:32.060]how carbon and water and energy,
[00:14:36.460]because in addition to,
[00:14:39.160]measuring carbon dioxide and water vapor,
[00:14:40.990]we're also looking at the amount of sunlight
[00:14:43.410]that's coming into these ecosystems.
[00:14:45.470]And not only the quantity of sunlight,
[00:14:49.030]the quality of sunlight,
[00:14:50.580]that has impact on photosynthesis.
[00:14:53.320]So we're measuring these quantities on a continuous basis,
[00:14:57.340]and it's telling us the net movement of carbon
[00:15:01.090]into and out of the ecosystems, okay.
[00:15:04.000]The net movement going in,
[00:15:05.834]is of course through photosynthesis,
[00:15:08.110]what's coming out is through respiration,
[00:15:10.920]respiration of different components,
[00:15:13.150]the respiration of the plants,
[00:15:14.660]the above ground portion of the plants,
[00:15:16.760]the respiration of the below ground component of the plants,
[00:15:21.070]and then the respiration coming from the soil microbes,
[00:15:24.960]microbes not only in the soil,
[00:15:26.650]but then on the surface that are breaking down the
[00:15:30.380]biomass, the corn Stover,
[00:15:33.280]or the soybean stocks and leaves that are,
[00:15:37.043]that were leftover from harvest.
[00:15:37.920]And so by looking at that,
[00:15:39.940]we can tell the net uptake of carbon,
[00:15:43.510]and ultimately when we combine that
[00:15:46.580]with the carbon that's removed,
[00:15:48.880]because you cannot forget that
[00:15:50.480]the carbon that's removed with harvest
[00:15:52.890]because about 45% of the grain that's removed,
[00:15:58.220]45% of that is carbon.
[00:15:59.990]And so it's obviously a huge factor in
[00:16:04.056]when you're looking at the carbon balance
[00:16:05.900]of these agricultural ecosystems.
[00:16:08.020]So when you take into account the net exchange
[00:16:11.970]over the course of the year,
[00:16:13.140]and you include the amount of carbon that you're losing
[00:16:17.442]with the grain removal,
[00:16:19.400]then you can begin to get a handle on what the carbon
[00:16:22.960]sequestration is of those sites.
[00:16:25.780]And very briefly,
[00:16:27.410]I'll tell you,
[00:16:29.180]we've had three sites there we've been measuring since 2001
[00:16:32.940]and the we've had an continuous corn,
[00:16:37.270]continuous irrigated corn.
[00:16:39.930]And that site has actually been
[00:16:41.290]losing a small amount of carbon.
[00:16:43.750]We've had another site that's also been irrigated,
[00:16:47.054]it's been a corn soybean rotation.
[00:16:50.390]And that site has been losing a small amount of carbon,
[00:16:54.470]also, not as much as the continuous corn.
[00:16:57.860]And then the third site is a rain fed site.
[00:17:01.310]And that site is actually been quite carbon neutral.
[00:17:05.550]Okay.
[00:17:06.964]So when you look at the movement of carbon
[00:17:08.420]into and out of the ecosystem,
[00:17:13.200]you need to take in those factors of the
[00:17:17.440]photosynthesis, the respiration and the grain carbon.
[00:17:23.930]Great, well,
[00:17:26.830]all of our speakers got through their comments in under the
[00:17:29.860]requested time, which is a rarity.
[00:17:31.440]So thank you all.
[00:17:32.710]So that gives us lots of time for,
[00:17:34.700]I've got a few questions and I encourage you to think about
[00:17:38.100]some of your own as well,
[00:17:39.240]and the introductory remarks thinking about, you know,
[00:17:42.210]this concept of the complexity of the soil system, right?
[00:17:45.260]So my first question for all of you, and we can,
[00:17:48.276]well, we'll start with Andy and we'll go back this way.
[00:17:51.600]What would you say is the greatest known
[00:17:54.330]and the greatest unknown within your topic area,
[00:17:56.540]in terms of the science of soil health and soil management?
[00:18:06.444]I would say the greatest known,
[00:18:15.393]sorry.
[00:18:30.628]Is this working?
[00:18:31.870]Oh, I'm so sorry,
[00:18:33.180]how frustrating this is for you not to be able
[00:18:35.230]to hear us properly.
[00:18:37.520]So I neglected to say that the topic area that I was
[00:18:41.240]covering today was soil biology.
[00:18:44.200]There are many experts here that cover soil biology.
[00:18:47.500]I just happened to be the lucky one to be picked,
[00:18:49.830]to sit up here.
[00:18:51.648]So let me just acknowledge all those
[00:18:53.207]great researchers out there.
[00:18:54.620]I think the greatest unknown that we have,
[00:18:56.810]in soil biology is we've got all these tools,
[00:18:59.050]we've got all this technology.
[00:19:00.700]We talk about metagenomics and all these really incredibly
[00:19:06.140]detailed tools that allow us to look at soil biology
[00:19:10.320]at the genetic level.
[00:19:12.380]And we don't know what to do with that data.
[00:19:15.960]How do we translate that data at that level to actually
[00:19:21.020]what's happening in the soil,
[00:19:22.850]how those actions in the soil
[00:19:25.100]are impacting the overall soil health?
[00:19:27.500]I think that's the greatest unknown that we have.
[00:19:31.410]The greatest known that we have is, well,
[00:19:34.320]we know soil biology is.
[00:19:40.790]We know that we know that soil biology is really,
[00:19:44.090]really important.
[00:19:46.320]That's, that's the,
[00:19:47.570]we know that that's a major building block,
[00:19:50.530]but discovering the mechanisms of how
[00:19:53.902]that soil biology can work for us,
[00:19:57.410]that's something that we are still working on.
[00:20:06.788]Okay,
[00:20:07.621]from the soil organic carbon soil organic perspective.
[00:20:10.440]So what we do know from a lot of field experiments on farm
[00:20:14.300]research, meta studies all over the world.
