Field Notes

with Dan Smith and Sara Walling

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This is a special series from Field Notes produced with the help of the Nutrient and Pest Management (NPM) team at UW-Madison Extension and guest-hosted by Landon Baumgartner (Southwest Regional Outreach Specialist for NPM). Across six episodes, we dive into the fundamentals and best management practices (BMPs) of Nutrient Management Planning (NMP) in Wisconsin, so we couldn't help by calling the series the BMPs of NMPs.

On this first episode, Andrea Topper (DATCP Nutrient Management Outreach Specialist), and Chris Clark (Northeast Regional Outreach Specialist for the Nutrient and Pest Management Program), bring diverse perspectives on nutrient...

In years of low commodity prices, most farmers think about where they might be able to cut costs. Some might begin to think about alternative crops can fit into row crop production. Enter the sunflower. From birdseed, to oilseed, and just looking dang pretty, sunflower production in the state remains miniscule compared to corn, soy, and wheat, but new crops like it can help farmers diversify income streams and reduce risk. So how do we grow them anyways? To find out, we talk with two farmers who also happen to be researchers/educators, Sam Bibby, farmer in Trempeleau County and...

Before dairy, wheat was king in Wisconsin. Between 1840 and 1880, the state was largest wheat producer in United States, providing a full sixth of the nation's supply. Today, wheat is 5% of total grain crop (corn, soy, wheat) acres in the state. While there are benefits to having wheat in the rotation and a healthy local market for straw, a higher potential for dockages due to quality standards than corn or soy can be a deterrent for farmers. We talk with Charlie Hammer a farmer near Beaver Dam and independent crop consultant Bill Stangel of Soil Solutions Consulting about how they...

Treated seed is the default for planted soybean (60-80%) and especially corn (close to 100%) acres across the US. While there are certainly advantages to some seed treatments, especially fungicidal treatments for early planted soybeans, others like insecticidal seed treatments can have a negative effect on the beneficial insects--aka good bugs--that prey on major pests in agricultural fields. Some farmers in a bid to save some money and help out the beneficials have gone back to planting naked seed. To break it all down with chat with Dane Elmquist, a conservation cropping specialist with UW-Madison Extension and big fan of arthropods...

Transitioning a farm with the bumps and successes along the way. Darren Eichelkraut farms on a 50 cow organic dairy with his family, including his dad, Junior Eichelkraut, right next to Paoli, Wisconsin. Darren and Junior tell us the story about how Junior transitioned the farm to organic, allowing Darren to come back to and eventually take over the farm.

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We talk quite a bit about on farm research results on Field Notes, so we thought it was high time to do an episode detailing the ins and outs of doing research on farms in Wisconsin. We dive into the details of asking the right question, trial design and logistics, and analysis with Ben Turzinski, a third-generation grain and vegetable farmer in Almond, WI in the Central Sand, and Monica Schauer, Research Director for Wisconsin's Nitrogen Optimization Pilot Projects program.

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Excess water, drought, and water quality are frequent topics in Wisconsin’s agricultural community. We sit down with Mallika Nocco, assistant professor and extension specialist in agrohydrology from UW-Madison to discuss water conservation: What is it, why does it matter for Wisconsin farmers, and what are practical ways we can implement it on the landscape? Listen in now to hear all about it.

Photo: University of Wisconsin Discovery Farms

Follow Up Resources

UW-Madison Extension Ag Water Quality: https://agwater.extension.wisc.edu/

UW-Madison Extension Crop Irrigation:

https://fyi...

Much time has been spent on the environmental benefits of conservation agriculture. But, do practices like reduced tillage and cover crops pencil out for farmers, and how do we figure that out? In the second episode of this two-fer on the economics of conservation, we talk with Jake Kaderly, who works as a crop consultant under the name Kaderly Ag and farms 330 acres in Green County, for the farmer's take on how he pencils out conservation practices.

Jake's farm was profiled in an American Farmland Trust Soil Health Case Study that runs some of these numbers...

Much time has been spent on the environmental benefits of conservation agriculture. But, do practices like reduced tillage and cover crops pencil out for farmers, and how do we figure that out? In the first episode of this two-fer on the economics of conservation, we talk with Jeff Hadachek, Extension Specialist and Assistant Professor of Ag Economics at UW-Madison, to get the economist's take on why economics is a useful tool when talking about conservation practices and adoption.

