2022 Eastern Nebraska Soil Health Conference Presentations - Aaron Hird

Deloris Pittman & Mike Kamm Author

02/08/2022 Added

16 Plays

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Recognizing Healthy Soil (Virtual Real-Time Presentation) - Aaron Hird, Nebraska NRCS State Soil Health Specialist

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[00:00:08.320]Thanks a lot, everybody for, for coming today. Again,
[00:00:12.220]my name is Aaron Hird on the state soil health specialists for NRCS, Nebraska.
[00:00:16.270]I'm certainly glad to take this opportunity to talk to you today about soil
[00:00:20.530]health. , today I have a title, recognizing soil health.
[00:00:25.510]I think I'd like to start here with these pictures on the screen and, ,
[00:00:30.100]portray all the different ways cover crops. Look,
[00:00:33.460]we have a romantic notion of how I'll cover
[00:00:38.230]crops. Look, we think golf course green and consistent and perfect.
[00:00:43.120]but there's a lot of varieties and there's a lot of ways to use them.
[00:00:46.780]And today we're going to talk about that.
[00:00:49.130]I also want to kind of key in,
[00:00:51.790]on the word recognizing soil health.
[00:00:55.210]I think how we measure soil health or recognize it on the ground varies.
[00:01:00.310]It's really challenging. We're going to talk,
[00:01:02.530]talk about quite a few of those ways. but primarily today,
[00:01:06.520]the take home message is to focus on regenerating social structure and the soil
[00:01:11.380]ecosystem really follows after that. So we can,
[00:01:14.980]we can certainly build it and have some habitat out there for,
[00:01:19.530]for the ecosystem to develop.
[00:01:25.450]See if I can get this to switch. There you go.
[00:01:30.010]Figure out what button works.
[00:01:32.350]So I like to start off right here with kind of the challenges that we're
[00:01:36.790]presented with in, in agriculture, in Nebraska.
[00:01:41.440]we have some extreme weather events that have occurred in the past 10 years,
[00:01:45.430]and we've all experienced that in various ways every year throws
[00:01:50.260]us a different curve ball. It seems, I took these pictures and,
[00:01:54.970]like to just highlight the fact that we,
[00:01:58.660]we have begun to see some,
[00:02:00.910]some pretty extreme examples of how our crops are interacting with the weather.
[00:02:05.110]And here's, a crop on the top left that flooded out on top of this hill.
[00:02:09.820]and then a year or two later,
[00:02:13.900]I took this picture of a corn crop that droughted out on top of the hill.
[00:02:17.860]And I took these two cover crop versus no cover crop pictures on the bottom
[00:02:22.690]left and show a waterway there spring melt off
[00:02:27.580]and some erosion coming down that,
[00:02:30.280]that concentrated flow area and this cover crop on the right protected,
[00:02:34.600]that same, a different concentrated flow area,
[00:02:37.270]but that was after a 15 inch rain, not just spring melt off.
[00:02:42.520]So that cover crop really served a purpose in that, in that system,
[00:02:47.500]protecting it from a massive rain event.
[00:02:51.130]we've all seen some cover crops in standing corn. This got a little wooly and,
[00:02:56.410]this guy was really concerned about this cereal in the bottom center.
[00:03:02.230]but it got real droughty that year and he still managed to grow his best
[00:03:07.120]corn crop ever,
[00:03:08.320]despite having a five foot tall cereal rye that he planted into.
[00:03:13.270]And I really liken that all to resiliency and
[00:03:18.520]the ability to withstand a disturbance is resilient.
[00:03:23.290]the pictures across the top there really show what that soil looked like,
[00:03:27.760]big cracks and, pretty poor functioning soil.
[00:03:32.470]And when the soil pawns water and then can't store it,
[00:03:37.060]then we have flooded out and drops or we have droughted out crops.
[00:03:41.330]So we're really thinking and keying in on how the soil responds to those
[00:03:46.210]extreme weather events, not so much the extreme weather,
[00:03:49.480]because we have cases where extreme weather occurred and we saw no, no,
[00:03:53.860]no damage. And we had brilliance spoiled.
[00:03:59.020]So if we can work with our soil to become more resilient to those extreme
[00:04:02.770]weather events, that we, we have something going on, how do we do that?
[00:04:07.630], I'm going to put a plug in for managing for healthy soil.
[00:04:11.290]It really comes down to all of the aspects of soil management, the chemical,
[00:04:15.370]biological, and physical aspects of soil.
[00:04:18.520]And that's really the foundation of this conference and other conferences that
[00:04:23.350]Keith booing hosted through time, biological, chemical,
[00:04:27.010]and physical aspects of soil and learn about all of those.
[00:04:30.880]I really like to point off that wherever you're at,
[00:04:34.480]that's where you need to start. You need to start where you are,
[00:04:38.320]use what you have and do what you can with the resources you have,
[00:04:42.580]and then build up from there with knowledge and information and opportunities
[00:04:46.870]like this conference.
[00:04:48.880]I really liked this quote from Warren Buffett's diversification is a protection
[00:04:52.600]against ignorance. believe me, I need this.
[00:04:55.990]this makes very little sense to those who already know what they're doing
[00:04:59.290]though. Well, that, that,
[00:05:02.950]really resonates with me.
[00:05:05.620]So I try and approach things with a little bit of hble pie a lot of
[00:05:10.360]times, unfortunately.
[00:05:12.820]but I took these two pictures and I think it's a good illustration.
[00:05:16.990]no-till in Nebraska is, is everywhere.
[00:05:20.740]52% of harvested crop land in 2017 was no-till farm.
[00:05:25.510]And we're the nber one state in the nation for no-till like yours.
[00:05:29.380]We've adopted, no-till farming everywhere. Everybody's doing it. And,
[00:05:34.510]and, or tried it. And if they're not doing it,
[00:05:37.330]they have a reason why they're not,
[00:05:39.430]but I've started taking some pictures of some no-till acres. And,
[00:05:43.810]I like to point out we really need that soil to function in the
[00:05:48.410]spring. And we see these sprayer tracks on the right side here.
[00:05:52.750]And we start to see some, some lack of stability in soil through time.
[00:05:57.950]And I started scratching my head and asking why. And,
[00:06:02.810], this field on the left is a continuous signage fields,
[00:06:05.990]and it had an even worse condition that previous spring than the,
[00:06:09.110]that no-till field with the spare tracks, continuous silent fields, just blow.
[00:06:13.610]And, and then they erode water erosion, that they can be,
[00:06:18.350]really degr, degraded, really poor. So function.
[00:06:23.420]We planted this cover crop on this continuous Savage field after harvest and,
[00:06:27.320]you know, night season,
[00:06:29.300]there was not a soil stability issue because there's a living armor on the
[00:06:33.890]soil that active soil management really protected the soil.
[00:06:38.330]Whereas the passive ed residue that management is just
[00:06:44.420]interacting by being present. It's not, it's not actively participating.
[00:06:48.830]So we,
[00:06:50.310]we need to focus on restoring that resiliency in the soil and its ability to
[00:06:55.190]function. And with that in mind,
[00:06:57.200]I really like to key in on the definition of soil health,
[00:07:01.100]it's the continued capacity of the soil,
[00:07:03.200]the function through time as a vital living ecosystem that sustains plants,
[00:07:07.890]animals, and hans.