[00:20:17.460]So we do have management options like cover crops,
[00:20:20.730]reduced tillage, bio chart, increased crop diversity.
[00:20:24.684]We do know that this works so we can see carbon increase,
[00:20:32.190]soil organic matter increase.
[00:20:33.910]And it's not only the carbon sequestration
[00:20:36.370]that we are going for,
[00:20:37.950]it's also about many co-benefits coming from
[00:20:40.560]soil organic matter.
[00:20:41.950]So we know we have this options is tools.
[00:20:44.800]What we do not know,
[00:20:46.010]or what's less known is the soil boundary conditions
[00:20:49.470]under which management conditions,
[00:20:52.660]coupled with site-specific conditions.
[00:20:55.250]A certain management of a option is most efficient.
[00:20:59.930]And this is why you see sometimes you see success,
[00:21:05.020]you see an increase, you see a better soil structure,
[00:21:08.290]a better, better carbon content,
[00:21:11.600]but at other sites you don't see,
[00:21:13.960]other open questions are,
[00:21:16.737]how long does it take?
[00:21:18.550]how stable it is?
[00:21:20.450]how resilient against disturbance it is?
[00:21:23.900]and how deep we need to look.
[00:21:26.900]So because a lot of management options are restricted to the
[00:21:30.110]first 10 centimeters.
[00:21:32.480]There's a lot more research questions what's going,
[00:21:36.833]especially below a 30 centimeters.
[00:21:38.915]So if carbon travels down with,
[00:21:43.309]in a water soluble phase or with deep rooting systems,
[00:21:46.710]so this is all really not known, but there are,
[00:21:51.520]we do know that we have this tools,
[00:21:55.480]but under which conditions is tools are most efficient and
[00:22:00.200]especially taking time taking into consideration that we
[00:22:04.860]have feed variability.
[00:22:07.010]And as a farmer, you might see an improvement.
[00:22:09.880]And in, in your soil performance, as a scientist,
[00:22:14.690]we are looking for the significant differences, right?
[00:22:18.450]And this might take much more time,
[00:22:20.760]and this is especially a topic,
[00:22:22.940]if you want to in future,
[00:22:25.350]if you want to use carbon storage
[00:22:27.410]to make money from the carbon market,
[00:22:30.860]because here we rely on significant differences
[00:22:35.030]that can be seen over quite amount of time.
[00:22:43.501]Right?
[00:22:44.334]This is a green, so probably can hear me now.
[00:22:46.569]Okay, great though.
[00:22:47.520]I was going to start yelling again.
[00:22:50.610]We know a lot about soil health.
[00:22:56.418]I'll go ahead and say that we have been measuring this
[00:22:59.200]indicators for many, many years.
[00:23:02.310]I'm talking from a research point of view.
[00:23:05.770]So now we came up with this phrase soil health.
[00:23:09.820]So it sounds great,
[00:23:15.170]but how can we make our soils more resilient in order to
[00:23:22.100]make the soils more resilient against what against drought
[00:23:26.060]against flooding against the heavy rain storms, right.
[00:23:30.860]2012, 2019.
[00:23:34.320]So we know we have,
[00:23:36.409]we know about all about the weather fluctuations, right?
[00:23:39.780]Two extremes.
[00:23:42.140]So on our plates as physicists,
[00:23:46.930]I would like to develop a system,
[00:23:50.380]a management system that can release water
[00:23:56.900]when it drains a bit too much.
[00:23:59.388]And in when it retains water, that doesn't drain much,
[00:24:03.320]right?
[00:24:04.756]So we need to develop a system that retains or stores water
[00:24:10.750]when it's dry and then releases or moves the water to
[00:24:17.670]ground water for longterm storage.
[00:24:21.366]So that's our challenge, right?
[00:24:23.700]So, and based on our many years of on-farm experiments,
[00:24:32.610]experiments in research centers,
[00:24:35.910]in terms of soil physical properties,
[00:24:38.630]then I can dive into carbon sequestration as well.
[00:24:42.660]A lot of those practices that were mentioned,
[00:24:44.720]so have been mentioned so far this morning,
[00:24:47.310]do not work in some conditions.
[00:24:50.540]Let me go ahead and tell you that
[00:24:52.070]we have maybe 10 crop experiments across Nebraska.
[00:24:58.841]And after 3 years, 5 years,
[00:25:00.930]even 10 years in 50% of the 60% of cases,
[00:25:04.980]we have not seen any differences
[00:25:07.011]in soil physical properties.
[00:25:08.890]We have been measuring carbon with depth as well,
[00:25:11.770]but I'm not looking at, in detail,
[00:25:13.947]the stabilization component.
[00:25:15.270]We haven't seen any changes, but Cardi Creech in Sydney,
[00:25:20.650]we planted cover crops, so we can improve soil health crops.
[00:25:25.050]Cover crops did not come out last year, no water.
[00:25:29.300]So it is, would be great for me here to say, well, you know,
[00:25:32.120]plant cover crops, you know, practice, no till,
[00:25:35.240]and you are sort of nup.
[00:25:37.710]That's no till, for example,
[00:25:39.610]improve or increase soil carbon compared to plow tail.
[00:25:43.840]Ma'am not really mixed results out there.
[00:25:49.986]So I guess we need to get realistic.
[00:25:52.189]That's why I said earlier, it can kick me out the room.
[00:25:54.144]So we need to be realistic.
[00:25:56.850]So what I'm, so what is it?
[00:25:58.671]I don't want to sound negative,
[00:25:59.860]but we keep comparing and we lost.
[00:26:02.282]We keep saying we lost 50%, carbon,
[00:26:03.610]30% can depends where you are.
[00:26:05.720]If you really want to improve soil health and resiliency,
[00:26:11.050]you need to use some perennials because
[00:26:17.720]yeah, well, that's not about economics.
[00:26:21.350]Well, what about livestock?
[00:26:22.700]What about planting those perennials in problem spots,
[00:26:26.430]right?
[00:26:28.050]That's what I'm talking about.
