DWAYNE BECK - CROP DIVERSITY & INTENSITY

      THESE  SHOULD  BE  VIEWED  SEVERAL  TIMES  FOR  AN  UNDERSTANDING

Click on the URL for topics of  NEW AG!    ---->    D. BECK 55:34 Presentation

 No-Till Guru  (Dwayne Beck)  55:34min presentation at the 2019 National No-Till Conference is a great audio/video on making new agriculture practices profitable.  I brought this up from a December 2020 post.  Everything said in this presentation is current today, June, 2023, and more meaningful for some of us who are trying to follow the principles for successfully regenerating our soils and maintaining yields.  The first ~ 18 minutes are about South Dakota, and the Pierre Research Farm.

Click on URL for, "Cover Crop Estabishment and Grazing".  --->  D. BECK 48:08 Presentation  

        No-Till Guru (Dwayne Beck) 2017 presentation talks about Cover Crops and factors to consider when raising them like purpose, and cultivar selection.   Some repeated information in different words.  If I would have found this earlier, I would probably have done better, and be farther along with cover cropping.                                                                                

LETS BUILD HEALTHY SOILS (pt1of 2)

For the last 10 years our operation has been working on acquiring the capacity to build soil health.  We have needed knowledge on how to approach the subject, and the equipment to apply that knowledge.  Prior to 2010, we were working to stop the destruction of our soils.  We now have the pieces to improve our soils natural productivity and` make a serious attempt to reach our goal of a sustainable cropping system with reduced synthetic inputs. 

    How do we reach our goal?  My video and document search, along with our limited experience, shows that it is imperative that soil organic matter be increased.  I list several points, not necessarily prioritized, that I have found to be important.   1--manage our cropping system with an eye on ways to reduce herbicide, insecticide, and fungicide applications.   These all have components that negatively influence the development of soil organic matter.    2--we need to do minimal ground disturbance.  This minimizes soil structure damage, keeps roots intact to help hold soil in place and leave root and worm channels exposed at the soil surface.  This also minimizes loss of surface cover.  This also maximizes any mycorrhizal network we may be able to develop for a nutrient/moisture transport, and communication pathway between plants.   3--develop and maintain surface residue.  Residue protects the soil surface, reduces compaction from equipment, feeds the soil macrofauna along with some microfauna, and helps moderate the soil temperature.   4--minimize compaction.  This will help improve soil structure.  Compacted areas have poor soil structure and promote anaerobic soil conditions that increase the types of fungi and bacteria that cause plant diseases and insect predation.  Aerobic soil conditions, on the other hand, increase fungi and bacteria types that promote healthy soil organisms, and reduce pathogenic organisms that negatively impact plants     5--we need to change our fertilizer practices, to minimize the lowering of soil pH,  minimize harm to microbes, and reduce nutrient antagonism.   6--develop techniques to extend the time living roots are in the ground, --preferably all year long.    7--increase microbes and fungi, in our soil.  With our history of a monoculture wheat system, our soils are extremely bacterial.  Soils would perform better if the Bacteria to Fungi ratio was closer to 1/1.   Fungi are important to soil and plant health.  They convert nutrients into more plant available forms.  When available, mycorrhizea fungal networks are an important transporter of moisture and nutrients to plant roots.  Fungal mycellium serve as a line of defense for plant diseases.  Fungi can be promoted by doing all of the (1-6) points discussed above which boils down to, --providing fungi food for as much of the year as possible and stopping the destruction of their hyphae and mycelium.  The chart below shows the relationship between plant types and the bacteria to fungi ratio.  The chart shows there is not much on the "left" of our wheat monoculture other than weeds and rocks.

    For the past 2-3 years, I have participated with a group looking into soil and plant testing, organic forms of fertilizers, and ways to manipulate soil biology to increase soil health.  This has been a valuable experience, and there is more to learn.  

    During this time I have come to the conclusion that we can build healthy soils by proper crop management without amendments.  This requires absolute minimal tillage, keeping the soil surface covered, replacing chemical fallow with green fallow, diversifying our crop cultivars, extending the time we keep a living root in the ground, and paying attention to the synthetic inputs we apply to our crops so as to not destroy the positive gains we make from other practices employed.  The use of animals is not mandatory, but it has been shown that grazing animals speed up the positive soil health processes when properly managed.   

    I feel our operation has the equipment and basic knowledge to begin the process of building soil health.  We now need to develop management skills to make it all happen.  

    As a final note to this post:  Absolute minimal tillage by itself works well too stop erosion and establish a base from which to develop practices that will improve our soils natural productivity.  However, actual improvement of our soils natural productivity comes by managing soil biology through growing diverse plant cultivars.  The intensity, meaning the time with living roots in the ground, and the time taken to mitigate negative components to soil biology, such as synthetic amendments, sets the pace for improving our soils natural productive capacity.

Building Soil Resilience

 

  < Loyal to the Soil >     1:02:07

Above is the link to a presentation (3/3/2020) by a young progressive farmer, Derek Axten, about his journey of building soil health and a sustainable agriculture operation in the challenging environment of Minton, SK.  It's amazing to see what can be done in a relatively short time at a location with low rainfall, short season, on shallow soils with low infiltration.  Even though the Axten operation is a long way from St. John, WA, in an entirely different growing environment, I found several ideas that are food for thought. 

    Axten's operation centers around five principles:  Keeping the soil covered at all times, minimize soil disturbance, diversify plant species, keep a living root in the ground as long as possible, and incorporate livestock when possible.  The presentation tells their story of how they try to carry out those principles.  They also show ways they are adding value to the crops they raise.

    Their operation includes intercropping.  Flax and Chickpeas planted in alternate rows works well for them.  Flax and lentils work for them although others say this doesn't work.  Flax with another forb works.  Flax and mustard or canola works.  Flax and peas work and they don't have to be standup peas.  It's important that the crops mature fairly close together.  They don't normally add fertilizer with their interseeded crops except for a starter with micros.  They haven't found a companion crop that works well with their cereal crops.  They are doing some interseeding with a planter that seeds a companion when the grain is at flag to heading.  They are not finding a yield drag by going out to 15" with the planter, and also, with singulation, they have cut seed rates back giving a substantial cost saving.

AMAZING CARBON

     Recently I have become aware of Dr. Christine Jones, a soil scientist from Australia.  Her schtick is (CMN) "common mycorrhizal network" and (SC) "soil carbon".  She has a website:  amazingcarbon.com.  She is a popular conference speaker and has a compelling message of hope that our depleted soils can be restored in a short period of time.  She has youtube presentations going back more than 10 years; however, her more recent work (<2yrs) is probably more useful because of the rapid increase of the knowledge base of the soil biome the last couple of years.
     Dr. Jones' presentations and articles put a lot of pieces together that I have been having difficulty linking.  Although my knowledge base is wanting, I now have a better understanding about how to improve soil health.