[00:07:09.500]I've underlined a really key part of that for me,
[00:07:13.220]the continued capacity of the soil, the function to me,
[00:07:16.460]that defines being resilient. And that's what we've talked about so far. And,
[00:07:22.700]there's a lot of good illustrations of how this definition fits with your own
[00:07:27.260]health. Your continued capacity to function is your health.
[00:07:32.570]And so if we start to look at our soil and ask,
[00:07:35.510]how can we facilitate it growing and change
[00:07:40.670]and gene to continue to come to function in the ways that we needed to
[00:07:45.890]then we're, we're after the right target, we're talking about the right subject.
[00:07:50.030]And we need to focus on that aspect of, of this discussion.
[00:07:54.380]So soil functions, I've got some pictures here of a,
[00:07:57.770]of a soybean field, conventional farming situation,
[00:08:02.330]and we see some, some horizontal lines in that soil structure. That's,
[00:08:07.220]that's a indication of, of a management induced soil structure problem.
[00:08:12.230], the picture in the center. I'm not sure if you can see that centipede there.
[00:08:16.220], but it's not often that you see a,
[00:08:19.200]a Stripe critter crawling around in your soil, in a conventional field.
[00:08:23.480]So we're looking for diversity and we're looking for roots to interact with the
[00:08:28.100]soil, that picture on the right.
[00:08:29.480]So I can't iterate enough that it's a living ecosystem that
[00:08:34.430]sustains plants, animals, and hans as well.
[00:08:38.720]So we'll let this slide load. And,
[00:08:42.530]how do we take that first step to regenerate soil health in our crop
[00:08:47.060]fields, we really need to just implement the,
[00:08:49.670]the four soil health principles and NRCS CSS has
[00:08:54.320]advertised and made them well-known. Hopefully you've seen this before,
[00:08:58.320]but we need to minimize disturbance. That's no till farming,
[00:09:02.040]we need to maximize soul cover. That's a lot of residue,
[00:09:05.490]but that's dead and living residue. And that's,
[00:09:08.850]that's where cover crops come in,
[00:09:11.310]to maximize biodiversity and provide that continuous living root
[00:09:16.170]and all four of those principles when applied at the same time can,
[00:09:20.700]can really change your soil and start to compound and
[00:09:25.230]cascade up or in a trend that's illustrated there in that
[00:09:30.030]slide. integrating livestock is like greasing those wheels though.
[00:09:34.710]Every aspect of that, of those principles are improved when,
[00:09:38.640]when the livestock are managed well and can, can benefit from that,
[00:09:43.290]that system approach. So the goal is to,
[00:09:46.510]to build some soil organic matter,
[00:09:48.360]to build some soil aggregates and start interacting with water differently,
[00:09:53.130]and then start increasing productivity of that soil. When we do that,
[00:09:57.900]we're really changing some properties of the soil.
[00:10:00.900]And so the NRA NRCS in Nebraska is focused on the soil health assessment,
[00:10:05.940],
[00:10:06.150]to help you as land owners and managers understand where your soil
[00:10:10.980]is today and where it's moving in the future.
[00:10:14.220]And we do that by measuring these dynamics, soil properties.
[00:10:16.890]I'm going to key in on this quite a bit as we go through this
[00:10:21.450]presentation, and talk about the ways that we can measure soil health and,
[00:10:25.950]and how to interpret that,
[00:10:28.830]dynamic psyllid properties are really what we're measuring those of biological,
[00:10:33.030]chemical,
[00:10:33.660]and physical aspects of the soil that change within a timeframe that we can
[00:10:38.650]can see within five to 10 years, we can see some major changes,
[00:10:43.560]but in,
[00:10:44.070]in one year we can quantify some changes that definitely
[00:10:48.570]result in, in productivity and interaction with water in a different way,
[00:10:53.730]those dynamics, so properties that we've keyed in on our biological activity,
[00:10:57.750]of course,
[00:10:58.200]there's a myriad of biological soil tests and ways that
[00:11:03.150]we can investigate biology.
[00:11:04.740]Oak density is something I'm going to talk quite a bit about the density of
[00:11:08.310]soil. So color is a rapid assessment of soil,
[00:11:12.600]and we can definitely identify what color it is, there's that science.
[00:11:17.460]And we can see how that color changes through time aggregate stability,
[00:11:22.710]the ability of the soil to stand up or stay
[00:11:27.090]structural when wet is what aggregate stability is.
[00:11:31.080]And then that leads to structure. We talked about the structure above ground,
[00:11:35.820]those aggregates and that surface crust,
[00:11:38.070]but also the structure underground and how water moves through the soil.
[00:11:42.270]All of those dynamic soil properties are related directly to soil functions that
[00:11:47.190]we depend on the farm and those soil functions are listed there.
[00:11:51.000]Nutrient cycling, water and storage, filtering in buffering,
[00:11:56.380]physical stability and support and habitat for biological
[00:12:01.270]activity.
[00:12:02.650]I put that one last because I really want to move into the aspects of habitat.
[00:12:07.660]That's what we're managing. When we apply the soil health principles,
[00:12:11.920]we're really putting something to cover up the soil and put some roots in
[00:12:16.840]the soil so that there's food, water, air, space, and shelter.
[00:12:21.940]Those are the five aspects of habitat for any living organism.
[00:12:26.260]Those are the five things you need in your habits, that food, water, air, space,
[00:12:31.090]and shelter. So when we're managing for habitat,
[00:12:34.150]that's when the organisms can come and live there.
[00:12:36.880]And those organisms then begin to work in the soil to provide
[00:12:41.290]more of those five aspects of habitat space and shelter predominantly.
[00:12:46.600]And that's when wet, stable aggregates are formed.
[00:12:49.750]And the picture there shows that when there's aggregates,
[00:12:52.390]then infiltration can occur. It's when we have poor aggregates to build
[00:12:58.840]that, we create those crusts on the soil surface, and then we get runoff.
[00:13:02.900]That picture describes
[00:13:05.740]a common problem in Nebraska is a tillage induced root,
[00:13:09.310]restrictive compaction layer.
[00:13:11.290]I've really keyed in on this because this is a rapidly assessed
[00:13:15.730]problem. We can go to your crop field,
[00:13:18.400]take a shovel biggest small pit and pop this out and,
[00:13:22.390]and look at these layers and identify are
[00:13:27.100]these coach induced root, restrictive compaction layers present.
[00:13:30.880]And then are they actually root restrictive in order to illustrate this on this
[00:13:35.170]slide?
[00:13:35.530]I found these pictures on these tillage websites that I've referenced here.
[00:13:40.360]they're trying to sell some deep tillage tools and different things by
[00:13:44.710]acknowledging that the other tillage tools have caused the problem.
[00:13:48.670]The field cultivator there is cause of compaction layer two to four inches.
[00:13:53.620]The disc has caused a compaction layer at six to eight inches.
[00:13:57.040]And the plow grandpa's plow caused the compaction layer at 12 to 16 inches in
[00:14:01.510]your field.
[00:14:02.470]So we should take another piece of iron that's heavy and has torque and go
[00:14:06.550]deeper and create another compaction layer at 16 to 18 inches in order
[00:14:11.410]to alleviate the compact I shouldn't problem.