[00:26:29.821]What about integrating,
[00:26:31.137]growing perennials for 2, 3 years?
[00:26:32.920]I remember I learned this.
[00:26:34.690]I'm still learning things,
[00:26:36.530]especially from farmers,
[00:26:37.640]but I remember from one scientist,
[00:26:39.400]Dr. Gary Peterson, who is an emeritus,
[00:26:43.431]and he said one time
[00:26:44.840]when I was attending field days in Akron, Colorado
[00:26:48.031]it was like 10 years ago when I was at K state.
[00:26:51.030]He said, if you want to increase soil carbon, you know,
[00:26:55.760]if you want to improve soil, you know, properties,
[00:26:59.980]you need to put forage or some perennials.
[00:27:03.517]So there is no till we even covered crops,
[00:27:05.960]not grow in some depends what system you are using.
[00:27:08.800]So we need to redesign the system need to redesign.
[00:27:12.093]If we are planting cover crops after corn in late October,
[00:27:14.950]early November, then you are killing in late March or April.
[00:27:18.960]Please show me that that's showing increase in carbon and
[00:27:22.100]improvement, physical properties I haven't seen.
[00:27:24.550]So let's stop there and move to the next.
[00:27:27.557]Okay, thank you.
[00:27:29.191]Yep.
[00:27:31.560]What we know are some of the key environmental parameters
[00:27:37.240]and biophysical parameters that are regulating the
[00:27:41.350]photosynthesis and the respiration on a day to day basis.
[00:27:47.043]What we have a much poor understanding of
[00:27:51.356]is what factors are regulating the exchange,
[00:27:57.479]the carbon sequestration on longer time periods from year to
[00:28:02.280]year, for example, over several years, for example,
[00:28:08.704]for photosynthesis, we know if we have a crop in the,
[00:28:14.261]in the late amaze crop in the late vegetative growth stages,
[00:28:17.710]there's lots of leaf area, lots of biomass.
[00:28:20.470]We have a sunny day,
[00:28:21.740]we have lots of photosynthesis and we can measure that,
[00:28:26.730]when we have a cloudy day,
[00:28:28.060]we have considerably less photosynthesis
[00:28:30.620]and we can measure that
[00:28:32.540]so we can predict on an hour basis or a daily basis,
[00:28:37.150]what the photosynthesis would be based on
[00:28:39.610]what the sunlight is.
[00:28:40.550]For example, however,
[00:28:43.180]when you go and you look at the annual exchange of
[00:28:46.710]carbon dioxide from that ecosystem,
[00:28:48.830]and you try and relate it to light, well,
[00:28:52.160]you don't see relationships at all.
[00:28:55.730]And that's because there's adequate light, okay.
[00:28:59.670]The crop is getting adequate light.
[00:29:01.220]So it's not a factor regulating photosynthesis,
[00:29:04.500]but then other factors like temperature or soil moisture,
[00:29:11.250]where it starts to affect the crop development and the
[00:29:14.250]amount of biomass that,
[00:29:15.640]that accumulates the amount of leaves,
[00:29:18.540]the size of the leaf, the leaf area,
[00:29:21.370]those factors start to become important.
[00:29:24.020]And so what we need to do is,
[00:29:27.310]is get a better handle on what's regulating things on an
[00:29:33.011]annual basis, the inter-annual variability.
[00:29:35.470]And then also,
[00:29:37.370]I would say the other great unknown is the extreme events.
[00:29:41.620]How do they affect carbon exchange?
[00:29:45.231]Because you may have an event in one year or
[00:29:47.290]one time period,
[00:29:48.210]but the impact of that
[00:29:50.330]you'll see the impact over several months.
[00:29:53.370]And so it's, it's determining
[00:29:59.146]how the carbon exchange gets affected and then how it
[00:30:07.670]responds to that disturbance for that extreme event.
[00:30:14.270]Great, thank you all for that.
[00:30:17.760]Okay, next question that I have, and again,
[00:30:20.990]encourage you all to think about followups and we'll have an
[00:30:23.517]opportunity to take some of your questions soon.
[00:30:25.760]How would you recommend that producers test their fields to
[00:30:28.780]monitor for changes that were improvements to soil health?
[00:30:33.070]I'll let anybody start who wants to.
[00:30:41.090]Okay.
[00:30:44.598]Okay.
[00:30:45.540]It's Bose red.
[00:30:46.530]I'm speaking loud.
[00:30:47.550]Is that okay?
[00:30:49.890]Good.
[00:30:51.262]So for my perspective,
[00:30:53.550]so I know no pharma will have a control field, right?
[00:30:57.070]Like, like we use in our long-term three to expert meds,
[00:31:01.150]because it does make sense to treat the system as a control.
[00:31:06.401]So if you want to see, or my recommendation would be, and,
[00:31:10.830]and all this, you know,
[00:31:12.610]management options like cover crops and no-till, I know,
[00:31:18.410]sort organic comps on organic matter is one of the key
[00:31:21.639]components, but it's not the only component, right?
[00:31:24.070]If you want to see changes in soil organic carbon,
[00:31:26.933]soil organic matter,
[00:31:28.520]you should test at least every 2 years.
[00:31:31.740]If you don't have a control, which you don't have,
[00:31:34.950]because it does make sense.
[00:31:37.544]We need to build up a time series
[00:31:39.940]to see changes over time, right?
[00:31:42.170]Like a baseline,
[00:31:43.530]and then if you're planning to change your system,
[00:31:46.570]or if you have two fields so that we have a comparison
[00:31:50.310]or a timeline,
[00:31:52.980]and it is especially important to detect changes after
[00:31:56.230]management changes and after disturbances.
[00:31:59.840]So you might build up carbon over 2 years
[00:32:03.730]that are getting lost by a disturbance
[00:32:06.440]like flood or erosion,
[00:32:08.610]or you might have built up carbon and you do,
[00:32:13.060]you are getting to lose it because
[00:32:15.130]you change your management.