<---Pic of a wheat field in Australia.  This field was originally grass, divided by a fence, and has never been tilled.  For the past 30 years the field was no-tilled with a rotation of fallow/wheat.  The fence was recently removed along with it's diverse cover of mostly weedy species cultivars.  The old fence line shows no drought symptoms where the remainder of the wheat field is dead from moisture stress.  This indicates that no-till, and good soil structure by themselves do not provide sufficient moisture for a monoculture crop in times of drought.  An intact mycorrhizal network in the old fence line provided sufficient moisture and nutrients for that strip of wheat to successfully mature with grain.
A FEW POINTS / STATEMENTS OF PARTICULAR INTEREST: (from her presentation)
----life on earth is carbon based.  (a reminder statement)
----as farmers, we first and foremost harvest sunlight.  (a true statement but who thinks that way)
----all life centers around photosynthate, a simple sugar manufactured in the chloroplasts of green leaves. (I think there are a few exceptions to this statement, --but I accept as generally true.)
----building soil carbon depends on quantity and efficiency of harvested sunlight.
----diversity of cultivars improve efficiency of harvested sunlight. (just starting to be understood)
----many of the processes that take place in the soil are either not known, or not well understood.
----all fungicides, herbicides, synthetic fertilizers - particularly N, and synthetic seed treats, lower the efficiency of harvested sunlight and result in being detrimental to soil biota, making it more difficult to restore our depleted soil carbon.
----soils can be either a source or sink for CO2.
----all cultivation, and bare soils are sources for CO2 in the atmosphere.  Farming practices, world wide, contribute more CO2 to the atmosphere than all the fossil fuel burned. (an astounding statement)
----in the last 150yrs, the worlds prime ag lands have lost between 30% - 75% of their carbon to the atmosphere.
----mineral depletion in food between 1940-1991 is significant: Today, we need twice the meat, three times the fruit, and 4-5 times the vegetables to equal the nutrition of 1940.  (This is astounding to me, and until recently, -- simply unbelievable.  It takes time, and a lot of reading to get ones mind to accept new ideas.)
----carbon conversion efficiency (CCE) is much higher in root derived, than in top growth derived biomass.
----mycorrhizal networks transport, water, nutrients, and carbon.
----mycorrhizal networks increase resistance to diseases and insects increasing plant vigor.
----mycorrhizal networks improve soil biological health.
----the magic number for a cover crop seems to be eight or more cultivars for vary rapid development of soil carbon.

<--In New Zealand a field consisting of volcanic ash that has been no-tilled 30yrs to a rye/clover mix for grazing cattle.  The pic shows ~5" of dark soil formed over ash bed in that time frame.  The dark color is indicative of carbon.

<--5 acres of that field, shown above, was seeded with a mix of ~12 cultivars.  FIVE MONTHS later, this spade depth of dark soil showed the result.  There is > 8"of dark carbon rich soil that developed over that entire 5ac plot.  (The finger points to the light colored ash ground below the dark carbon rich soil.)  I wouldn't expect this dramatic result in our climate, but I think an important part of the puzzle is expressed in these pic's.


JONES'   ---  FIVE PRINCIPLES FOR SOIL RESTORATION        --- Light Farming ---
       1----Green is good!  (Year long green is better )
       2----Microbes matter!  (Plant/Microbe bridge is being increasingly recognized)
       3----Plant Diversity is not Dispensable!  (Every plant have different Exudates)
       4----Limit Chemical Use!  (All synthetic chemistry harms the soil Biome)
       5----Animal Integration!  (Not imperative but highly beneficial)

2018 Cover Crop Update

SUMMARY OF 2018 COVER CROP EXPERIENCE: (the details are below this summary)  -- The property history is:  farmed conventionally from ~1900 through 1986.  CRP  from 1986 through 2013.  2014 field seeded to spring barley.  2015 seeded to 5 & 9 cultivar cover crop.  2016 seeded to winter wheat.  2017 seeded to spring canola.  2018 seeded to 5 cultivar cover crop.
     The cover crop (~75ac) was the first seeded for the year, with (~ 10ac) seeded last, after the cash crops.  All the cover crop cultivars had a high emergence rate with a good to excellent stand on poor as well as good soil.  The amount of biomass grown represented the type of ground under it.  10#N placed with the seed would have paid big dividends in the poor soil areas.  We did an early takeout this year instead of letting it go to maturity.  The hope was that we could maximize the N retention and minimize water loss.  We took soil tests from our normal fallow area as well as on the cover crop area.  As usual they are a source of frustration.  Inconsistent, What? that's not right! how can that be?!  The only consistent element is the use of 3" moisture to grow the CC.  I'm disappointed in this because our early takeout should have resulted in less moisture use by the CC.  Well, it's just one piece of data in a short list of try's.  I can see that I should be taking these tests myself.  Even though I have a competent person pulling these tests, I can't be sure they are taken consistently in the same place time after time, and without that knowledge it's difficult for me to analyze the results.  (Most of this summary was posted to the Cover Crop Page.)
                                            --------------------------------------
    4/15/18?? --Seeded ~75ac field with 5 cultivar cover crop.  Two cultivars of large seed (forage pea, forage oats), and 3 cultivars of small seed (white dutch clover, daikon radish, pardenni lentil).
    5/12/18?? --Seeded ~ 5ac with remaining 5 cultivar cover crop all mixed together.  Earlier seeding was separated by size with large seed on 20" row's and small seeds between the large seed rows.  We had great emergence of the early seeded cultivars, including the Dutch White Clover.
    7/7/18 --We started the takeout process for the 5 cultivar (forage oat, forage pea, daikon radish, small lentil, white dutch clover) cover crop.  The intent this year was to takeout at the height of N production (early pod setting).  We were a little late (~1-1.5wks).  Currently the peas and lentils and radish have finished bloom and well into pod/seed development.  The clover has some blooms.  The forage oats has headed and have some seed in the milk.  East of the ditch, the planting is ~3wks later and takeout is probably 1-1.5wks too early.  We should have added some N (~10#).  I think it would have resulted in significant more biomass.  As it is, we have some areas with good height and color, and others are shorter, and yellowish in color.  Many of the areas without complete canopy have Russian Thistle and Skeleton Weed competing with the covers.
        The late seeded cover mix, which was all mixed together and seeded out at the same depth as the canola at Thornton showed difference in emergence between cultivars.  The radish was the only indicator that the small seed mix was fairly well distributed throughout the large seed mix.  The White Dutch Clover did not emerge well.  The other four cultivars emerged well.  Radish, because of it's early bolt and flowering, is a good indicator of field distribution of the seed mix.  What we have learned at this point from three years experience is that radish will likely emerge if held to around 1.5" depth.
        We have an interest in four types of takeout processes.  We hope to find one that will leave our White Dutch Clover and take out the remainder.
        Because of logistics issues we were not able to try a crimper.  We would like to have tried that method although we are skeptical that it would work with our cultivars or terrain.
        We sprayed ~20ac (one swath west of the ditch, and all the cover on the east side of the ditch) with a mix of 2-4D and Rt3 left over from the bordering chem fall field.
        We used the 26' Shulte mower on ~20ac, --mostly on the upper west side with wide headlands on the north and south borders.  At a distance the mowed area looks pretty good; however, close inspection shows cultivars missed.  We'll see if the forage oats become a contaminate in next years fall wheat.
        On the 9th we sprayed one quart per acre of paraquat and 2qt/100g of Outrigger with 20gpa total solution on the remaining field and over some of the mowed ground.