[00:14:16.450]I'm not buying that. And that's why I put on that big clod of dirt. It's roots,
[00:14:20.980]not iron, you know, all these hashtags in our world today,
[00:14:25.210]you can go onto Twitter or even just the internet and type in hashtag bruits dot
[00:14:28.900]iron,
[00:14:29.650]and a whole series of pictures and stories will pop up that really portray
[00:14:34.450]how people are implementing that concept on their land.
[00:14:37.810]And if we can boil it down to a catchy slogan, that's it.
[00:14:41.500]And I took this picture of these tillage induced or restrictive compassion
[00:14:45.380]layers in this field on the left.
[00:14:47.530]And I'm showing how those of her crop roots just went straight through them
[00:14:52.820]and cover crops can have a higher rooting pressure tolerance than our cash crop
[00:14:57.560]roots.
[00:14:58.400]And they can push through those high bulk density layers and create those
[00:15:02.630]channels for air and water movement, but also root movement.
[00:15:06.530]So that we don't end up with a corn crop like there on the top, right?
[00:15:10.580]That has a root system. That's impeded at two to four inches,
[00:15:15.110]or really farming a lot of corn and soybean crops in two to four inches of
[00:15:19.970]soil.
[00:15:20.840]You can see why water and nutrients are so important in that sort
[00:15:25.760]of a system because that,
[00:15:27.560]that corn crop is depending on just a very small vole of soil to
[00:15:32.330]live.
[00:15:33.590]And if we can interact with the whole soil profile by creating passageways for
[00:15:38.510]cash crop roots, that's, that's early success in the system.
[00:15:43.830]So what is a root restrictive compaction layer?
[00:15:47.880]I've tried to portray this with some USDA,
[00:15:51.780]charts and pictorial descriptions.
[00:15:55.290]Farming is a disturbance.
[00:15:57.300]So when we enter a crop field with a tractor and any sort of piece of equipment,
[00:16:02.910]that's going to disturb the soil. That's the whole point.
[00:16:05.940]We're trying to interact with the soil and grow a crop,
[00:16:09.510]but tractor tire compaction results in a pretty standard compaction
[00:16:14.460]across the field, if done right to about 1.4,
[00:16:17.820]three grams per cubic centimeter and grams per cubic centimeter
[00:16:22.740]is how many kind of pounds of soil or, or,
[00:16:27.300]dense densities of soil,
[00:16:29.700]we can fit in a cup or a known vole.
[00:16:32.940]And so if you kind of sift some soil into a cup,
[00:16:36.480]you can have just a little bit of soil in there,
[00:16:38.400]but if you pound on it with your fist and pack it down,
[00:16:41.970]you can fit some more soil in that same income.
[00:16:46.770]And that's the concept of compaction. And when we drive on, on soil,
[00:16:51.270]it pushes down on the soil and it makes it a little bit more dense.
[00:16:55.560]what's interesting is that those tillage tools at depth create quite a bit more
[00:17:00.540]density than just standard tire complexion. And so that,
[00:17:04.240]that picture on the right there shows those depths and the top layer that
[00:17:09.240]old disc plan at six to eight inches,
[00:17:12.900]it's been measured at 1.9 grams per cubic centimeter.
[00:17:17.430]And so in order to describe what that means,
[00:17:20.250]I put this chart on the left that describes the dent effect, root growth,
[00:17:25.020]and the densities that restrict root growth.
[00:17:27.600]And we're talking about root restriction here, root, restricting layers,
[00:17:31.530]so that the roots just stop. They can't go deeper.
[00:17:35.070]And every soil texture has a root restriction density.
[00:17:39.930]That's less than 1.9 grams per cubic centimeter.
[00:17:44.840]So what that means is that this file,
[00:17:46.770]Pam that's achieved 1.9 grams per cubic centimeter. In most soils,
[00:17:51.120]it's functionally a root restrictive compaction layer.
[00:17:55.020]And so roots roots, can't go through it.
[00:17:57.570]And then we're farming in the soil above that layer. And if,
[00:18:01.380]and when a crack appears or a root does find a preferential path,
[00:18:06.330]yep. We'll find a way down. And in those,
[00:18:09.090]those plants are suffering in the meantime or the whole season.
[00:18:12.840]And so understanding your bone density is really important,
[00:18:16.260]but it's really important within those soil layers to understand that
[00:18:21.330]density has changed.
[00:18:23.760]I've really highlighted that no-till systems are great at retaining soil
[00:18:28.530]structure.
[00:18:29.340]We just stopped disturbing the soil so much by converting the no-till,
[00:18:34.290]but we're not regenerating soil structure with biological activity.
[00:18:39.270]And by spreading a cover crop across the whole field,
[00:18:42.030]distributing it across the whole field randomly and consistently,
[00:18:46.920]we can interact with all of the soil to regenerate social structure with those
[00:18:51.720]roots and not, not depend on iron to do that.
[00:18:57.210]So in order to portray this,
[00:18:59.310]I'm going to move on to this Nebraska's NRCS soil health initiatives
[00:19:03.210]description.
[00:19:04.470]We for the past five years been applying conservation demonstrations
[00:19:09.390]across Nebraska, and we've done that by funding,
[00:19:14.160],
[00:19:14.460]demonstration projects portraying the use of cover crops in different ways on
[00:19:19.170]farm with, with farmers that are volunteering for this activity. And,
[00:19:24.000], participating with us in the equip,
[00:19:26.490]we've established some goals to provide a local source of information,
[00:19:30.900]to validate the soil health management systems and to focus on communication.
[00:19:36.030]We're trying to get some pictures from patient from these research
[00:19:40.920]projects to further the use of cover crops in that region.
[00:19:45.270]We needed to say, how, how do cover crops work here at this location?
[00:19:50.190]And we've done that 17 times across the state in the last five years.
[00:19:54.060]And I have quite a bit of information to share with you about these,
[00:19:57.630]but I did want to portray that, these were our original goals and I,
[00:20:02.070]I feel like we've done, we've accomplished that and,
[00:20:05.090]and we've done it so well that we've set out to do it again.
[00:20:09.540]And so we're gonna, continue another five years.
[00:20:13.200]So it help initiatives with these demonstration projects.
[00:20:16.320]And so I've got a little note there on the cover crop strip that if you're a
[00:20:20.570]wanting to apply for this, , contact your NRCS office,
[00:20:24.570]we have an open opportunity right now.
[00:20:27.690]these demonstration fields really equate to on-farm research.
[00:20:32.040]And I can't iterate that enough that when we can do real research with real
[00:20:37.200]subject matter experts right there on your farm,
[00:20:40.080]that's when we arrive at solid conclusions that matter to you
[00:20:45.030]that change your management systems because it is your management system,
[00:20:49.780]you're the one doing it.
[00:20:51.430]And so on farm research is a really awesome opportunity to engage in research
[00:20:55.750]and test problems and theories that you have so that we can come up
[00:21:00.610]with good solutions. They're long-term field scale comparisons,
[00:21:05.490]they're system comparisons, they're randomizing, replicated thoughts,
[00:21:09.100]which really matters for statistical purposes.
[00:21:12.700]And they're an opportunity to form partnerships.
[00:21:15.430]They're an opportunity for you to gain in your partnerships on your farm with
[00:21:19.660]UNL extension,
[00:21:21.190]or has gone from research network specialist on UNL agronomy.
[00:21:25.360]And in NRCS,
[00:21:26.980]we can all partner with you to come up with solutions on your farm.