[00:32:17.020]So this is all valuable information.
[00:32:20.106]And as I said,
[00:32:21.999]it's pretty tough to detect significant changes because
[00:32:25.250]it takes time, it's site-specific.
[00:32:27.700]And I know it's a pain to take symbols and to pay for it,
[00:32:32.120]but, but if we want to keep track on success of certain
[00:32:37.839]management options, we on such data,
[00:32:41.048]especially on this time theory is, and as I said,
[00:32:44.388]as successful soil health management strategy
[00:32:51.990]should not only rely on carbon,
[00:32:55.150]there is also soil organic matter there.
[00:32:56.830]Because cover crops,
[00:32:58.710]what I've seen in my research, the impact on,
[00:33:02.180]on protection against erosion is immediate and probably a
[00:33:08.250]much more significant than your increase in carbon.
[00:33:12.800]because this takes much more time.
[00:33:19.439]Okay, I'll see if this stays on.
[00:33:21.820]I think in many ways,
[00:33:23.720]what you choose to measure depends on what your goal is and
[00:33:27.910]what your question is.
[00:33:30.262]In the same way that we use annual nutrient testing,
[00:33:32.890]because the goal is to see what the crop needs that year.
[00:33:36.890]We're still trying to work out,
[00:33:39.000]what are the best questions to ask,
[00:33:41.610]in regards to soil health?
[00:33:43.700]Some of the most common measurements would be,
[00:33:46.010]as Michael mentioned,
[00:33:47.170]soil organic matter content to give you some general idea of
[00:33:51.170]where your soils are in terms of carbon,
[00:33:54.730]there are slew of new soil carbon, or maybe not even new,
[00:33:59.650]but so soil health tests that are available
[00:34:04.656]and often the results they needed,
[00:34:08.623]just like your soil test results need interpretation.
[00:34:12.081]What do these mean? Because it's biology.
[00:34:14.170]It means it changes constantly.
[00:34:16.750]The soil that you collect today
[00:34:19.030]and test today
[00:34:20.410]might look different biologically
[00:34:22.880]than a soil that you collect next week
[00:34:25.950]because it dried out
[00:34:28.416]or it got a rain
[00:34:29.249]or something else happened.
[00:34:31.964]So that is a huge challenge in trying to understand
[00:34:35.210]what to measure and how to measure
[00:34:38.100]when you're thinking about the soil,
[00:34:40.520]biological component of the soils now.
[00:34:44.650]Oh man.
[00:34:47.156]So now this one too.
[00:34:49.415]Okay, wait, this is, did it do it now?
[00:34:53.730]I think I'm having the most problems with the technology.
[00:35:00.040]I think, you know, when it comes to, to soil biology,
[00:35:03.710]we often want to have prescriptive ideas about, well,
[00:35:08.070]if I see this, if this is a threshold,
[00:35:10.540]then this is going to help me make a decision
[00:35:13.356]on what I need to do.
[00:35:14.260]But I think that's the challenge with biological things.
[00:35:16.650]They change all the time.
[00:35:19.230]But I do think that there may be some things
[00:35:22.334]that we can use as indicators,
[00:35:23.711]which is what I think the soil health test attempt to do.
[00:35:25.540]And the same way that we're looking at our own health,
[00:35:28.680]there are indicators of our health that we use as
[00:35:31.700]symptoms for what might be the underlying problem.
[00:35:35.060]There are some ideas that soil health in and of itself is
[00:35:38.160]what we would call an emergent property.
[00:35:40.550]It doesn't matter how much detail you know,
[00:35:42.760]about each individual component,
[00:35:45.598]biological, physical, chemical.
[00:35:47.600]It's good to know those things,
[00:35:49.760]but it's the interaction of those things that result in a
[00:35:52.720]completely different response,
[00:35:54.260]that you may not be able to predict,
[00:35:56.580]if you only know detailed things
[00:35:59.130]about each one of those components.
[00:36:01.380]So how do we understand what those interactions are,
[00:36:04.880]how those dynamics are going to impact the overall health of
[00:36:08.420]the system as an emergent property?
[00:36:11.240]I think that's probably that probably didn't answer the
[00:36:15.240]question for you,
[00:36:16.848]what exactly to measure.
[00:36:19.660]But I think that's a,
[00:36:21.484]a major concern that we have on trying to make those tests
[00:36:24.240]most effective for folks who want to use those tools.
[00:36:29.323]No, this is a tough question.
[00:36:30.573]That's why I asked it.
[00:36:31.741]That's really hard.
[00:36:32.813]And one that is someone,
[00:36:34.401]I'm not trained as a soil scientist,
[00:36:36.131]when I try to talk to my students about it, you know,
[00:36:38.374]we're so used to thinking about the nutrient testing,
[00:36:40.882]but no, you measurement depends on goal tests,
[00:36:43.117]you need interpretation.
[00:36:44.718]There can be some indicators yet.
[00:36:46.374]So that was, and Michael's comments too.
[00:36:48.228]You know,
[00:36:49.127]you need to test at the start or with some kind of control
[00:36:51.457]disturbances, regular intervals.
[00:36:52.827]So we're getting there with some concrete thoughts.
[00:36:57.062]So Andy, Humberto.
[00:36:58.890]Yep, this is red.
[00:37:01.004]So can you hear me?
[00:37:04.630]No worries.
[00:37:06.628]I'm going to be okay.
[00:37:07.853]I don't have a sore throat or anything, right.
[00:37:10.043]Okay.
[00:37:11.060]Excellent question.
[00:37:12.130]I mean,
[00:37:13.862]we have suggestions on measurements from the
[00:37:15.500]Soil Health Institute, right?
[00:37:16.870]A good number of indicators from soil physics,
[00:37:20.040]point of view, you know,
[00:37:23.330]aggregate stability is one of the key parameters.
[00:37:25.620]I mean, they weren't as measured measuring
[00:37:28.040]that in the lab now.
[00:37:29.679]Right.