     8/14/18-- The cover crop takeout methods were evaluated.  The Roundup and Gromoxone applications look pretty good; however, the mowed area has recovered with the skeleton weed showing a lot of bloom.  We applied Gromoxone to the mowed ground to stop the Skeleton weed bloom.
     9/20/18--Some recovery of Rush Skeleton Weed, and it was flowering and some matured.  It appears that the Gromoxone is the best takeout method.  It burned everything down fast and the Rush Skeleton Weed was very slow to recover.  The Glyphosate was too slow in burn down allowing the target plants to continue competing for 4-6 days longer than the Gromoxone.
     We did not make a Glyphosate application prior to seeding our winter wheat.   There were few Russian thistles present and no grass weeds observed.  There was a significant amount of Rush Skeleton weed present.  I'm not sure whether we are making any headway in controlling that pest(Rush Skeleton weed).  It's not suppose to compete well with a growing crop; however, this piece of ground with shallow soil and heavy population, may be an exception.
      11/21/18  --Evaluated winter wheat seeded into the cover crop ground.  The wheat was seeded during the 3rd wk of September into dry conditions.  We received sufficient moisture the 4th wk of October to germinate the winter wheat, but by then the weather was quite cool with freezing nights and near freezing days.  The winter wheat has mostly emerged (~95%) but very small, ranging from spike to a few two leaves.                                                                    

COVER-CROP INFORMATION

       A good article in No-Till Farmer (June 18th, 2018 edition) on the experience of John Stigge.  Stigge no-tills corn, soybeans, wheat, oats, milo and raises livestock on 2000ac near Washington, KS.  He has cover cropped ground for many years.  Real progress has been made to soil health in the past 5 years, after years of trial and error, and some notable failures.   He has found that grazing cover-crops have given him positive income when grain has not, and that grazing has accelerated microbiology.   Here are some points he expressed that I found pertinent.  Keep in mind this is KS, with a much longer growing season than we have in the Inland Northwest.
     ---Three main species work synergistically!  He states that brassicas, legumes and grasses work together supporting soil biology and providing nutrients for cash crops.  He has found that using the three together has been the secret to getting the results he wants.
     ---Use of Grasses in mixes!  Stigge finds grasses are an essential foundation to cover-crop mixes.  He likes annual ryegrass as it's relatively inexpensive, grows extensive, deep root systems, and are easy to terminate.  After starting to use annual ryegrass, his OM started to jump.
      Cereal rye is used by many no-tillers.  He states that those looking for cover, but have to put up with late seeding dates, go this route but he found cereal rye problematic and quit using the cultivar.  (my note:  I have found only one other article expressing a concern using cereal rye, --and I know it is problematic.  We are still rouging cereal rye out of our fields after 70+ years since it's introduction.  That one article cautioned, to use cereal rye seed that the supplier can certify being one cereal rye cultivar, and not a mix of 5 cultivars that is commonly sold as cereal rye.  Growth habits vary with each type of cultivar. )

<---pic shows cereal rye plant in WW.  65 years ago you could hardly see the wheat for the rye.  Today, we still walk our fields and find a few stalks of rye.  If you miss a year, you have a bigger problem the next year.  
         Stigge also noted that cereal rye, once it hits boot stage has the value of compost from a grazing standpoint.
        Oats are a great soil conditioner and hold their grazing value through it's life cycle.  Stigge likes using oats, vetch, peas, and a brassica for weed control in his organic program.  After it dies he grazes calves through the winter with no additional feed.  He once rolled out a bale of alfalfa and they used it for bedding, not interested in eating any of it.
    ---Use of Legumes in mixes!  Stigge includes a legume in all his mixes.  They are expensive but very important part of his mixes and about half the mix cost.  They not only sequester free N in the soil but support rhizobia bacterium to fix N, and feed mycorrhizal fungi that serve as the transportation network bringing nutrients from plant to plant.  Legumes also aid in the formation of globulin which is important for soil aggregation.  Vetch (seeded in summer or early fall) is a good spring grazing cultivar if you don't have to terminate to early.  He likes Naomi Wooly Pod vetch, a variety from Australia.  It will start nodules after seven days.  He likes cow peas and they all die with one 37F night in either spring or fall (probably not an option for us where we will reach that temp, or lower, nearly every month of the year).  Stigge likes flying on crimson clover with annual ryegrass.  Berseem clover is for warm season use.  He has found Sunn hemp is good.  Seed is becoming more available and with better inoculants.  It does require heat though to perform well.  Sunn hemp builds a lot of N and has a tap root that goes deep.
      ---Use of Brassicas in mixes!  He has found that brassicas bring up nutrients from deep in the profile and make them available to cash crops.  Their exudates break off calcium, sulfur and other minerals from phosphorous compounds to make them more available.  He likes mustards and radishes, and particularly the bayou kale-rapeseed cross.  This cross has an exceptional root structure.  This cross also brings in a lot of leaf eaters, but they quickly are countered by predator bugs, so don't apply insecticides.  Stigge finds that Daikon radish is great for loosing top soil but the leaves are bitter and livestock don't like it until after a frost.

ROUNDUP -- (Good or Bad ??)