[00:21:31.180]So if you are interested in that,
[00:21:32.860]do stop by your inner CFO office and talk about the initiative and the signup
[00:21:37.150]closes February 18th. So I did want to mention that we do have a,
[00:21:41.800]a whole slew of other opportunities to participate in conservation
[00:21:46.150]programs. I hope you know about those, and I hope you would investigate those,
[00:21:50.920]especially if you're new to cover crops,
[00:21:53.650]we have some really great opportunities to decrease your financial risks in this
[00:21:58.240]endeavor and,
[00:21:59.330]and help you with some information and knowledge and come alongside of you to
[00:22:04.150]support you in that endeavor. So, do look, look for that.
[00:22:09.100]in conclusion of the five-year studies that we've just done,
[00:22:12.610]I have some really neat information to share with you,
[00:22:15.340]and I'm really excited today to portray baby. We,
[00:22:20.080]we came up with some case studies and some larger smary studies for the
[00:22:25.030]soil health demonstration farms. This one was in NEMA Hawk county, and I,
[00:22:29.230]I just pulled out a small segment of some of the data from the soil health
[00:22:33.400]assessments that we did for five years. And I really,
[00:22:37.300]keyed in on this and studied it. I liked the, the treatment coln.
[00:22:42.430]We were studying winter Hardy cover crops versus a winter killed cover crop.
[00:22:47.200]And that was that picture. I just showed you on the past slide,
[00:22:49.870]where there was brown dead cover crops and living growing green cover crops that
[00:22:54.190]was taken in the spring after the winter had killed the one strip out.
[00:22:59.230]And that treatment was applied on the same acres in the same place for five
[00:23:03.640]years to see if we could acculate any difference in the soil or the cropping
[00:23:08.080]system. And so we measured infiltration, soil, moisture, bulk density,
[00:23:12.370]soil temperatures at, at,
[00:23:15.520]sampling time in the fall there and soil respiration.
[00:23:18.790]And we did a composite soil health score through time.
[00:23:21.550]And when I looked through these nbers, I kind of went well, okay,
[00:23:25.840]we're off to a good start in 2018, 1920,
[00:23:29.260]and then 2021 threw us a curve ball and all the nbers changed.
[00:23:34.270]And I started to scratch my head and, and it kind of confirmed what I R
[00:23:40.590]pretty new measuring soil health is a lot like walking around with a two by four
[00:23:44.520]and a lake with a 60 mile an hour wind trying to measure the water depth.
[00:23:49.280]You're going to get a lot of variable results.
[00:23:52.310]So I portrayed that on the side there,
[00:23:54.560]if you're ever trying to measure soil properties,
[00:23:56.900]just remember you're using a two by four,
[00:24:00.020]and you need to understand that variability in the system is exactly what you're
[00:24:04.430]going to get.
[00:24:05.270]There's a lot of waves and a lot of changes that occur annually and
[00:24:10.610]over a longterm.
[00:24:12.380]So this really pinpoint precision look at this
[00:24:17.000]one,
[00:24:17.450]said the treatment strips doesn't show us that much of a conclusion after five
[00:24:22.400]years. And I'm like, is that, is that okay? What does that mean?
[00:24:26.450]Where do we go from here? Fortunately, at the beginning of this project, we,
[00:24:30.530]we partnered with UNL extension and UNL agronomy and hoarder
[00:24:35.500]culture to do a larger study.
[00:24:39.140]And I'm so excited to show you this today,
[00:24:42.410]a research project that was completed and published by Fernanda crew Peck,
[00:24:46.760]a PhD candidate student there, I had agronomy and horticulture,
[00:24:51.710]shows what the compounding effects of applying the force soil health principles
[00:24:55.880]means. And this is a, a bit of a complicated slide.
[00:25:00.110]This study it's available at that link there,
[00:25:02.420]it was in angioedema and published. there earlier this,
[00:25:06.860]this year, 2022, I believe in January. So if you want to look this up,
[00:25:11.840]you certainly can. I've got copies of this article,
[00:25:14.420]if you want to reach out to me. this study is,
[00:25:18.290]multi-variant analysis.
[00:25:20.360]What that means is we've looked at the whole system on all of the
[00:25:24.740]17 demonstration farms.
[00:25:26.750]We keyed in on 10 of the farms that had comparable system analysis.
[00:25:31.490]And then we started to look at all of the farms together. And in this analysis,
[00:25:36.260]I love how Fernandez keyed in on this side on cover crop
[00:25:41.120]use to the years of cover crop use. So,
[00:25:44.810]because we were working with all sorts of different farms,
[00:25:49.640]we had a lot of different amounts of cover crop use in their history.
[00:25:53.780]Some had zero cover crop use,
[00:25:55.490]and some had up to 12 years of cover crop use prior to this. And so that's that,
[00:26:00.190]that description at the top of the slide and that intensity is,
[00:26:03.710]is extrapolated over zero to one in the,
[00:26:06.740]in the data analysis,
[00:26:09.260]so that we would have a standard way to look at it.
[00:26:12.920]And you can start to see how these farms fall apart.
[00:26:15.860]Then when we look at the years that the cover crops were present,
[00:26:20.360]and the acculation of that benefit,
[00:26:22.760]and we start to see a separation of the data,
[00:26:25.430]not a perfect clean separation, because we're working with nature.
[00:26:30.020]We're working with that lake in a 60 mile an hour wind there's waves,
[00:26:34.190]but we can start to see acculations of results and so cover crops
[00:26:39.260]or the most effective contribution to these,
[00:26:43.890]these unknowns,
[00:26:45.630]to this multi-variant analysis cover crops had the biggest effect on all of the
[00:26:49.890]properties when, when analyzed, and you can see how the,
[00:26:52.890]the long-term cover crop use here, kind of groups,
[00:26:56.250]those larger green dots into one sector and the smallest,
[00:27:00.660]smallest green dots, the zero cover cup use. There are all sorted in one,
[00:27:04.950]one direction as well. And then some of the middle dots,
[00:27:09.060]the 3, 6, 9 year some of those separate into groups.
[00:27:15.030]it's really interesting how after 12 years of cover
[00:27:19.950]crops, the bulk densities have decreased on average,
[00:27:23.940]but not quite statistically confident. And so that's what that,
[00:27:27.990]larger box means across the average line,
[00:27:30.600]the zero line and what we can start to see groups of users
[00:27:35.490]start to show a trend towards that positive decrease in bone density.
[00:27:40.020]Infiltration rates have increased across the board marginally and
[00:27:45.000]water. Extractable organic nitrogen kind of showed some clear
[00:27:49.560]definitions of, of separation.
[00:27:52.980]that's part of the Haney test through a standard soil test,
[00:27:56.670]from various labs. And w we completed that on many of the farms,
[00:28:01.680]our soil health score,
[00:28:03.210]multi factoral analysis of the soil showed some trends,
[00:28:08.310]positive increase and change,
[00:28:10.690]especially with those longer term cover crop pods.
[00:28:15.630]So I'm super excited to see this,
[00:28:18.120]to see it published and to be able to stand up and use it as,
[00:28:20.940]as a support for what we're doing.
[00:28:23.550]What I really like is this slide here that shows what it
[00:28:28.080]means to the economics of cover crops and your whole system.