[00:37:30.512]That's that's great.
[00:37:32.350]What about, you know, what the holding capacity,
[00:37:34.400]what about measuring even like what we call soil sort of
[00:37:38.260]activity, you know,
[00:37:39.093]like the initial water infiltration that only takes a couple
[00:37:41.410]of minutes and, you know, aggregate stability.
[00:37:44.370]Those are the kinds of sensitive parameters to evaluate in
[00:37:47.970]terms of soil physical properties.
[00:37:50.250]But again, I mean,
[00:37:52.184]we are going to discuss more of that.
[00:37:54.000]I don't think you are going to catch that anything
[00:37:56.533]in the short term.
[00:37:57.366]I mean, yes, you can catch,
[00:37:58.630]but they can talk about the system change.
[00:38:01.010]We really need to do design.
[00:38:03.010]I mean,
[00:38:04.459]if you're talking about continuous corn or corn soybean,
[00:38:06.745]if you add cover crops to the systems,
[00:38:08.210]we have done it with an airplane planting cover crops in
[00:38:11.990]August, standing corn, no differences,
[00:38:16.890]3 years,
[00:38:17.723]5 years,
[00:38:18.556]10 years.
[00:38:19.565]We don't have experiments more than, you know,
[00:38:22.026]over 10 years when we might catch something.
[00:38:23.996]But Michael,
[00:38:24.829]I agree with Michael,
[00:38:25.662]as soon as you plant cover crop,
[00:38:27.643]you see this much cover, you are gonna, you know,
[00:38:30.280]intercept rainfall, raindrops, and then that will help.
[00:38:34.510]So it depends on the goal.
[00:38:37.180]Depends on the goal.
[00:38:39.068]Let's think about that.
[00:38:40.621]Why no till and covered crops were created?
[00:38:47.330]It was not until came out after the dust bowl, right?
[00:38:49.640]And the 1930s, 1940s, it was created.
[00:38:54.320]It was designed to stop soil erosion,
[00:38:56.360]not to sequester carbon cover crops or design cover crops
[00:39:01.023]are old as the hills.
[00:39:03.670]They were used in the 17 hundreds, 16 hundreds.
[00:39:09.070]Now it's kind of coming back. Right.
[00:39:12.070]But they were designed to reduce erosion.
[00:39:16.330]Now we're trying to say, oh,
[00:39:17.200]these are going to be great for carbon sequestration.
[00:39:20.330]We really need to think hard about, you know,
[00:39:24.200]how the systems can deliver multiple functions, you know,
[00:39:28.630]and that is a challenging.
[00:39:31.480]Okay, thank you.
[00:39:32.980]Did you want to add anything in, you know, okay.
[00:39:35.779]Okay.
[00:39:37.590]My last question is within your topic areas,
[00:39:42.120]what should producers and practitioners, you know,
[00:39:45.840]for the future know about managing soils,
[00:39:48.420]more optimally for improving soil health?
[00:39:59.080]These can be quick thoughts to.
[00:40:03.100]I can go ahead and get started.
[00:40:04.840]I guess I said repeat what I said, you know,
[00:40:08.270]we need to change the cropping system.
[00:40:12.190]I think if you had a corn soybean,
[00:40:13.680]I'm thinking corn soybean and continuous corn,
[00:40:18.178]I would like to see that happen.
[00:40:20.630]An experiment where you have seen improvement on a lot of
[00:40:24.087]soil health indicators after putting cover crops.
[00:40:25.990]Yes, we have seen positive effects after corn silage.
[00:40:28.980]Yes, we have seen positive effects after wheat,
[00:40:32.250]but you are harvesting wheat in July.
[00:40:34.100]And then if it rains,
[00:40:36.228]then you have more time for cover crops to grow.
[00:40:38.440]So depends on where you are.
[00:40:41.143]Right.
[00:40:42.370]So we really need to customize the practices we need for a
[00:40:47.371]given field, right?
[00:40:50.340]In some cases cover crop my work.
[00:40:52.020]But in some cases perennials might work, right.
[00:40:56.008]I have let's say when somebody has, like,
[00:40:57.966]we had a couple of experiments in Kansas wheat sorghum,
[00:41:01.680]and then we planted some hemp and off-season soybean and
[00:41:05.299]late July, we got three tons per acre of biomass.
[00:41:12.410]After 15 years there were changes in carbon.
[00:41:15.170]But again, it was in the upper 2, 3 inches.
[00:41:18.460]Right, so depends what system you have.
[00:41:20.970]And then if you have a corn soybean or continuous corn,
[00:41:25.630]there's going to be challenging.
[00:41:27.381]And also depends on the initial carbon you have.
[00:41:28.700]I mean, in textbooks,
[00:41:30.310]I learned 40 years ago, 50 years ago,
[00:41:32.510]that 5% there is an idea of 75% of organic moderators,
[00:41:39.252]an ideal soil
[00:41:40.130]Well, if you have that type of soil,
[00:41:41.950]probably that soil doesn't need much help.
[00:41:45.260]We need to target those practices.
[00:41:48.020]The problem soils, let's talk about sandy soils.
[00:41:50.430]Okay, can reduce leaching sloping, soils that.
[00:41:52.840]Okay, what about low carbon, soils problem spots, right.
[00:41:59.122]Complicated.
[00:41:59.955]They'll I'm glad that the heading was complex systems,
[00:42:03.018]right?
[00:42:07.370]So for, yeah.
[00:42:08.740]Going back to my expertise.
[00:42:11.590]So what's important to understand is that if we talking
[00:42:16.026]about soil organic carbon, soil organic matter,
[00:42:17.570]that's just the general term, right?
[00:42:20.280]So if I look at the bulk soil organic matter,
[00:42:23.338]there are different compartments.
[00:42:24.750]There are organic particles, not decomposed.
[00:42:27.541]We have dissolved organic carbon in the soil, pour water.
[00:42:33.150]We have organic come inside aggregates.