UPDATE 2/24/18:  I recently received a critique on the book "Whitewash", a bash piece on GMO's and Glyphosate by Carey Gillam.  The timing and purpose of the book was to educate the public on the cancer causing effects of glyphosate and pressure the EU to not re-register glyphosate for use last fall.  The critique by Karl Haro von Mogal shreds the book and shows how, through the misuse of data,  and using partial truths, the anti-glyphosate crowd is misleading the public for the benefit of the "Organic" movement.  It's a bit difficult to read.  Because of the mirth employed, I had to read it twice to get the straight of the message.  The critique can be read at: < "Whitewash" is hogwash>

    Glyphosate was introduced to the public in 1974 following it's discovery by Monsanto chemist John E Franz in 1970.  Since it's discovery, Glyphosate has been under constant scrutiny with research trying to prove what glyphosate does or does not do.  What we do know is that it has been a very effective herbicide.  We also know that there are some resistant cultivars, and more will become resistant to the effects of glyphosate.  There is no revelation here, all our chemistry has developed resistant cultivars, --it's merely a matter of time.
     Our operation has used a lot of glyphosate and we have been comfortable with knowing that research proved over and over that it is safe for humans and animals.  At times we seem to bathe in the stuff.  We try not to ingest the chemical, but that has probably happened as well.  The first real concern over safety I'm aware of came around 2010, when Purdue professor emeritus, Dr. Don Huber dropped a bomb, stating that Glyphosate and GMO's are harming human, animal and earth's health.  The research that he based his conclusions on has never been duplicated.  With his continual repeating the claim, and the inability to duplicate the results at Purdue and other universities, Purdue disavowed him.  He is the darling of the anti-GMO crowd and continues to lecture world wide on the evils of glyphosate and GMO's.  The next big hit on glyphosate was when the World Health Organization (WHO) through the International Agency for Research on Cancers (IARC) published a statement that glyphosate "probably" is a Group 2a carcinogen.  The label "probably" can be used on a lot of chemistry and preservatives used for growing and processing our food.  Forty three years of research should be able to determine yes or no, --not a "probable".   However, if you want it to be a carcinogen but can't prove it then the next best thing is to damn it with the adverb "probably".   In fact,  Reuters has an investigative arm.  They state that the IARC research conclusions were changed from no evidence of being a carcinogen in the draft version, to a neutral or positive conclusion of being a carcinogen in the final published version.   The < Glyphosate Battle > is an interesting read.   Reuters has been stonewalled by both WHO and the researchers of the IARC on the reasoning for changing their position, --it wasn't apparently the science.   Since WHO's pronouncement, anti-Monsanto/Roundup/GMO activists, using all available media upped the public concern to the point where several countries are considering removing glyphosate from the register of approved herbicides, along with the State of California.
      In the November 2017 edition of No-Till Farmer there is an article on glyphosate titled,  Is Glyphosate Harming Your No-Till Soils?  The article states that the glyphosate molecule is hanging around longer than anticipated.  Glyphosate is negatively effecting some soil microbe communities.  Glyphosate is encouraging some plant diseases.  Glyphosate is interfering with nutrient uptake.  And, glyphosate is effecting mycorrhiza.  Some serious stated findings.
       I have been working with WSU researcher, Tim Paulitz, for several years on glyphosate interaction with soil biota, --principally bacteria and fungi.  Over the years I have gained a lot of respect and confidence in his work and knowledge of glyphosate.  He heads up a lot of glyphosate research and reads journal entries about glyphosate research worldwide.  His own research projects have found no statistical difference in either the bacteria or fungi communities, between ground that has never had glyphosate applied, and ground that has had a lot of glyphosate applied.  He is doing this study over a wide area of the Palouse and is working in three rainfall zones, ---high, medium, low.  I asked him why this study was in conflict with his findings.  His response:
       Tracy, ---- I looked over the No-Till article.  There is nothing new in this article, except the work from Cornell. The rest of the article refers to old work by Robert Kremer. As I mentioned before, he did not have the molecular tools to really address the questions about microbial communities.  He was only working with the small fraction of fungi and bacteria that can be cultured-  less than 1% of what is out there.  Kind of like trying to paint a picture of the world by only looking through a small narrow slit. Rather than trying to rebut his work, I think it is more useful to look at the new work we have done.

        But I will comment on the article from Cornell by Aristilde.  By the way, this article was reviewed by Kremer.  First of all, the No-Till article was misleading in talking about this work, when it said that “beneficial Pseudomonas… decreased when glyphosate seeped into the surface soil layer by leaching or release from glyphosate treated plants”.  In the Cornell paper, they did not work in the soil, or with plants.  All their work was done in the lab in culture. There may have been other work that they did in soil, but I could not find it published.  They took 4 biocontrol strains of the bacterium Pseudomonas and tested them in culture to see how sensitive they were to glyphosate.  Three were relatively insensitive, but one was completely inhibited at 5 mM.  It was also slightly inhibited at 0.5 mM. This is well known- some bacteria have a form of the enzyme that is sensitive to glyphosate, others are insensitive.  Nothing new here. In fact, the original gene that was used in Roundup Ready crops came from a bacterium, Agrobacterium.  But when I converted the molar concentrations into ppm, it came out to 84 ppm and 845 ppm.  Bacteria in the soil environment will never be exposed to these concentrations, unless there is a chemical spill on the soil. So I would say that this study is not really relevant to the real world.  Many things we do in the lab are useful to develop theories and basic understanding, but the key question is, --does this really happen in the real world? If you hit just about any microbe with a high enough concentration of a chemical in culture, growth will be inhibited.  Also remember that bacteria and fungi may behave in culture very differently from in the soil.   In the study they used high tech state of the art metabolomics to show that the shikimic acid pathway and aromatic amino acids were inhibited.  This has been known for 40 years.  These are the target of glyphosate, --an enzyme in the shikimate pathway that plants, bacteria and fungi use to make aromatic amino acids, which are essential.  They also showed you could supply these amino acids to the bacteria and overcome the growth inhibition. Again, this is nothing new.

         Let me address a few other points in the article. The work on Roundup ready soybean and Fusarium was not done with isogenic lines, so the difference could have been inherent differences in the genetic background of the two lines, There is a picture  of petri dishes with bacteria in the article, and says he can tell by looking at them that there are mostly non-beneficials in the glyphosate treatment.  You cannot tell by looking at cultures.  He talks about gene issues, and having transgenic DNA in the soil, --DNA is quickly broken down in the soil, and there is no evidence of these genes being transferred to other bacteria.  He talks about nutrient complications, --again, a non-issue for us since we do not have GMO wheat, --and others from Purdue have rebutted this argument.  The amount of glyphosate in the environment is so small, it does not play a role in chelating nutrients in the soil, which are in much larger concentrations.  He also cites a study on his farm of taking out fescue and then planting soybean, and noted higher levels of fungus on the roots of soybean in the glyphosate take out.  This is classic green bridge effect, and we have known about this risk for 30 years.  