[00:28:32.490]And this really portrays that how cover crop use used over the longterm
[00:28:37.770]begins to acculate benefits.
[00:28:40.950]And we start to be able to measure it with that two by four. We start to see,
[00:28:45.120]okay, it's, it's gone past the end of the two by four. Now our,
[00:28:50.820]our benefits have increased that much. And so you see the nine and 10,
[00:28:55.140]nine and 12 year farms have,
[00:28:57.480]have arrived to a statistically confident,
[00:29:00.990]economic benefit for, for the use of cover crops.
[00:29:05.190]And it shows up in that nitrogen savings. First,
[00:29:09.030]we have also started to, test, to look at weed seed banks.
[00:29:13.890]So the acculation of weed seeds in the field,
[00:29:17.070]and we're trying to sh to show that benefit as well as in yield and,
[00:29:21.420]and then others soil, biological tests in other ways.
[00:29:26.070]So, if you're interested in this sort of information,
[00:29:30.630]you certainly are, cause you're here at the conference. I just really can't.
[00:29:34.920]Thank you enough, no extension enough.
[00:29:37.500]And the department of agronomy and horticulture,
[00:29:41.200]they have this wonderful website crop watch.
[00:29:43.690]You can sign up and get a weekly newsletter from them. We play your biweekly.
[00:29:48.340], crop watch is a great communication tool.
[00:29:51.310]It talks about current events that are coming up and,
[00:29:54.520]and current research smary of research articles and discussion are located
[00:29:59.170]there,
[00:30:00.130]but you can also access all of these on-farm research case studies there on the
[00:30:04.120]right. You can click on that link and go to an,
[00:30:07.630]into a database that has all of the on-farm research that's been conducted in
[00:30:11.680]Nebraska. That is,
[00:30:14.500]one of the foremost on-farm research networks in the nation.
[00:30:18.250]We have an acculation of data there that that will definitely help
[00:30:22.990]you.
[00:30:23.530]And we have the subject matter experts in the extension educators across the
[00:30:27.250]state to analyze and interpret that data for you
[00:30:32.260]in this case studies and help you understand them.
[00:30:34.930]So I can't iterate enough how important this partnership is for the NRCS and
[00:30:38.950]what we're trying to accomplish with land owners and this information.
[00:30:43.060]We just want to make sure that you're aware of it and get you connected to these
[00:30:46.540]folks in this resource. part of that crop watch webpage.
[00:30:51.310]There's a soil health initiative tab.
[00:30:53.740]You can go in there and read all about these demonstration projects and what
[00:30:57.040]we've accomplished.
[00:30:58.240]All of the case studies associated with that are located there.
[00:31:02.200]But the main thing I wanted to talk to him about with crop watch and on-farm
[00:31:06.340]research network is that on February 17th, they're hosting a re
[00:31:11.380]a results review, an annual review of the,
[00:31:14.720]the case studies accomplished in 2021 is scheduled for February 17th.
[00:31:19.930]And they're going to host those across the state concurrently,
[00:31:23.470]at Alliance Norfolk, Auburn, north Platte, Carney in New York,
[00:31:26.950]trying to get to one of those meetings,
[00:31:28.930]that annual results update is amazing.
[00:31:32.770]You're going to hear about everything from nitrogen management to population
[00:31:36.580]studies, cover crops to different equipment studies.
[00:31:41.290]farmers have studied everything in Nebraska and in 2021,
[00:31:45.430]that diversity was still there. , it's peer reviewed research,
[00:31:50.590]it's done on farm, and it it's statistically analyzed for confidence.
[00:31:55.810]And so you can trust it. You can acknowledge where that was,
[00:31:59.620]that research was done, what county it was done in,
[00:32:02.740]and you can utilize that information on your own farm. So check that out,
[00:32:07.240]get online register for those of that event and show up and take in all that
[00:32:12.040]information as well. We're going to be presenting there.
[00:32:14.980]These case studies on the, on farm or the soil health initiative,
[00:32:19.810]from the NRCS projects as well. So look forward to that,
[00:32:24.220]moving into this,
[00:32:26.380]presentation then about interpreting soil health results. I,
[00:32:31.310]I stepped into this,
[00:32:33.520]presentation in order to portray that and how I'm going to do that is talk about
[00:32:38.110]what's new with NRCS.
[00:32:40.520]We recently in 2021 adopted new soil health resource
[00:32:45.320]concerns or resource concern is like [inaudible] or a
[00:32:50.090]tree infestation,
[00:32:51.830]but we've also now identified soil health sorts concerns like compaction
[00:32:57.080]compaction has been something that's been with us.
[00:33:00.590]in order to support the four soil health principles,
[00:33:03.560]we've identified a couple of new ones, organic matter depletion.
[00:33:07.850]If your field is depleted in organic matter over the time over time, that's a,
[00:33:12.560]that's a resource concern.
[00:33:14.150]We've always had concentration of salt or other chemicals that doesn't happen
[00:33:18.560]very often in Nebraska, but we do have some places where that's,
[00:33:22.010]that's becoming an issue or has been such as assault Creek watershed here
[00:33:26.840]around Lincoln, but in other places,
[00:33:30.200]a new one is soil organism, habitat loss, or bigger days today,
[00:33:34.640]I described what habitat was and in your soil, that means space and shelter,
[00:33:40.040]food, and water and air.
[00:33:42.770]now we can call that a resource concern when it's,
[00:33:45.530]when it's gone or not present.
[00:33:47.810]And the last one that I'm really excited about is aggregate instability.
[00:33:51.860]If you have a soil crust, like in this picture here on the right,
[00:33:56.780]soil that's moved and dissolved become flat
[00:34:01.910]because of rains or floods, that agri Dane stability is a resource concern.
[00:34:06.590]Something that we can address with cover crops and management techniques.
[00:34:10.220]And so now we can come to your field and really hang our hat on an
[00:34:14.420]identifiable characteristic of your field to address,
[00:34:18.290]to target with our activities.
[00:34:20.510]And so that target that objective is really,
[00:34:23.630]really important to establish upfront.
[00:34:26.390]And when you start to think about the use of cover crops and soil health
[00:34:29.510]management, please, please,
[00:34:31.190]please write down what your first objective is right now and put it on your,
[00:34:35.630]your office wall and hang it there and date it that way five years
[00:34:40.550]from now, you can look at that sheet of paper and go,
[00:34:45.590]Hey, my first goal was to stop erosion, have I stopped the erosion?
[00:34:50.600]And then you can know whether you're successful after all that time.
[00:34:54.170]But if you don't write that down every year,
[00:34:56.780]your objective changes a little bit every year, your perspective grows.
[00:35:01.100]And pretty soon you're starting to hope for some other
[00:35:05.750]romantic notion that wasn't your original objective. And so we can,
[00:35:10.280]we can have a objective shift or lose track.
[00:35:15.410]Another thing that's new in the NRCS. We have a brand new crop land,
[00:35:18.470]infield soil health assessment worksheet.
[00:35:21.410]We can come to your farm and identified those soil health
[00:35:26.030]resource concerns with an assessment worksheet.
[00:35:30.470]This nationally adopted worksheet is, is really great.
[00:35:33.980]we worked through that to look at the indicators of those resource concerns,
[00:35:37.980]soil cover residue, breakdown, soil structure, or some of them.