[00:42:35.780]We have organic carbon attached to matter surfaces.
[00:42:40.347]Each of the different sub compartments is responsible for or
[00:42:43.410]supporters for different soil functions.
[00:42:46.230]So the stuff that's attached to metal surfaces is good for
[00:42:50.252]long-term storage.
[00:42:51.240]So stuff that's occluded or included in aggregates.
[00:42:54.450]It's good for soil structure, the organic party goods,
[00:42:58.897]and to stop in the bottom of the pour water.
[00:43:01.710]That's the,
[00:43:03.040]the sub compartments that will show change first.
[00:43:07.870]So we did a couple of experiments with our PhD students,
[00:43:11.820]Andrea and PhD student in my, my group, working,
[00:43:15.616]looking specifically in cover crops and no-till,
[00:43:19.860]and then detecting that we see changes first in the organic
[00:43:24.510]particles, particular to organic matter or the soil organic.
[00:43:28.810]So this is also starts,
[00:43:30.270]it's a bit more complicated to measure,
[00:43:34.387]but not too complicated, but,
[00:43:36.110]but if you want to detect early effects
[00:43:39.010]or early changes that
[00:43:40.860]are sub compartments, you could target for,
[00:43:44.280]and especially the stuff in the soil,
[00:43:47.523]poor water and organic particles,
[00:43:51.160]that's mainly the substrate microbes are happy about,
[00:43:54.970]right?
[00:43:56.574]As soon as I have my comment and minimal surface microbes,
[00:43:59.460]don't do or have that easy access.
[00:44:02.400]So they are happy if they have a lot of organic particles,
[00:44:05.850]fresh substrate staff, that's dissolved in the
[00:44:09.340]in the pour water,
[00:44:10.917]because this is decomposable or easily accessible.
[00:44:14.170]So that could be stuff we could target for,
[00:44:17.430]to see if an system is responding to a change in management.
[00:44:32.233]Okay. Okay.
[00:44:34.374]If I put that, I'll leave that as a backup.
[00:44:37.610]I'd like to return to the idea that Jerry brought up earlier
[00:44:41.500]about agro ecosystems and agroecology.
[00:44:45.340]For a lot of our time,
[00:44:47.790]when we think about agricultural systems we've been managing
[00:44:51.170]for the crop and not really managing for the soil or
[00:44:55.550]thinking of the soil is just the stuff that we grow the crop
[00:44:59.350]in as we move forward.
[00:45:02.250]And we think about farming the soil instead of farming the
[00:45:06.450]crop, that's a fundamentally different,
[00:45:13.349]Thank you.
[00:45:14.410]That's a fundamental change
[00:45:16.830]in how we approach our farming systems.
[00:45:19.370]So as we go into the future, how do we think about
[00:45:24.710]what are the practices?
[00:45:25.930]What are the system changes?
[00:45:28.124]As Humberto said that we would require
[00:45:30.530]to really manage the soils in such a way
[00:45:33.803]not to ignore the crops cause that's important.
[00:45:38.410]But if we manage the soils,
[00:45:40.180]we know that the soils are going to take care of
[00:45:42.240]a lot of the crop,
[00:45:43.430]a lot of the concerns that we may have with the crop.
[00:45:47.140]So I'm hoping that that change in practice,
[00:45:50.922]that change in system,
[00:45:54.230]it requires a shift in the way
[00:45:55.910]that we're thinking about the farming systems.
[00:45:58.780]It may require some significant capital investment on the
[00:46:02.430]part of the farmers to be able to execute those systems.
[00:46:06.100]No, till planting equipment is not cheap.
[00:46:09.600]If you're moving to different system,
[00:46:12.091]that investment that you have in the equipment that you
[00:46:14.681]need, those are,
[00:46:16.578]those are significant parts of your farming enterprise
[00:46:20.251]that you have to consider whether or not
[00:46:22.550]that's risk you're going to take.
[00:46:25.280]So I think that, you know, both the approach, the,
[00:46:29.860]the financial risk and reward for going after these,
[00:46:35.190]these farming, your soil systems.
[00:46:38.060]I think those are,
[00:46:40.094]those are some of the things that we're looking at in the
[00:46:42.877]future, at least.
[00:46:43.791]And when it comes to thinking about the system as a whole,
[00:46:48.360]as an agro ecosystem.
[00:46:53.836]In my area, I would say
[00:47:00.849]if the crop is not doing well and it's not the environment,
[00:47:08.281]then it's obviously the soil.
[00:47:10.440]And there's a number of
[00:47:17.734]research projects that are looking at relating remotely
[00:47:23.100]sense data to the kind of measurements that,
[00:47:26.310]that we collect.
[00:47:29.422]When we go and make our measurements,
[00:47:31.239]we set our sensors up in the field and the sensors are there
[00:47:34.286]on a long-term basis, but we're only measuring that field.
[00:47:37.830]There's obviously lots of other fields.
[00:47:41.120]So if the data that we can collect, we can,
[00:47:46.320]which is characterizing the quality of the crop and
[00:47:50.740]therefore the quality of the soil that
[00:47:55.920]we can develop the relationships between these,
[00:47:59.568]these remotely sensed parameters and crop development.
[00:48:04.228]And then we can potentially use that over large area basis.
[00:48:08.065]So in the future, and again,
[00:48:11.510]this touches on precision ag too,
[00:48:14.541]not only from one crop to another,
[00:48:17.269]but variability within the crop,
[00:48:19.436]that you could see areas that are lacking nitrogen.
[00:48:23.410]You could see areas that are lacking water.
[00:48:27.440]You could see areas that are,
[00:48:28.928]that are too wet and then adjust your management again,
[00:48:34.123]assuming that the technology is there, you know,
[00:48:36.565]the variable rate irrigation, for example,
[00:48:39.384]and therefore on a short-term basis maximize the
[00:48:44.790]productivity of that particular crop,
[00:48:48.120]but then on the longterm basis,
[00:48:50.200]possibly lead to healthier soils, you know,
[00:48:53.230]across the field.