        So, in summary, I think the main risks of glyphosate that our farmers in the PNW have to worry about is the green bridge effect of carrying over root pathogens to a new crop (and we have known this for 30 years) and the risk of developing glyphosate resistant weeds by overuse, --as has happened in the Midwest.  In the end, farmers have to weigh risks with benefits.

        Timothy Paulitz,USDA-ARS,Wheat Health,Genetics and Quality Research Unit,Washington State University, Pullman, WA, Phone- 509 335-7077, 
email: timothy.paulitz@ars.usda.gov

      The Green bridge referenced by Tim P. was discovered and studied by Dr. Jim Cook of WSU.  Root diseases can be carried over from one cultivar to another when planted into a  dying cultivar.  The recommendation is to not plant within 20 days of a Roundup application. Time is part of the recipe for sanitizing a field along with cultivar rotation and cultivar diversity.

HOW DO I SEE THE FUTURE!

         Regardless of  glyphosate or any other chemistry's fate, --they are all under attack, we have to get smarter about raising crops with fewer chemical inputs.  That means we have to learn how to manage cover crops for the purpose of suppressing weed competition and supplying nutrients to our cash crops.  This is a challenge, and the "How-To Book" is just starting to be written for the Inland Pacific Northwest.

Comparisons using Rain Simulator

     There are a lot of rainfall simulators on the net; however, this one is one of the best.  It's a clear demonstration of differences with five types of management, and well narrated.  The comparisons are, --conventional tillage, no-tillage, mixed species cover crop, compacted overgrazed rangeland, and well managed rangeland.  Watch for the water splash on the conventional tilled ground.
     This video was taken in the North Central part of South Dakota about 10 miles east of the Missouri River in a 16" rainfall zone, in a slightly rolling landscape.
                                      Rainfall simulator in SD (17:46min)
     All the simulators I have observed applies rain in a short amount of time on terrain that is relatively level.  Simulators have application rates of 1.5"-2" of rainfall in 10-20 minutes.  Many areas in the world would find these rates as moderate, but for our hills it would be devastating.   Fields with surfaces disturbed would be washed away.  When I started this quest to improve our resource conservation ethic in the early/mid 1970's that's what I envisioned.  At the time, we were receiving a lot of snow on frozen ground and received downpours from summer thunder storms fairly regular.  Severe erosion annually was the rule, not the exception, and no-till was a new term to be learned.  Fortunately for our fields, by the mid 80's we were designated  as in a drought condition, and erosion rates have fallen dramatically to this day.  Now, severe erosion is more the exception than the rule, even on cultivated ground.  However, this fall, our area has received two events that have left some fields in an eroded state.  The pattern is set for serious erosion on unprotected land in 2018, as it was in 2017.  Is this going to be a new trend, ?????, time will tell.  The fields that we steward are prepared, --bring it on!

SOIL HEALTH PRINCIPLES

       Over time I have viewed a lot of video around and about soil health.  Occasionally you run across a jewel.  Recently I came across the 'Merit or Myth series'.  These are a series of short videos (≈3min each) produced in South Dakota through cooperation between ARS-USDA, various researchers, and growers around the state.   < Merit and Myth website >     
       These videos do a good job of explaining what goes into improving soil health.  This series is also a good introduction to Dr. Elaine Ingham's, 'The Soil Food Web', --the need for improving the biology of the soil.  Her video links can be found at: < Dr. Ingham's video link >  Some of the venues are hard to hear.
      These videos are compelling discussions on principals of no-till and soil health, but they don't tell us how to apply them in the Palouse.  The Principles are sound, but we have to figure out how to apply them in our climate conditions.

Low Disturbance vs High Disturbance DS drills

     All DS drills can seed and grow an excellent crop and improve soil health.  Farming too efficiently use the moisture we are provided, and the pace too improving soil health is the difference I see between high and low disturbance drill designs.
   High disturbance drills (the term I use for all hoe, double disc, and some single disc openers) all share a similar problem, --they move or disrupt too much soil which exposes the soil surface.  As a result they break infiltration channels, they accelerate decomposition of cover, they plant unwanted seed, and they damage the soil food web if any is present.  There are places in our field where even the CrossSlot fits into the high disturbance category, --on steep slopes where side pressure causes a wider slot, and where we turn.
     I distinguish between DS drills by the amount of soil surface they disturb.  They range from disrupting nearly the entire surface down to a narrow slot of <1.5 inches.  I would say that most hoe drills fall in the high disturbance category, and most single disc drills would fall in the low disturbance category and the CrossSlot in the ultra-low disturbance category.  Others may have their own scale.  By the numbers:
      High disturbance drills:  Their configuration disrupts a large percentage (>70%) of the soil surface and most or all of the surface residue. 
      Low disturbance drills:  Their configuration disrupts (<30%) of the soil surface and about 60% of the residue.
      Ultra-low disturbance drills:  Their configuration disrupts (<15%) of the soil surface and maybe 40% of the residue.
      Whether the numbers accurately describe the drill type performance is not the point here.  What is important is that they represent the concept that the more soil and residue that is disturbed, the more moisture you lose from evaporation, the less moisture your field can absorb from later rains because of disrupted channels, the more biological communities in the soil you disrupt which effects plant food production,  and the more unwanted seed that will be  planted grow and compete with the crop.
      To maximize moisture retention and absorption, you will want to minimize disturbance of the soil surface, grow and maintain the maximum amount of residue possible, and leave it as tall as possible in the absence of a growing crop. (see other posts for the reasoning behind this statement).  It's my belief as well that this statement is valid for all rainfall regions whether 7" or 70".

Erosion Spring 2017

           The winter of 2016-17 has been long, windy, cold, and with significant snow.  With frozen ground, and piled up snow I was sure that we would have horrible erosion in the area.  I was sort of looking forward to how our operation handled a fast melt condition.  As it has turned out, the heavy rains predicted didn't turn up, so we had as gentle of runoff as one could hope for.  At this point in time we have lost nearly all the snow except those areas that drifted heavily.  All of the cultivated fields seeded to WW have significant sheet and rill erosion, but it could have been a lot worse.

This pic shows conventional tilled field with a long slope showing significant erosion, --pretty typical.  It's noticeably more ugly where the corner was turned and vertical seeding took place.

This pic shows our CC seeded to WW.  The WW was seeded close to freeze up so it is just emerging now.  The ground is in great shape with most of the CC dead, but the late seeding will cost us yield.  I don't see any grassy weeds at this point in time.  The radishes appear to have done their job by intercepting water and helping penetrate the frozen ground.  We were able to intercept most of my neighbors water coming off a conventionally tilled field.  The thin standing radish residue did help intercept snow.  This greatly reduced the drifting.  The snow coverage wasn't as even as in the more dense, taller grain stubble.