[00:35:42.660]And we can then use those indicators to work through a decision support
[00:35:47.640]tree, with a preponderance of evidence,
[00:35:50.430]we can support a determination of yes or no.
[00:35:53.580]We have that resource concern,
[00:35:57.000]and that helps us analyze where we start off.
[00:36:00.330]So we've got a benchmark of a resource concern and what factors cause that
[00:36:05.250]resource concern to be present.
[00:36:07.680]And then we can move into some decision support,
[00:36:12.300]brand new for 2022. We have some new conservation practices.
[00:36:16.830]It is really rare for us to adopt new conservation practices and the NRCS
[00:36:22.080]every year we have one or two, but for soil health activities,
[00:36:26.730]we haven't seen anything since cover crop became a new conservation
[00:36:31.200]practice. no till management,
[00:36:33.900]nutrient management crop rotations. Well,
[00:36:36.750]now we can support you with a soil health testing activity. We can come in,
[00:36:41.490]with a [inaudible] contract and fund some soil health testing
[00:36:46.410]on in your field.
[00:36:47.880]We can establish a benchmark and then we can come back and reevaluate that after
[00:36:51.600]you've made a management change. Okay.
[00:36:55.930]The new conservation practice is called soil carbon amendment.
[00:37:00.340]I've kind of listed the four ways that, are included in that soil,
[00:37:05.080]carbon amendment conservation practice. We can apply compost.
[00:37:08.380]We can apply carbon amendments, such as coal Ash. we can apply bio char,
[00:37:13.090]which is a newer,
[00:37:16.840]resource that we can acquire or there's folks trying out wood chips and
[00:37:20.800]different combinations of woodchips and manure and compost and wood chips and
[00:37:25.180]different ways of putting carbon out there on the ground and getting long
[00:37:28.630]lasting carbon on the soil surface. So I'm going to key in, on,
[00:37:32.810]on these two and talk more about soil sampling on this picture on the right was
[00:37:37.240]taken in hall county. it looks, looks pretty familiar. What wait,
[00:37:41.980]probably hall county, Texas, , counting of breath.
[00:37:47.650],
[00:37:48.250]there are just a few soil scientists with belt buckles that big in hall county,
[00:37:52.690]but not very many. So this picture is
[00:37:58.060]kind of portrays a different perspective,
[00:38:00.340]but I hope your crop field doesn't look like that.
[00:38:03.490]there's some pretty degraded soil down in Texas and my, my boss,
[00:38:07.690]Carlos B the rail just moved from Texas up here, and I like to,
[00:38:11.560]to poke fun at Texans. but
[00:38:14.980]this soil sampling practice we can come to your field,
[00:38:17.800]helped you sample the soil, consistently and,
[00:38:20.840]and precisely apply these soil. Collections,
[00:38:25.570]send those off to a soils lab and have a quantitative analysis of
[00:38:30.460]the soil, physical, chemical, and biological properties. Finally,
[00:38:33.910]we can support you with financial assistance to,
[00:38:36.550]to measure those things in your field and to understand them together.
[00:38:41.080]So then we can develop a five-year recommendation.
[00:38:44.410]We can return in three years and in sample again,
[00:38:48.220]and we can apply those conservation practices through time with that same
[00:38:52.000]contract. So I'm really excited about this opportunity.
[00:38:56.080]that's all supported through the soil health tech note that was written this,
[00:39:01.090], collaborative project to,
[00:39:04.160]to acculate all of the scientific information and support these conservation
[00:39:08.650]practices was no small feat and it was accomplished in 2019.
[00:39:14.230], that fundamental science based conservation delivery is,
[00:39:18.410]is what the NRCS really stands up on. And it took a lot of
[00:39:25.090]work in this,
[00:39:26.440]this new day and age to actually pull that off and get it through the process.
[00:39:31.030]And we're really, supportive of,
[00:39:33.880]of these conservation practices because the science supports it.
[00:39:37.900]And so we're in this, two 16 soil health testing.
[00:39:42.640]We're looking at aggregate stability, soil,
[00:39:45.070]organic carbon active carbon,
[00:39:47.800]which is analyzed through a permeate oxidizable carbon test
[00:39:52.660]microbial activity. And in the short term, carbon mineralization,
[00:39:57.160]the things that turn over nutrients in your soil and bio-available nitrogen,
[00:40:02.200]we can look at the or organisms and activities that make
[00:40:06.820]nitrogen available to your cash crop.
[00:40:10.840]I really wanted to identify the importance of the combination of these tests.
[00:40:15.460], when I,
[00:40:16.150]when I look at the combination of these and all of the ways that we're analyzing
[00:40:20.290]your soils, biological, chemical, and physical aspects,
[00:40:23.860]it really comes down to how your management interacts with the habitat
[00:40:29.110]and the habitat supports the biological community.
[00:40:33.610]And those biological communities are what's
[00:40:37.060]honorable well for the functions of the soil.
[00:40:40.270]And so those microbes, the things living in your soil,
[00:40:44.410]they conduct nutrient cycling, they build soil organic matter,
[00:40:48.430]and they aggregate the soil. And when we, when we do those,
[00:40:52.390]that's when we can start to test the soil for those processes and understand
[00:40:57.160]how well the community is,
[00:40:59.050]is present or not present and how your management is impacting those
[00:41:04.030]aspects of the soil. So we can look at the resistance to erosion,
[00:41:08.500]carbon sequestration, nutrient availability, et cetera.
[00:41:12.430]So I really want to portray that, that combination of tests, aggregates,
[00:41:16.840]stability, soil, organic carbon, active carbon, and short term carbon,
[00:41:20.530]and bio-available nitrogen is really important. And so we're,
[00:41:25.210]we're gonna be able to support you in that, with that test.
[00:41:27.850]So I put this picture on and I said, let's just dive right in. wait,
[00:41:32.930]hold on. Let's form a plan.
[00:41:35.600]Let's let's come together and look at our resource concerns. That's why we've,
[00:41:39.830]we've developed those new resource concerns.
[00:41:42.500]Compaction AgriStability might be an example in your field,
[00:41:46.310]and we need to identify the,
[00:41:47.810]the management activities that that can be used to address those resource
[00:41:52.430]concerns,
[00:41:53.450]not just dive in whole hog and try something that won't work in
[00:41:58.250]your field or won't even address the issue.
[00:42:02.240]maybe we could real quick just dive in and apply wood chips,
[00:42:06.440]all the customer field, three inches,
[00:42:07.910]the that's going to cause an ecological problem.
[00:42:11.570]So we might want to avoid that.
[00:42:14.750]however we can correctly and,
[00:42:18.620]prescriptively applied with chips, you know,
[00:42:20.810]mix of manure and hold some of those nutrients and do some really good things in
[00:42:24.260]your field if done well in partnership with a plan. So,
[00:42:29.030]I can't iterate enough how many decisions there are, you know,
[00:42:32.570]in a conservation plan,
[00:42:36.680]to support soil health.
[00:42:38.240]We need to look at the cover crop mix and the seeding rate and the timing we
[00:42:41.930]need to look at the residue, the crop rotation, the nutrient management,
[00:42:45.740]and the types of ways that we can add carbon to your,
[00:42:50.390]to your soil. So we've got this new brain,
[00:42:53.720]new planning and monitoring matrix.
