HEALTHY SOIL:
HEALTHY LIFE
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NACD celebrated the 67th Stewardship Week April 24 - May 1 with the promotion of Healthy Soil: Healthy Life. NACD Stewardship Week is one of the largest national programs to promote natural resource conservation. Celebrated annually since 1955 between the last Sunday in April and the first Sunday in May, NACD Stewardship Week reminds us of our individual responsibilities to care for natural resources.
This year, we had some of our Soil Health Champions help us out with promoting the five principles of soil health with daily video clips highlighting each principle. Each day during stewardship week, NACD posted one of these videos on Facebook to help engage a broader audience. Each video is going to be made available on our NACD YouTube Channel, so be sure to check them out soon!
Here's how the week went:
April 26: MINIMIZE SOIL DISTURBANCE, Michael Thompson (KS)
While Stewardship week is just one week of the year, NACD has free materials for kids that can be downloaded and printed for use all year long. Be sure to go to the NACD website to check out the following items. And if you would like high-quality, print-on-demand copies, please visit the Goetz Printing storefront.
Level 1 booklet: grades K-1
Level 2 booklet: grades 2 – 3
Level 3 booklet: grades 4 – 5
Level 4 booklet: grades 6 – 8
Field Day Curriculum Guide
Additional Resources include:
- Educators Guide
- Placemat/Activity Sheet
- Poster
- Bookmark
- Liturgical Materials
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FARMISH: CONNECTING CONSUMERS TO PRODUCERS |
Terra Osman of Michigan, a mother, gardener and web developer, wanted to buy more of her food from local producers and found herself spending a good deal of time searching for producers close to home. Osman thought her quest for keeping the supply chain local shouldn't be this difficult with the technologies of today, but she discovered there wasn't any centralized place where communities could make such connections.
It was from this experience that she created Farmish, an online app exclusively for food and farming, allowing users to find food within their own communities. Farmish also assists the small producer by taking out the marketing barrier as direct consumer marketing can take a lot of time, money and strategy in order for the producer to be successful. Instead, small producers are usually investing their time and energy in their day-to-day running of their farm or ranch.
While other social media platforms such as Facebook Marketplace and Craigslist are available, producers can find it difficult to surface in consumer searches among the various algorithms used.
When Farmish launched on March 16, 2022, it registered 700 users in the first 24 hours. Two months later, the app has 74,000 users with local food products listed in all 50 states.
Participating producers can be anyone from a backyard gardener to a farmer on larger acreage and is free to both producer and consumer. For a fee, producers can enhance their presence in the app and create their own farm store which can take the place of a website.
For more information, you can download the app from your favorite app store or go online to the Farmish website to explore the services and products offered. |
This bulletin we'd like to connect you with another conservation partner and resource - the USDA Climate Hubs.
The Mission of the Climate Hubs is to develop and deliver science-based, region-specific information and technologies, with USDA agencies and partners, to agricultural and natural resource managers that enable climate-informed decision-making, and to provide access to assistance to implement those decisions.
Regional offices each have their own websites linked below for region-specific resources and information:
To keep up with your regional Climate Hub, you can sign up for their newsletter to get the most up-to-date information and opportunities in your part of the country, but you can also sign up for the national newsletter to get a more comprehensive overview of issues throughout the country.
Some of the topics you can explore through the Climate Hubs include animals, bioenergy, carbon, climate science, crops, communities, economics, education, forests and woodlands, grazing lands, greenhouse gases, soil, urban and water.
For more information on this valuable resource from the USDA and a list of upcoming workshops or webinars, please visit the USDA Climate Hubs website. |
SOIL HEALTH RESOURCE LIBRARY |
The Soil Health Institute has a Soil Health Resource Library which is a great resource for research and information to advance soil health. The goal of their library is to provide convenient access to useful information and educational tools for anyone interested in soil health. If you have additional resources to recommend for their library, visit their Resource Library webpage and fill out their online form and include a link to the resource.
Current resource categories include: Best Practices, Research, Measurements & Standards, Economics, Conservation, Climate Change, Ecosystem Services, Global Reports & Data, Public Policy, Communication & Education, Web Apps & Tools, and Soil Health 360 – a quick-link to current publications, videos and information on soil health.
Be sure to check back often as they are always updating the library.
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Here are just a few of our Champions who have recently been interviewed for this podcast and the links to their episodes. |
Russell Hedrick on Building Soil with Cover Crops |
When first generation farmer and Soil Health Champion Russell Hedrick from Hickory, NC, took up farming, he couldn’t afford the high horsepower tractors and big tillage equipment he was told he needed in order to be successful.
With some well-timed visits to his local Soil and Water Conservation District to get ideas on dealing with erosion, Hedrick learned about no-till and cover crops and was soon on-board with regenerative ag practices.
For this episode of the Cover Crop Strategies podcast, contributing editor Martha Mintz chats with Russell about how he has used conservation practices like cover crops and no-till to stop erosion, improve soil function and build soil aggregation by about an inch each year.
He discusses how using the Haney soil health test has helped him save $183 per acre on his best ground, why he does zone testing instead of grid testing, how he picks cover crop species for his farm based on carbon-to-nitrogen ratios, how he calculates nitrogen release and credits from cover crops, and more.