This pic shows erosion in our field where there is virtually no ground cover and seeded vertically.  This is WW on WP ground.

This pic is the same field (WW on WP) but in an area where the seeding was done on contour.  Even with our ULD-DS system using the CrossSlot drill, erosion will happen if you don't have good surface cover, or if you are seeding vertically.  There were no radish holes for intercepting and moving water through the frost layer.  The pic shows staining in the lower half.  You don't see the erosion tracks in the top half but they are there, --following the drill rows and breaking out, going down the slope.  The soil was redeposited down slope leaving this track, and most of the water lost had a low sediment load.  It will be a challenge to maintain adequate surface coverage when low/no residue spring crops are grown.  In this situation if we would have seeded earlier and also seeded a low rate (0.5-1.0#?) of radish with the WW, less erosion would have resulted.  I would like to see radish going into the winter about 1" diameter and ≈24" long, and ≈48" apart (it's a guess).  That's doable if seeded by first of October in our climate.  When radish freezes(dies), the tuber shrinks quickly.  I'm convinced this will be a good practice.  It's the plant population that is the unknown for me.

VALUE OF TALL STUBBLE (RESIDUE)

 [SUMMARY] --The taller and more dense the standing residue, the less snow displacement takes place.
      As, when I started direct seeding (DS) many years ago, much of the time there is nothing dramatic to see from an enhanced conservation practice, --DS compared to conventional tillage.
      But, there are exceptions, and this winter is one of them.   This winter is a showcase for what tall residue left by the stripper header can mean for the coming crop.

Above:  This pic shows snow accumulation of 12", fairly evenly distributed over the field of spring wheat stubble that stands ≈24" tall.  Compare this pic to the pic below.

     This pic shows accumulation of 6" in a neighboring field of mowed/harvested stubble standing 7".  Both fields experienced the same snow and wind events.  Notice the small area of standing stubble ≈16"tall and the snow that accumulated in and down wind of the clump.  Which condition provides more moisture for the coming years crop?  --Obviously the condition shown in the top pic.  In this instance with the snow bearing 0.25" moisture for every 2" of snow,  the field in the top pic has accumulated potentially 0.75" more moisture than the field in the lower pic.

       To continue this story, the pic above shows a conventionally tilled field seeded to ww.  The point here is that with no vertical blockage (tall residue), the recent 3" snow fall left the field and piled up in the usual places.  The very white areas are what is left of that 3" snow fall.  The slightly darker area is the old crusted snow  The field shown in the pic at the top of this post did hold most of that snow fall for an additional ≈0.25" of moisture.

 
The two pictures, above, show two fields seeded to winter wheat.  On the left is seeded into a 9 cultivar CC.  The vertical blockage is relatively sparse, but still having an effect.  The snow cover is not as even as in the more dense stripper headed wheat and barley stubble, but snow displacement is significantly less than WW fields with no vertical blockage.  We have radish in this field.  The radishes have deteriorated, leaving holes through the frost layer. We expect to retain all the moisture available from the snow for that crop.   On the right is WW seeded on spring pea ground.  The crop was seeded into heavy residue (SP plus past WW residue); however, that residue provides no vertical blockage.  There are noticeable snow drifts, indicating that we have large areas in this field where the crop is missing more than 2" of potential moisture.   In this field we will be dependent on thawing conditions.  If the thaw is gradual, we'll retain the moisture in the field although it's distribution will be uneven.  If the thaw is accelerated, we'll lose a lot of this moisture, similar to 2014.  

    (UPDATE:  In late February we had a Chinook,  which is when warm air suddenly moves in, and in this case a light rain accompanied it, that quickly removed the snow.  When I saw water in the ditch near our home, I geared up and walked the fields to see where the water was originating, --hoping it was all from my neighbors portion of the drainage.  It wasn't!!  First evident was my neighbors winter wheat on black fallow ground.  It showed like a mottled black/white area beyond the border of our field.   The snow, a thin layer because of previous winds, was mostly gone, and water was coursing down the hillside leaving a badly eroded hillside.  The ditch water was heavy laden with soil.  Little, if any, of that moisture was able to enter the ground.  Our winter wheat on chem fallow ground had good surface protection, but mostly flat from a year of fallow.  It caught very little additional snow compared to my neighbors.  I saw water was rolling down our hillsides the same as our neighbors.  The difference was that the water we were losing was mostly clear.   There was very little soil included in the ditch water.  The bright spot though was the field of winter wheat we seeded into the cover crop.  When I walked out of our ww on chem fallow into the field of ww on cover crop it was like night and day.  We had a lot of snow caught in the cover crop residue.  There was no movement of water down the slopes of that field.  Every drop of water entered the soil profile.  The cover crop (specifically the radish) did its job of saving the moisture.  The ground was frozen 4-6" deep, but the radish grew, died, deteriorated, and left a hole through the frozen soil surface that allowed moisture to enter the soil profile.)

Another observation:  I decided to check on the frost depth and whether the snow cover made a difference. This was a chilly morning in single digit temperatures and no wind.  By this time we have experienced a lot of cold weather including three nights of below zero temperatures.   In this field with 12" snow cover, one stab and a push by standing on the trenching shovel drove it more than a foot into the ground. That was a surprise, and pretty good.  It felt like the shovel was going through a big rice crispy treat.  In another field I found a bare ridge with ww and tried the same technique.  I stabbed repeatedly in the same spot and never got more than 2".  The third field, a flat, had 6" snow cover.  I stabbed repeatedly and eventually would have been able to get the shovel to the depth shown in the picture, but it would have been a hole instead of a slice.
      I'm not sure what part snow cover has played in frost depth at this point in time.
      I think the field shown above is frozen fairly deep but has developed a better soil structure over the years using DS and now has a lower bulk density.  This should allow moisture to enter the soil profile faster than the other two fields that were conventionally tilled.