[00:48:58.811]Great.
[00:48:59.644]Thank you all.
[00:49:00.523]Well, we have some more time for our panel,
[00:49:02.460]so I encourage you to,
[00:49:05.490]I don't know if the mics that were here were the ones that
[00:49:08.072]we had floating around, but you can stand up and we'll.
[00:49:10.789]Oh, okay.
[00:49:12.003]So how, okay.
[00:49:13.110]I don't.
[00:49:14.856]All right, so we'll just ask this one.
[00:49:16.540]So I don't know how many we have to manage time,
[00:49:18.156]but maybe the first person who wants to answer,
[00:49:20.350]how do we incentivize transformational research across
[00:49:22.900]disciplines required to develop answers to these problems?
[00:49:30.349]I think we're doing that.
[00:49:32.399]I think the example that I said earlier of federal
[00:49:34.470]researchers, working with UNL,
[00:49:37.050]the projects that we have on farm,
[00:49:39.740]the work that we do with our NRDs.
[00:49:43.160]I think that we're on the road to doing that right now.
[00:49:48.079]And the reality and the research world is if you're not
[00:49:50.400]doing collaborative research,
[00:49:53.010]you're not going to get funded.
[00:49:55.570]And so I think the structure has established itself,
[00:49:58.550]such that doing cross-discipline research is now it's a,
[00:50:04.420]it's not a, it's not a unique thing anymore.
[00:50:08.145]It's a requirement in order for us to be able to answer our
[00:50:11.170]questions where I would like to see more transformational
[00:50:14.822]research being done is in this regenerative agriculture,
[00:50:18.000]where we have a lot more animal inputs into our systems,
[00:50:21.370]how do we use integrated crop livestock systems within the
[00:50:24.770]systems that we have to reach the goals,
[00:50:27.220]whether it's crop production or animal weight gain,
[00:50:32.470]or environmental sustainability and environmental quality.
[00:50:37.616]I think that there's room for us,
[00:50:39.350]especially in the state of Nebraska,
[00:50:40.620]where all of those industries are incredibly important
[00:50:44.340]to answer those cross-disciplinary questions.
[00:50:52.072]Do we have more questions?
[00:50:53.764]Here we go.
[00:50:54.597]Okay.
[00:50:55.430]How do you manage soils during abnormally dry conditions to
[00:50:57.830]improve soil health?
[00:51:02.789]So it looks like we have 7 questions.
[00:51:04.173]Is that right?
[00:51:05.058]So we kind of like speed.
[00:51:06.874]We have maybe,
[00:51:07.707]I don't know how much more time you want to give us we're
[00:51:08.914]approaching noon.
[00:51:12.577]Okay.
[00:51:13.498]Okay.
[00:51:14.331]So one person quick,
[00:51:15.340]so we can get through through all the questions
[00:51:18.003]that have come up.
[00:51:20.513]I think it's too late.
[00:51:22.319]If you're in abnormally dry conditions and you think that
[00:51:24.680]you can do something today, when it's dry to fix it,
[00:51:28.380]it's too late in the same way that we have to think forward
[00:51:33.210]in the same way that you're planning for your next growing
[00:51:36.302]season and what your management is.
[00:51:37.810]I mean, I think,
[00:51:39.706]I don't think that there are any silver bullet solutions or
[00:51:41.500]things that you can do right away.
[00:51:43.510]It's not like, oh,
[00:51:44.930]I see a disease on my crop.
[00:51:46.800]I can then add a pesticide and try and manage it that way.
[00:51:51.570]I don't think that we can do that necessarily with soil,
[00:51:55.540]soil health.
[00:51:57.260]There's a lot of things you can do to build the resiliency
[00:52:01.988]of your soils as Humberto said to,
[00:52:03.817]to drought or to flooding,
[00:52:08.150]but it takes preparation.
[00:52:10.596]I don't think that's something that you can do,
[00:52:12.576]like on the fly,
[00:52:14.085]in response to something right then and there.
[00:52:16.917]Anybody want to add.
[00:52:18.140]Maybe related to this.
[00:52:21.545]It is, there was an excellent question.
[00:52:24.330]I'm getting side tracked here,
[00:52:26.727]but how can commodity groups can assist farmers or maybe
[00:52:32.820]even researchers please fund the long term projects because
[00:52:39.570]the funding is only 3 years, 5 years maximum.
[00:52:42.865]Now it's not enough.
[00:52:45.768]We're not asking probably for millions,
[00:52:47.550]but just a bit continuation maybe, but reduce the amount.
[00:52:50.740]That would be good.
[00:52:52.711]We need long-term experiments.
[00:52:54.384]I mean, cover crops will work.
[00:52:56.078]And even in continuous corn or corn soybean,
[00:52:58.357]but you need more long-term data.
[00:53:00.361]We stop out experiments after 3 years, 5 years,
[00:53:02.812]10 years.
[00:53:03.687]But please continue that to monitor that
[00:53:05.937]because it takes time.
[00:53:06.920]I guess Paul said earlier, Paul Jasmine, it took 100,
[00:53:10.897]150 years to degrade.
[00:53:12.700]So there's going to take kind of that amount of time to,
[00:53:15.980]you know, the store.
[00:53:18.960]I think organic matter can help.
[00:53:23.280]And let me just reach out to some of your researchers.
[00:53:25.469]I think there's one just came out, I guess last year,
[00:53:29.720]organic matter content has limited effect on increasing the
[00:53:33.740]water holding capacity.
[00:53:37.070]So I would research and then SWAT Aramark came in,
[00:53:40.620]had some experiments there showed the same thing.
[00:53:43.563]I would experiment with the same thing.
[00:53:45.544]So we say organic matter is going to increase what the
[00:53:47.972]holding capacity.
[00:53:49.567]And I think I agree with the Virginia.
[00:53:52.086]It's a complex question in some cases, yes.