[00:42:56.870]This tool allows us to look at your resource concern and then look at
[00:43:01.520]some short-term and long-term ways to manage for that resource
[00:43:06.320]concern. And it's related directly to our conservation practices.
[00:43:10.490]This key linkage is really,
[00:43:12.140]really important to support our financial contribution to this
[00:43:16.760]plan and to allow it to be part of a, of a conservation program.
[00:43:21.950]And so this tool right here is really fundamental.
[00:43:27.110]So a carbon amendment is a,
[00:43:28.910]is a brand new conservation practice that I'm really excited about.
[00:43:33.470]we've known the benefits and,
[00:43:35.740]and continue to see and track the benefits of the applying manure to crop
[00:43:40.730]fields.
[00:43:41.990]But we really haven't seen or supported or track the benefits of applying mature
[00:43:46.700]compost, soil, carbon amendments,
[00:43:49.820]like coal Ash or bio char or wood chips. We just don't,
[00:43:54.650]that's so new. And we don't know all of the ways that that's going to interact
[00:44:00.440]with your crop field and we've established some,
[00:44:03.920]some application recommendations and some support for,
[00:44:07.790]for that practice in this, conservation practice standard.
[00:44:13.160]So we can apply that compost we've outlined what that means, what compost is.
[00:44:18.230]That's really important for the compost industry.
[00:44:21.290]it's not manure out of the feedlot,
[00:44:23.810]but it's manure and other amendments that result in a mature compost.
[00:44:28.460]That's really heavy in carbon. it's pretty low in nitrogen and other,
[00:44:33.540]other nutrients. And so it's,
[00:44:35.850]it's quite a bit different than composted manure or compost or, or,
[00:44:39.530]or just manure in general. Manure is a, it's a great nutrient resource,
[00:44:44.610]definitely a contribution to soil health.
[00:44:47.880]And we need to use that as a resource,
[00:44:50.580]but that falls into a different scope that would be in nutrient management.
[00:44:55.260]And we need to outline a manure application plan and make sure that we're
[00:44:59.490]applying based on the nutrients available in that crop field and the nutrient
[00:45:03.570]needs of the crop. compost is different than that.
[00:45:07.260]And so we've outlined how, and when we can apply that,
[00:45:11.130]other carbon amendments such as coal Ash, there's a few sources of coal Ash in,
[00:45:15.960]in Nebraska.
[00:45:17.280]And that inert substance is just carbon after it's been burnt,
[00:45:21.660]it's it's pure carbon, and it can be applied and,
[00:45:26.010]and really show a benefit in eroded soils or soils that are really low in
[00:45:30.030]organic matter. And so if you come across to,
[00:45:33.870]a resource of coal Ash or a source of that,
[00:45:37.710]that might be an opportunity for you to add some carbon to your soil profile.
[00:45:42.450]Bio char is a brand new kind of resource that we've come
[00:45:47.430]along to support.
[00:45:49.170]Bio char is a low temperature burn of wood that results in charcoal,
[00:45:54.810]and that charcoal is charged.
[00:45:57.390]It's different than Ash and it's different than compost.
[00:46:01.200]It has a whole different quality structure.
[00:46:04.550]It's application to the soil ecosystem is really
[00:46:09.150]phenomenal. It's like a giant hotel for soil organisms.
[00:46:14.460]It can store water and nutrients at the same time.
[00:46:17.430]And when we applied bio char to a field that can take it from zero to 60,
[00:46:21.450]really, really fast. So we've outlined application rates for that,
[00:46:25.890]or working with partners to identify sources and,
[00:46:28.760]and build them an enterprise to provide bio char for that application.
[00:46:34.140]What are the materials I've talked about that you want to be careful with Woody
[00:46:37.650]materials they're really high in carbon and they're an edible carbon they're
[00:46:41.920]cellulose.
[00:46:43.020]And so the nutrients that are required to digest that car high carbon
[00:46:47.760]source need to be provided like a good maneuver wood chip mix.
[00:46:52.740]And in other ways to do that,
[00:46:54.480]or a really small application of those wood chips in order to not
[00:46:59.460]have a nutrient tie up in a long-term situation, you need your crop field,
[00:47:03.810]but there's a really great application for that wood resource,
[00:47:07.410]and it can be really useful in your crop field. So, ask us about that.
[00:47:11.940]If you have a,
[00:47:14.250]a place to get that would be sourced from bio char,
[00:47:18.210]it's a stable form of carbon.
[00:47:19.980]I've put this slide next to identify that it doesn't just happen by accident.
[00:47:24.750]It's not really easily achieved producing
[00:47:30.280]IO char. It's a really low temperature burn and it takes a long time.
[00:47:34.600]And so they're building equipment.
[00:47:36.220]We're not putting a plug out for this company,
[00:47:38.530]but I just put this on the screen to show you that it's not just a fire in the
[00:47:42.400]backyard making charcoal, but it's,
[00:47:45.370]it's a paralysis that is controlled in a,
[00:47:47.970]in a machine that generates bio char as a product on these machines
[00:47:52.930]can generate electricity. They can generate heat for other processes,
[00:47:57.730]drying out materials or heating buildings.
[00:48:01.840]so there's a lot of secondary benefits to producing bio char that we're
[00:48:06.400]creating as well. So what does all that mean? Those new,
[00:48:11.650]everything new in the NRCS,
[00:48:13.750]it means that we can conduct still soil testing with you.
[00:48:16.990]Now we can evaluate the environmental benefits and outcomes.
[00:48:22.000]We can make a plan and adjust the plan three to five years down the road,
[00:48:25.960]and we can support you in your continuing education.
[00:48:28.930]We can come alongside of you and go on this journey with you and we can measure
[00:48:33.070]success and recognize the benefits.
[00:48:35.560]So when we transitioned from having a compaction layer, like the top picture,
[00:48:40.130]we use cover crops to roots, not iron member.
[00:48:44.650]And we start to build in some biological habitat and have some big critters like
[00:48:48.310]this earth worm show up. We can now track that change with you and your field.
[00:48:52.600]And we can quantify that over time and help you understand
[00:48:57.610]have I achieved healthy soil or not? So I would just iterate.
[00:49:01.780]If you need more information on this contact, your local NRCS office,
[00:49:06.520]those folks are subject matter experts. We have a field office technical guide.
[00:49:10.750]You can pull up all these resources and check them out online.
[00:49:15.130]And if you don't understand your soil,
[00:49:17.710]in RCS has a web soil survey and that's,
[00:49:21.520]that's all of the soil survey books on the, on a website. I mean,
[00:49:25.750]you're outside. So go check that out
[00:49:30.220]again. We're an equal opportunity provider and employer,
[00:49:33.790]and we're not endorsing anybody in any of this,
[00:49:36.760]and I'll just leave you with this. How can you improve your soil health?
[00:49:40.720]That's a really important question.
[00:49:43.810]And in order to understand that we need to dig in and learn a lot.
[00:49:46.870]And so together we can learn about what that means and,
[00:49:50.400]and your situation and your circstance.
[00:49:53.260]So I've left you with my contact information there.
[00:49:55.450]Feel free to reach out to me if you have questions,
[00:49:58.060]but if you don't want to just go dig a hole,
[00:50:01.480]take a tape measure out there and look for that horizontal fracture in your crop
[00:50:05.470]field and find out how deep it is and where your roots are stopping or not
[00:50:10.150]stopping. Hopefully you don't have that problem.