2016 Harvest Update

   This year has been the most confusing of my 60+ years of farming.  The weather looked like it was going to treat us pretty good, but, mostly after the fact, we found it wasn't as good as it first appeared.  I thought we missed the frost in April, but as it turned out, not quite.  The moisture was coming along just fine, then it shut off.  The years moisture was just short of our long term average.  The heat wave in May, although not real hot, apparently did damage depending on where the crop was in it's development.  The temperature for this growing and harvest season was quite comfortable.  A relatively mild winter, and no 100+ days. Very different from 2015's long stretch of 100+ temperatures.  All in all everything was looking pretty good.  Looking back on Art Douglas' prediction, I think he was right on for my immediate area.  There apparently was a big swing of temperature in the April-May period that set us up for falling number issues depending on area, and wheat cultivar.  I knew when it happened but didn't think anything about it, --not severe, not unusual.  Everything I hear is antidotal; however, I'm of the opinion that the test is badly flawed.  Inconsistency in the ability to replicate the numbers, even in a relatively narrow range, is wide spread.  It appears to me that the milling industry has found a way to purchase high quality grain, --cheap, and at our expense.  Hopefully, this will be addressed before another harvest.  I have been hearing of some fantastic yields, but some are pretty mediocre,  and some fields have very low FN's, but not all of them.  With the quality issues and plummeting prices, this will be a year we hope to never repeat.
     Now, for our farm.  ---Wheat yields were good, but not exceptional, --with exception.  The FN's varied across the fields ranging from 279-330.  Wheat yields ranged from 83 to a little over 100.  This yield range is close to norm for us at this stage,--slow but steady gain over time.  We have a variety of soils ranging from very complex shallow ground to deep Athena soils.  Our cover crop ground was the 83 and we consider that fantastic.  This is the worst ground we have with complex soils and large areas that have a couple of inches of soil over fractured rock, and infested with Rush Skeleton weed.  This area was seeded to a multiple cultivar (brassica/legume) cover crop last year and used 3" water compared to our CF.  This spring there was less than an inch (0.8") difference in moisture.  There were variations in yield over the CC area but none of the shallow spots showed significant drop as was expected.  Was this unexpected yield do to the cover crop?  Too early to tell!  One year doesn't make a trend, but since it wasn't a flop, it's encouragement to expand the practice.  Our experience is paralleling the experience of other farmers in the area, --covers used 3" moisture, yields didn't collapse.  This also matches the literature on the subject.  The remainder of our Brundage 96 looked exceptional through harvest, but didn't end up yielding exceptional.  The Puma went over a hundred.
--- The mustard was a disappointment.  Yields ranged from ≈680 to 870#/a.  The stand emerged well with an OK population.  Quality was good.  It was harvested with the stripper head.  The field Rep. indicated that they were finding similar results region wide, and no real explanation as to why.  In our case, my thoughts are: --we should seed 8-10#/ac instead of the 5-6, and that we seeded to shallow.  we had emergence over too long of time span.  I'm guessing that another factor was that the little heat wave in May hit the mustard at the wrong time in it's development.  I didn't see frost damage during emergence.
--- The winter peas were problematic from the start.  They yielded 1262#/a.  One field was destroyed because of contamination with Billy Beans.   They were all dormant seeded in November.  They came up this spring looking great and high population.  With no experience in dormant seeding we didn't put on the pre-emergence chemistry.  Bad mistake!  Spring applications of grass and broadleaf herbicides were a total failure.  Dormant seeding of winter peas has great potential, but make sure to get the pre-emerge chemistry applied.  We ended up with an even over-story of Jim Hill Mustard, that proved to be challenging to harvest.  An IH8230 with MacDon header had no easier time than our N7 and standard head.  A very slow grind.  The crop grade showed high percent of hard seed which was subtracted from the germ making it un-usable as seed stock.  Our supplier had only one field that returned seed quality winter peas, and they were seeded in the spring, --so missed the environmental condition that caused the hard seed.  We will likely see Austrian peas show up for several years because of this hard seed issue.  Fortunately they are not difficult to remove.
----The spring peas were fantastic at Thornton.  Thornton was DRY.  They were ≈6" below normal, but the yields were very good.  Most communities north and south of Thornton had fairly normal precipitation.  Except for the rainfall, the other environmental conditions favored a good crop in 2016.  Our "Ginny" peas ranged from 2400-2980#/a, depending on the field.  The normally high yielding low ground tallied as much as 6500#/a.  They stood way too long for a green pea; however, the bleach, was insignificant, and seed coat damage was reasonable.  Normally green peas will have significant bleach if they stand beyond maturity.  Ginny is a great cultivar.  We harvested them with a standard head w/o pea lifters.  A slow harvest and in areas some peas were left on the vine (too deep in the track).  Our old wheat residue was left intact and we had a lot of pea residue left in the field.  We expected we would process all the residue, leaving exposed ground, which is normal with pea harvest, --but didn't.
--- Our DNS (Glee)@ 42b/a was ok.  Heavy weight, but only 13+% protein.  Stand was good but maybe it needed to be thicker.  Consider increasing seed rate, --we had 2-3 tillers and don't want more than two.  Probably needed more N to get protein.
--- Our SB (Lenatah) @3030#/a was ok.  Heavy weight and quality was excellent.  Stand was good, but may consider increased seeding rate.
--- We had a Viterra test plot of 6 new spring canola cultivars for the area.  Most were a GMO of one type or another.  They all had excellent yields ranging between 1700-2700#/a.  The plot was in the flat in front of our house.  The trial was not limited in moisture, and had a high pH (8+) in much of it.  We seeded the plots after the mustard and before moving to Thornton.  The seeding rate was ≈4#/a.  The stand developed over about 3 weeks,--it didn't seem to effect the outcome.  The canola probably stood too long; however, there was very low shatter on all the cultivars.  The quality of the stand didn't allow much movement within the crop canopy.

2016 - Late Spring Review of our Cover Crop

 

 This spring we started taking out CRP with 2qt of Rt3 with extra surfactant, using 12gpa solution, TeeJet blue TT with 40psi.  Results were excellent.  Two weeks later we seeded a cover crop mix that included:  Yellow Blossom Sweet Clover, Common Vetch, Daikon Radish, Graza Radish, Attack Mustard, Ida Gold Mustard, Winter Canola, Spring Canola.  The mix at 10#/ac contained about 1.7million seeds per acre.  Because the source of the Ethiopian Cabbage (Corinne) was not certified disease free, it was not included. The intention is to leave this cover to grow through March, maybe April 2017, and then chemically destroy it, leaving as much of a residue mat as possible.  The cultivars that are expected to survive the winter is the clover, vetch, and Graza radish.  Both of the legumes should grow well early in the spring 2017 and provide N by takeout time. The Graza will exist and grow leaf material prior to takeout.   If we could have planted the Corinne, it would likely survive and provide us with another vigorous bio-bore plant.  The radishes, canola's and mustards are bio-bore plants as well.  We have found that our CRP ground is in need of deep boring cultivars.  The mustards, canola and Daikon Radish will seed out in 2016 and likely die during the winter.  Come spring we will see high populations of these cultivars emerge early.  None of these cultivars will be a problem to remove.  Our intention is to seed these acres to winter wheat the fall of 2017.
      Today, I noticed some areas are very good and others with a sparse population.   On reflection, we should have started the process about a month earlier.  The south exposures indicates they were short on moisture showing a spotty stand with few cultivars.  One 0.40 rain will get them started.  Field aspects that point anywhere northerly looks good with high populations, and a good diversity of cultivars.
   