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Reducing Inputs, Boosting Yields at
Starkey Farms in Indiana
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In this episode, Cover Crop Strategies interviews Soil Health Champion Mike Starkey of Starkey Farms, a seventh-generation family farm just outside of Indianapolis.
Co-owner Mike Starkey’s been no-tilling since 1989. He started using cover crop mixes on his corn and soybeans in 2005.
For this episode of Cover Crop Strategies, Mike reflects on lessons learned over the years, and identifies the benefits of cover cropping on his farm. Mike also shares some advice on planting green.
Plus, he explains how the use of AirScout thermal imagery has helped improve nitrogen application methods, ultimately boosting yields.
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David Brandt on Lessons Learned from
45 Years of Cover Cropping
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If you’ve spent any time at all researching cover crops online, you’ve probably come across the famous picture of Soil Health Champion Dave Brandt holding a gigantic tillage radish. Brandt laughs about the photo, but for this meme-worthy no-tiller from Carroll, Ohio, that massive taproot only hints at the amazing benefits he’s seen from the cover crops he’s been growing since 1976.
For this episode of the Cover Crop Strategies podcast,
contributing editor Martha Mintz chats with Dave about some of those benefits as well as the lessons he’s learned in his 45 years of using cover crops. Dave talks about how and why he went from using a single species cover crop to a multi-species mix, some of the unusual methods he’s used for measuring nutrient payback from covers, how they’ve helped him reduce fertilizer inputs by 80%, herbicides by 45-50% and fuel by 10-15%, the equipment he uses to plant green into 36,000 pounds of cover crop biomass, and much more.
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Since our 2022 Winter Bulletin was published, we have some new Champions to welcome into the Network!
• Kimberly and Chris
Sheehan (NM)
• Brian Naughton and Tam
Doan (NM)
• Chad Hahn (TX)
• Wes Brtittenham (NM)
• Susan Smith (NM)
• Matt French (NM)
• Lorenzo Domínguez and Dr.
Chelsea Hollander (NM)
• John Sparks (NM)
• Gabriel and KaLee Lee
(NM)
If you or someone you know is interested in joining the Network, please visit the NACD website for more information or contact Beth Mason.
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Jimmy Emmons Talks Good Grazing Management to RFD TV |
Soil Health Champion Jimmy Emmons from Oklahoma was interviewed by RFD TV on managing your pasture in a proactive way in times of drought and prioritizing grazing management.
Emmons says it is tempting to want to graze the pasture down before moving the livestock to another field, but he suggests leaving the grass a little taller to provide armor for the soil. A good grass cover provides shade from the heat of the sun, and when heavy rain events occur, the healthy root system holds the soil in place and assist with water infiltration.
Emmons recommends a good grazing management plan that rests the pasture no less than three days, and the longer, the better. This resting period is necessary to allow your grass to leaf out again. He says that getting educated on what soil health means and monitoring where rain falls is essential to developing a drought plan.
Click below to watch the interview.
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Report: Conservation Practice Impact on Carbon Sequestration |
A new report by Kayla Bergman, Senior Policy Associate of the Center for Rural Affairs was published in March 2022 which explores a lesser known benefit of conservation practices. While these practices are used to improve water quality, soil health, and wildlife habitat as well as lower the cost of inputs, this report examines each practice for their positive impact on carbon sequestration and the reduction of greenhouse gasses. |
There are a lot of great podcasts out there full of interviews and the latest information. Here are a few you might consider. Share your favorite Soil Health Podcast with the group by emailing Beth Mason at beth-mason@nacdnet.org
This podcast is about helping farmers and ranchers learn from the experiences of others and connecting them with resources to improve their own likelihood of success, however they choose to define it.
This podcast focuses on conservation issues facing the states in the Southern Plains of the U.S., sharing programs and projects in the region, examining the topic of soil health, and connecting with conservation partners.
Monthly podcast dedicated to soil health practices and systems. The podcast is produced through a partnership between the Conservation Cropping Systems Initiative (ccsin.org) and Hoosier Ag Today. It features farmers and other experts discussing a wide variety of practices: no-till, cover crops, nutrient/manure management, grazing.
This podcast is produced by Champion Mitchell Hora (IA) with the goal to bring awareness to the Soil Health and Regenerative Ag movements. Hora interviews a variety of producers and leaders in the regenerative ag.
This podcast focuses on the use of cover crops and has interviewed many Soil Health Champions to share their experiences - from interseeding, boosting yields and decreasing inputs, impacts for no-till operations, cover cropping in organic systems, and much more.
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Are you a member of our Facebook Group? If you are an NACD Soil Health Champion or the conservation district or Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) employee who sponsors a Champion, be sure you connect with us on Facebook.
Share your conservation, articles, pictures, updates and events with us by connecting through Facebook! This is an opportunity to network and discuss soil health, and can be a chance to conduct outreach among other members.
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Promote Your
Next Soil Health Event
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Do you have any upcoming soil health events? Are you looking for an upcoming soil health event to attend?
Both NACD and the Soil Health Institute have opened their events calendars for folks to post various soil health events at the local, state, national or international level.
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