[00:50:13.090]But about 90% of the fields that I dig in, have a root,
[00:50:16.150]restrictive compaction layer. So that's, that's our target. That's the,
[00:50:20.920]the resource concern that we need to address in Nebraska. Thanks a lot,
[00:50:24.910]everyone, everybody, Nathan, I saw you jp up.
[00:50:28.820]Yep. let's give Aaron around applause. Thanks, Aaron.
[00:50:35.150]We do have a one online question. so hopefully Erin, you can hear me.
[00:50:39.950]you talked up no-till can cover crops, work with Ridge till,
[00:50:43.940]or is ridge till still a sin, just like a disk.
[00:50:50.350]So no Ridge, there was not a thin Ridge.
[00:50:55.630]It was a tool just like cover crops are a tool and cover crops can be used
[00:51:00.280]anywhere for any purpose, but if you don't know why you're using them,
[00:51:04.390]then you're,
[00:51:04.890]you're running the risk of coming up with more problems than solutions.
[00:51:08.980]So I'd like to know what your irrigation system is in that Ridge till
[00:51:13.750]system and why your Ridgestone in the first place. If you have a water problem,
[00:51:18.280]and you're trying to get your growing point up out of the water and your Ridge
[00:51:22.810]towing to get the corn and beans up on that Ridge,
[00:51:26.290]maybe you have an infiltration rate problem.
[00:51:28.750]Maybe you could use cover crops to address your soil structure,
[00:51:33.490]that compaction layer that's impacting water infiltration and work your way out
[00:51:38.320]of needing to Ridge till if that's the problem that you're trying to solve.
[00:51:43.960]continuing to Ridge till will continue to create that compaction layer in
[00:51:48.730]the, in between the rows, that tillage tool,
[00:51:52.690]but the pressure down on the soil,
[00:51:54.640]is it ways that tillage tool actually has a weight.
[00:51:58.090]Most dis are applying a barrel 250 PSI per blade,
[00:52:02.500]and that PSI torques the soil and it creates that compaction layer.
[00:52:07.540]So continuing to do that continues to, to build that compaction layer.
[00:52:13.000]if you're dependent on those ridges and that compaction layer for your
[00:52:17.230]irrigation system, if you're flood irrigating,
[00:52:21.040]flood irrigation is dependent upon compaction to get water from point a to point
[00:52:25.690]B. You don't want all the water to soak in in the first 10 feet,
[00:52:29.680]and you really needed to,
[00:52:31.190]to transport player across the field and to stay in place long enough to,
[00:52:35.620]to wake into the soil.
[00:52:38.920]Wicking rate is about a half an inch per hour.
[00:52:41.320]And that's the infiltration rate of most convinced conventional,
[00:52:46.300]gravity irrigated systems. So, you know,
[00:52:49.060]we need to talk more about your system to understand why you're using
[00:52:52.720]Ridgeville. We need to understand why you want to use cover crops,
[00:52:55.960]and then we can start to formulate a plan of how to do that and,
[00:52:59.620]and objectives of why. So great question.
[00:53:04.540]We do have an extra microphone. Is there a question from the crowd here?
[00:53:08.530]Cause we have two audiences,
[00:53:09.760]so we appreciate the online and the in-person audience here this morning.
[00:53:13.360]So any questions here in the crowd?
[00:53:23.590]So.
[00:53:26.190]So before I, plant corn in the spring, I'm primarily flat.
[00:53:31.290]So I was first say that I'm not have a lot of highly erodible
[00:53:35.580]hillsides. so when I feel cultivate in the spring,
[00:53:40.020]a lot of times this has done in April and especially the last couple of years,
[00:53:42.810]our weeds have not been very big when we do it.
[00:53:45.510]So I would say I'm probably even going less than this in depth high to this.
[00:53:51.180]And then I'm turning around,
[00:53:52.420]moving half that soil away with my planter and I'm planning my corn
[00:53:57.420]around two and a half inches deep. Isn't my corn actually getting below
[00:54:04.140]that area that you're talking about.
[00:54:07.200]That's what I've always wondered when I am doing my tillage,
[00:54:10.920]because I can definitely feel that area that you're talking about when I'm
[00:54:14.160]checking out deep, the field cultivators going isn't my plant,
[00:54:17.490]or actually getting the seed below that.
[00:54:21.990]Did you get that Aaron shallow?
[00:54:25.960]Yep. I, I sure did Nathan,
[00:54:29.170]great question and really good point on the planar opener and
[00:54:33.520]penetration of the seed and planting deep.
[00:54:36.340]Those are all highly recommended activities.
[00:54:38.890]I hope Paul Jasa we'll talk about that. he usually does,
[00:54:43.660]that planar opener does penetrate past some of the,
[00:54:47.660]the shallow compaction layers.
[00:54:50.290]And I've actually got some soils that some soil peds,
[00:54:53.290]some big modelists some big dirt clods that I've glued permanent,
[00:54:58.510]that show that planar opener and how their roots go past that first restrictive
[00:55:03.010]layer. The problem is that nine times out of 10,
[00:55:06.370]there's another restrictive layer at six or eight inches that's even worse.
[00:55:10.450]The field compaction or field cultivation layer had two to four inches.
[00:55:13.750]That's shallow enough that freeze and thaw events address that compaction layer
[00:55:18.790]and your cash crop roots usually have enough time in place to,
[00:55:22.120]to address that compaction there, that shallow layer, the deeper,
[00:55:25.810]the compaction layer area is less
[00:55:30.670]addressed or less,
[00:55:32.800]impact that it is by all of those ways that compaction are alleviated.
[00:55:37.300]There's less biological activity at depth.
[00:55:39.670]There's less freezing and thawing that depth.
[00:55:41.890]There's less water movement at depth.
[00:55:44.260]And so all of those things really cause that compaction layer to persist through
[00:55:48.580]time. That's why after 50 years of not plowing a field,
[00:55:52.600]you can still go and find an old pile pan at 12 to 16 inches of
[00:55:57.370]depth that old plow pan is just sitting there waiting for a root to come
[00:56:02.260]through and re structuralize it. And if,
[00:56:06.370]if biology doesn't get down there, then it just persists through time.
[00:56:11.020]And that's, that's the big problem.
[00:56:13.420]So the planner opener typically creates a preferential crack in soil that
[00:56:18.310]has an aggregate instability issue.
[00:56:21.340]And that preferential crack don't know if you've
[00:56:26.650]in this state on your land, hopefully not, but you know, drought,
[00:56:30.010]you'll see the soil crack right down your planter opener,
[00:56:33.640]and it'll actually tear apart your germinating roots.
[00:56:37.390]it can expose the seeds.
[00:56:39.670]You can get water erosion right down that crack and it can open up that and
[00:56:44.170]that, that preferential open opening means that that instability of the soil
[00:56:49.270]didn't didn't have the continued capacity to function, to stay structural.
[00:56:54.190]And so not having the planar opener. Yes,
[00:56:58.060]because the seeds are germinating at, or below that compaction layer,
[00:57:02.980]but that's not the whole picture.
[00:57:04.450]It's really the aggregate instability issue on the surface that we're trying to
[00:57:07.690]address rather than the, the compaction at the surface.

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2022 Eastern Nebraska Soil Health Conference Presentations - Aaron Hird

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