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From severe drought to flooded fields, Wisconsin’s forage producers are turning to forage species that can provide adaptability and flexibility in the midst of abnormal conditions. We jump in with Yoana Newman, UW-River Falls professor and Extension forage specialist, and Matt Oehmican, from Short Lane Ag Supply, to talk the details of warm season annual forages, from the decision-making process for growing these species to the unique technical agronomy management warm season annuals need to grow in Wisconsin. Are warm season annual forages a fit for your farm’s forage inventory?

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Like gas and groceries, the cost of trucking and raising dairy heifers out West has gone up. Does this present Wisconsin farmers with an opportunity to lure these animals back to the state with low-input approaches and similar performance standards with well-managed grazing? We sit down with Jason Cavadini, UW-Madison Extension Grazing Outreach Specialist, and Mike Redetzke, a farmer custom-raising dairy heifers near Colby to discuss the nuts and bolts of getting confinement dairy operations in Wisconsin to put their heifers out on grass.

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Heard about the Haney test and want to learn more about how it might be used in Wisconsin? Listen in while we chat with leading UW researchers and outreach specialists Chris Bandura, John Jones, and Andrew Stammer on this topic. We dive in deep discussing how the Haney test can be used practically on-farm, how it calculates fertility recommendations differently than other soil tests, and what that means for Wisconsin cropping systems.

Photo by Chris Clark

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Wisconsin infrastructure for grain markets and the ability to drop off grains at the nearest elevator incentivizes corn and soybean (and wheat to a lesser extent) rotations. Breaking outside that box and finding alternative grain markets can yield dividends in price premiums and extended crop rotations enhancing farm resilience to drops in commodity prices and other external shocks. We talk with Willie Hughes, an organic and conventional grain farmer in Rock County, and Alyssa Hartman of the Artisan Grain Collaborative about how they navigate finding, complying with and knitting together these differentiated markets.

Photo taken by...

Whereas most grain farmers with a livestock grow crops to feed their cattle, Jeff Gaska a farmer between Beaver Dam and Columbus in Dodge County is trying to grow his cattle to feed his crops. One of the ways he is moving towards this goal is by grazing cover crops interseeded into 60" row corn. We talk with Jeff about this system, the results that he has had over the last couple of years, especially with drought, as well as the approach to how he is determining if it is an economically viable practice for his farm.

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Just in time for Thanksgiving, Field Notes brings you an episode all about cranberries. Wisconsin's state fruit for a reason; we produce the majority of the world's supply, and who better to dig into the details, or the peat, than UW-Madison Extension Cranberry Outreach Specialist Allison Jonjak? We strap on our waders and hop into the bogs to talk about Wisconsin's production of this native, perennial vine and the unique environment and highly acidic soils in which they grow.

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Surrounded by the peak autumn colors of Wisconsin, we thought we'd take a turn to talking about trees, specifically about integrating trees and crops in a system called agroforestry. We call up Jacob Grace of the Savanna Institute, a Wisconsin non-profit focused on promoting, educating, and breeding trees for agroforestry and Eric Wolske of Canopy Farm Management, which specializing in agroforestry installation, maintenance, and management, to chat about the many benefits of trees in cropland and some of the challenges.

Photo taken by Eric Wolske

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Field Notes reporting from the field, well, the bar. We sit down with Mark Keller of Kellercrest Holsteins of Mt. Horeb and Chelsea Zegler, Outreach Specialist with Extension's Ag Water Quality Program, at the Mt. Vernon Tap to talk phosphorus and how farmers can work to draw down excessive levels and save money in the meantime. Mark recounts the Pleasant Valley Watershed Project that worked with farmers in the area to adopt conservation practices like reduced tillage and cover crops for forage, which reduced soil test and water phosphorus levels by 40%, which meant big fertilizer savings. And Chelsea discusses pathways...

There is a lot of solar being sited in Wisconsin with some projects reaching a pretty massive scale. The traditional narrative has been hello solar, goodbye agriculture, however a new crop of farmers, researchers, and solar companies are thinking differently: how can we continue to farm this land between, under, and around solar panels? Steffen Mirsky from Extension's Cutting Edge Podcast joins us as we talk with Sarah Moser, director of agrivoltaics with Savion, a utility-scale solar developer, and Eric Romich, Extension Field Specialist in Energy Development with the Ohio State University about their current and future projects investigating...