[00:53:54.300]Can,
[00:53:55.737]but depends on the carbon content that we really need to
[00:53:59.160]look at this in the long-term after 10 years think.
[00:54:06.552]Okay, thank you.
[00:54:07.821]Next question.
[00:54:12.265]How can you drive soil organic carbon past the top soil?
[00:54:18.554]Yeah, it's a good question.
[00:54:19.640]So they are couple of mechanisms.
[00:54:22.310]So the natural way to increase,
[00:54:26.694]sub soil carbon is by deep rooting systems because the stops
[00:54:31.900]that the soil, the organic carbon,
[00:54:34.436]this is 1% of total organic carbon, right?
[00:54:37.430]So you could say, okay,
[00:54:40.178]I wait until my indigenous input is dissolved and traveling
[00:54:44.090]down to soil pool fires.
[00:54:46.205]This depends on your site by and the sandy soil,
[00:54:48.650]you have more traveling in the clay soil, less
[00:54:52.652]Depends a bit, but if you don't want a deep plow,
[00:54:57.920]which is from my perspective, no good idea.
[00:55:01.843]If you want to rely on a system and increase your solar,
[00:55:06.187]organic calm into deep soil,
[00:55:08.625]you need to have deep rooting systems.
[00:55:10.697]We know as this from grassland sites.
[00:55:12.752]So roots go down 1 meter, 2 meter, 3 meters.
[00:55:15.340]We know as a cover crops are, have differing hooting depth,
[00:55:20.680]but mechanistic wise,
[00:55:24.240]the ways that carbon goes from the top soil,
[00:55:27.430]to the sub soil.
[00:55:28.491]It's either via as the roots or
[00:55:30.250]via leaching with the poor water.
[00:55:33.560]As I said, pour water carbon,
[00:55:35.343]1% of the total root calm can be much, much more and roots.
[00:55:41.280]And the sub soil, they need minimal surfaces that are naked,
[00:55:46.620]that are easily and,
[00:55:49.855]and well reactive to takes a car mop to stabilize it.
[00:55:54.650]I wanted as a day, it is pretty stable because if it,
[00:55:57.960]if you enrich a deep soil,
[00:56:00.050]if you have to the storms at the top soil,
[00:56:03.160]it's probably less, it does have less an effect on the,
[00:56:06.404]on the assumption, right?
[00:56:10.213]But, but for this stuff,
[00:56:11.168]you need to have a lot of biomass below ground biomass.
[00:56:15.470]The roots are needed need to going down.
[00:56:19.970]Great, very quick.
[00:56:21.695]One sentence here,
[00:56:22.787]sorry for jumping in considered one 10 tillage.
[00:56:27.770]Once in 10 years, maybe a once in five years,
[00:56:31.354]there are a lot of papers coming out on that.
[00:56:33.323]If you have this know your carbon and no-till system is to
[00:56:36.437]start that fight, okay.
[00:56:37.710]And that 3, 4 inches,
[00:56:39.441]you have a good amount of carbon there.
[00:56:41.787]In some cases,
[00:56:42.620]flip it, flip it.
[00:56:45.914]If you really want to stabilize carbon in deep soil,
[00:56:48.430]we have review papers that show not really negative effects
[00:56:51.760]of catching your long-term no till in once in 10 years.
[00:56:55.160]Not it's not only my group,
[00:56:56.680]but are reviewing that up on a global scale, okay.
[00:57:01.220]So that's something as we think about.
[00:57:04.601]That was a couple of sentences, but good.
[00:57:07.627]Good.
[00:57:08.476]Okay.
[00:57:09.971]Next question, okay.
[00:57:11.128]Is this the last question?
[00:57:12.460]This is the last one.
[00:57:13.679]Okay.
[00:57:15.383]We'll wait for it to, or was it,
[00:57:17.690]or wasn't it the last question.
[00:57:20.100]Okay.
[00:57:20.933]Is there any research being done on Kernza
[00:57:23.726](perennial grain developed by the Land Institute)
[00:57:24.559]in Nebraska?
[00:57:25.392]Or other perennial crops?
[00:57:26.727]Well, I will take that because
[00:57:27.791]I am doing some Kernza research.
[00:57:29.555]We have a crop watch article about it,
[00:57:31.136]and he just planted some long-term studies this year.
[00:57:33.659]So I don't have an extension appointment.
[00:57:35.170]We're starting to kind of promote it a little bit,
[00:57:38.020]but feel free.
[00:57:39.090]Other perennial crops.
[00:57:40.090]Anybody else who wants to answer that feel free to.
[00:57:44.000]Kernza is very exciting.
[00:57:46.120]It has, there's a lot of challenges,
[00:57:48.420]but I think a lot of excitement and potential too,
[00:57:51.800]especially with livestock systems.
[00:57:55.570]Anybody want to say anything about other perennial crops or
[00:57:58.778]bioenergy crops?
[00:58:00.007]I know maybe Humberto.
[00:58:01.050]Warm season grasses, right?
[00:58:03.414]Warm season grasses, switchgrass, Indian grass,
[00:58:05.701]Miscanthus we have done work on that again.
[00:58:08.580]It will take time.
[00:58:10.405]I mean, Virginia has a lot of experiments in that.
[00:58:15.568]Well, okay.
[00:58:16.401]One more.
[00:58:17.411]One more, okay.
[00:58:19.950]No one has mentioned mycorrhizal fungi yet.
[00:58:23.810]Can we have soil health without fungi?
[00:58:26.748]No, no way.
[00:58:29.715]That was an easy one.
[00:58:33.371]Look at that.
[00:58:34.280]When we're tasked with the one word,
[00:58:36.540]we can do it.
[00:58:38.560]Thank you, Andrea.
[00:58:39.545]Thank you, panel.

The screen size you are trying to search captions on is too small!

You can always jump over to MediaHub and check it out there.

Comments

0 Comments

Soil Health Summit: Soil Panel

Description

Searchable Transcript

Comments icon comment

Related Channels

Comments