More than 70 people committed to soil-health research and engagement attended the Demonstrating Soil Health in the Badger State program held Aug. 7 at the University of Wisconsin-Arlington Agricultural Experiment Station. The event, hosted by SHARE, began with a panel discussion about four demonstration farms around Wisconsin. Panelists discussed opportunities and challenges associated with the demonstration farms. They also took questions from the audience.
The panel was comprised of (clockwise):
Rick Bieber, soil stewardship advisor for Fields of Sinsinawa (Fields of Sinsinawa – A Farmer-Led Learning Center), and a retired farmer and rancher from Trail City, South Dakota
Twyla Kite, a program coordinator for the USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service in Wisconsin. Among her responsibilities is working with the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative (Great Lakes Restoration Initiative | Great Lakes Restoration Initiative (glri.us)).
Jim Stute, a farmer and agricultural scientist who is the farm manager and fundraising chairman for the research plots at Case Eagle Park (What We Do | Watershed Protection Committe of Racine County (WPCR) (wpcracinecounty.org)).
Dane Christenson, a conservation specialist in Polk County Land & Water Resources who works with the Horse Creek Farmer-Led Watershed Council (Horse Creek Watershed – Farmer-Led Watershed Councils of the St. Croix and Red Cedar Rivers (farmerledwatershed.org)).
One of the questions posed to the panelists was how to provide information that will continue to be of interest and value to producers.
"Our council members go through planning meetings in winter to identify concerns in our watershed," Christenson said. " We work with them to find speakers in those areas for our March seminar where we see 40 to 120 people attend."
This past spring the Horse Creek Farmer-Led Watershed Council's entire program featured local data. Christenson gave a presentation focused on local test plot data. Information about rainfall and a local runoff simulation study also was presented. And two agronomists gave information on nitrogen-optimization studies they had been working on with local producers.Â
Stute said another way to engage producers is to have them bring a sample from what they think is their best soil on their farm. Using slake tests, that soil can be compared to a sample from a neighboring farm. The results can stimulate conversations about their soil-health practices and how they're progressing.
Organizers of producer-led educational events also may want to consider having a general session or two with a topic that would be of interest to most attendees. Those sessions could be followed by breakout sessions for beginners as well as breakouts focused on more advanced/technical topics, Stute said.
The panelists also addressed ways to select demo farms.
"You don’t want all rock stars – you want to select producers who are going through (the soil-health improvement) process at different levels," Kite said.
When working to select demonstration sites, it's worth considering producers who aren’t afraid to fail when experimenting with soil-health practices, she added.
 Bieber said it's important to focus on soil health first, then plants/animals, and then one's pocketbook. If producers don't do that, it will be a long battle for them to understand soil care, he said. When he farmed in South Dakota, he transitioned away from using synthetic inputs. For the first couple of years, he saw yields decline but by the fourth year there wasn't a noticeable difference in yields in an 800-acre field that had been divided in half -- one half that had been managed with synthetics and the other half that was managed using soil-health practices without synthetic inputs. By the fifth year, yields were better in the half focused on improving soil health, Bieber said.
But the key is focusing on net income versus yield, said Bieber and Stute. The focus shouldn't be solely on a per-acre basis. One should consider looking at the amount of capital and labor involved. Stute said he saved money by selling most of his tillage equipment when he transitioned to regenerative farming in the early 1990s.
WICST
The panel discussion was followed by a presentation by Gregg Sanford, co-director of the Wisconsin Integrated Cropping Systems Trial (WICST) at the Arlington Agricultural Experiment Station. WICST (Wisconsin Integrated Cropping Systems Trial – College of Agricultural & Life Sciences) is of the country’s most diverse and long-term cropping systems experiments.
Gregg Sanford is a senior scientist in the Department of Plant & Agroecosystem Sciences at the University of Wisconsin-Madison as well as co-director of the Wisconsin Integrated Cropping Systems Trial.
After lunch, attendees visited the WICST plots where they could visit as many as five stations to learn about the technologies scientists and staff use to evaluate cropping systems, soil health and more. The stations focused on greenhouse gas analysis, hydraulic conductivity, deep soil sampling, earthworm monitoring and a rainfall simulator to show the effect of rainfall on different cropping or grazing management systems.
The plot tour was followed by a social hour where attendees could enjoy ice cream sundaes while networking with each other. Attendees included representatives from various producer-led watershed protection groups, Land and Water Conservation Districts, the University of Wisconsin and the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
-- by Lynn Grooms, SHARE
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