Drought affects pasture as well as crops. During these dry times, what are the considerations that graziers need to keep in mind to optimize forage, and what are the advantages that a rotationally grazed system gives us when we're short on water? We talk with Mary C Anderson, Wisconsin DNR Grazing Specialist, retired dairy farmer, and current grass-fed/finished beef farmer and Kevin Mahalko from the Gilman, WI area, a grass-fed dairy farmer and president of Grassworks.

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No digg-it-y. No doubt? On this episode of Field Notes we dig into the question: to till, or not to till, or somewhere in between? Strip tillage is not as common in Wisconsin as full width tillage or no till, but it presents an opportunity to reduce soil disturbance and improve soil aggregation, while also gaining some of the benefits of full width tillage like early season soil warming and fertilizer incorporation. To explore some of the benefits and logistics of the system, we talk with Dr. Francisco Arriaga, an Associate Professor and Soil Science Extension Specialist at UW...

Guolong Liang, outreach specialist for the Agriculture Water Quality Program of Extension in the Central Sands of Wisconsin, guest hosts this episode of Field Notes. Guolong talks with UW-Madison Horticulture Professor and Extension Specialist Jed Colquhoun about the use of cover crops to reduce nutrient runoff in canning and processing vegetables. For the farmer perspective, he chats with John Ruzicka of Guth Farms in Bancroft, Wisconsin and Dylan Moore, a Seneca Foods Field Representative, about Guth Farm's journey in integrating no-till and cover crops into their processing vegetable rotations.

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When we think of nitrogen leaving the fields, we often think of nitrates leached down to groundwater, but the mobility of nitrogen is not just downwards. Nitrogen can also leave the field and be lost to the atmosphere in the form of nitrous oxide, aka laughing gas. But this is no laughing matter. Nitrous oxide is almost 300 times as warming as carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, and 80% of our nitrous oxide emissions in Wisconsin come from agriculture. We talk with Diane Mayerfeld, the Sustainable Agriculture Coordinator with UW-Madison Extension to break down the science and discuss what farmers can do...

March is mud month in Wisconsin. While this season may not be particularly pretty on the eyes, the freeze and thaw of the soil presents farmers with an opportunity to seed small-seeded plants like clovers into a fall-established wheat crop. The benefits are numerous: weed control, diversity, nitrogen for the following corn crop, forage and grazing opportunities. We cover it all with Jefferson County farmer Scott Schultz.

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Data is the currency of the future. What does this look like for farmers? We sit down with Drs. Emily Bick, Extension-funded field and forage crop entomologist with University of Wisconsin-Madison, and Jim Eckberg, a scientist with General Mills, to find out. We talk on how sensors and imaging can help build back biodiversity and soils as well as how industry is working to spur the transition along.

Image adapted from USDA photo by Peggy Greb under creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode

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Everyone is talking about soil health, so we thought we should too. We chat a bit about what exactly is soil health with Jamie Patton of UW-Madison's Nutrient and Pest Management program and Brendon Blank, a farmer and Byron Seeds rep from Ixonia, WI, and importantly, how do you measure progress?

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With winter on the horizon, ensuring that your bags, bunkers, and silos are full to brim is a ready solution for easing worries about winter feed supply. But, for some farmers, the solution to winter feeding and storage is out in the field. We talk bale grazing with Jason Cavadini who, in addition to being the state grazing specialist with Extension, grazes beef cattle near Marshfield and Lynn Johnson a farmer and grazing consultant with the Northwest Grazing Network.

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As fall arrives, farmers turn to harvest. Once the dust settles, some fields lay bare while others show signs of life heading into winter. We talk with Kevin Shelley of UW-Madison's Nutrient and Pest Management program and Scott Carlson, a farmer in northwestern Wisconsin, about the benefits, challenges, and choices of planting winter cover crops.

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In this, the first episode of Field Notes, we dive headlong into the practice of interseeding cover crops into standing corn, a practice becoming more and more popular in Wisconsin. To help us out, we talk with Anne Pfeiffer, program manager for UW-Madison's on-farm research research network, and Marty Weiss, a farmer in Dodge County and the vice-president of Dodge County Farmers for Healthy Soils Healthy Waters farmer-led watershed group.

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Two regional crops educators with UW-Madison Extension in Wisconsin combining our skills, knowledge, and experience to help farmers and agronomists develop research-based solutions to issues facing agriculture in Wisconsin.

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