SOIL HEALTH - USDA SERIES

USDA, with their "UNLOCK THE SECRETS OF THE SOIL" series have some great stuff in easy to understand Utube presentations.  Most are 2-4 minutes.   Attached is a 20 minute compilation titled "The Hope in Healthy Soils".                    soil health compilation

(??) MAKING A SILK PURSE FROM A SOWS EAR

Summary:  Cropping a broadleaf behind a broadleaf is problematic if grain is the expected end product.

Background:   Last fall we wanted to even out field acres.  To do this we had to put winter peas (WP) on Billy Bean (Garb) ground.  The remainder(majority) of the WP was put on DNS ground.  The stripper headed bean ground had very light residue, and the stripper headed DNS ground had reasonably heavy residue.
        The ground had little or no weed/volunteer growth when we applied 20oz/ac of Rt3, late October.  We dormant seeded the Austrian WP on the second week of November, placing them ≈2.5" deep.  Freeze up occurred a couple of weeks later.  The information from the breeder was to get the peas to break germ but not emerge until early spring.  Our timing was apparently good, because this spring we had three times the population to qualify for a successful stand, and no weedy cultivars were present.  When temperatures warmed, the weeds and volunteer came big time in the garb ground, but the DNS ground remainder relatively clean.  The only broadleaf chemistry we can apply to the WP is Basagran and that does not have a good reputation. There is good grassy weed chemistry for WP.  A couple of cold nights set the WP back allowing the weed species to become more competitive.
       The pic below shows the WP on the garb ground.  The WP are topped by mustards.  The RCIS evaluated the stand the other day and came up with a projected yield of 2100# if all the stars line up right.  All you can make out in this pic are black mustard and jim hill mustard.  Neither cultivar do we see anymore in our small grain crops, but they waited for a screwed up rotation like this to show their ugly head.  The real problem with this crop though is not the weeds, but the surprising number of garbs that germinated and rooted.  The fear of our supplier is that the garbs will foul the grades making them non-marketable other than feed.  If there had been a good mat of residue I don't think these garbs could have survived long enough to root down.

         The pic below shows our WP crop on DNS ground.  It has good residue cover that includes DNS stubble and the previous WW stubble.  The CrossSlot drill has had a low impact on the stubble, other than laying it over.  If the stars all lineup, this field still holds the potential of 4200#/ac.

SO, HOW DO WE MAKE SOMETHING POSITIVE FROM THIS!

         The WP on garb ground will not go to harvest, --so, what to do??  We could still destroy and reseed to a C4 plant like millet or milo.  We could CF the field, however, the next scheduled crop is in the spring of 2017.  We could manage the field as a cover crop (green fallow).

        We have decided to manage this field as a cover crop, but instead of destroying this mess and seeding cultivars normally associated with cover crops we are going to utilize what's already growing.  ( 6/26/19 update: --After re-reading this post I find that this is not what actually occurred.  Kye couldn't stand this mess so we roundup the field and seeded a 9 cultivar cover crop mix that included --2 canola, 2 mustard, 2 clover, 2 radish and one vetch.  This grew to maturity and was seeded to winter wheat.  The winter wheat emerged but was very small the following spring.  The notable part of this was that I found no noticeable runoff from that field, where our CF field did have runoff.  Our rotation for this field changed at this point.  I'm leaving the remainder of this post more as a "what if".  We may have been able to accomplish a similar result without the expense of seeding the cover crop mix.)  The next regular cash crop will be either spring wheat or spring barley.  None of the weed species currently growing, (primarily black mustard and jim hill mustard, along with a smattering of fiddle neck tarweed, prostrate pigweed, russian thistle, and china lettuce), offer any real challenge for the herbicides we use on spring cereals.  This field has a long history of high populations of grassy weeds (primarily downey brome), but fortunately, following the garb crop I have found NO grassy weeds other than a few plants of rattail fescue.  Chemistry for grassy weeds in a broadleaf crop are killers, -- not suppressors like those available for small grains.  This is a very good reason to incorporate a legume or brassica in the rotation, --removing grassy weed competition.

       Our Reasoning: (for keeping this mess).  WP, with our high population will grow a lot of biomass.  I expect the vines to reach 12 feet long and stand 3 feet or more in height.  Both the WP and garbs are nodulating well, so, we are growing N.  The mustards, which is the primary weed species, are growing long taproots (already slender tubers are 12+inches, and will continue to grow for some time.  They will add significant amount of biomass along with the WP.  We'll watch to see if one suppresses the growth of the other.

         Our goal for this field is: grow biomass, grow N, keep live roots for as long as possible.

---bio mass for surface protection and critter food (worm, and others).

---N for the following grain crop.  (hopefully we can find a way to successfully test for it)

---live roots for making critter food, and boring holes to allow moisture infiltration later.  

         How to manage from this point on (????).

---We'll plan to terminate at full bloom or early pod set to maximize the N.  When pods start setting, N is moved from the root nodules to the leaves and eventually in to the pea.  (I have to learn more).

??-- can we mow or crush, setting back the podding, allowing the WP to continue building N?

??-- will we need to seed into this mat to extend the cover crop through the winter?

?? HOW TO USE A COVER CROP ??

 This is a cleaned up version of an earlier post that will be deleted.  I've concluded that the first step in using cover crops is to know what your soil needs, and that means, take, and develop an understanding of the biological test for the field.  This will satisfy the first rule of cover cropping, --know your objective.  I've also learned that with "new" fields, take the complete test, --there are options given by the lab.  Following, --I will go section by section with comments relating my current understanding of the test  (example pic below).  The test result from Earthfort has basically three sections: top-middle-bottom.
--Description area:  When submitting your sample, give complete info on your applied fertilizer, farming method, cultivar to be grown.  Follow the sampling instructions, and don't delay sending them, after they have been bagged.  Failure to name a crop will result in a default category of perennial grass, and this can skew the result.
--Top Section:  Dry Weight, -- can indicate several things about a soil like structure, and location.  A high number (low water content) may indicate soil structure issues.
         Bacteria/Fungi/Hyphal dia., --best when Bacteria and Fungi are high in both total and active, and they are somewhat balanced in numbers.  Hyphen dia. less than 2.5 may indicate harmful or problematic conditions.
--Center Section: Protozoa/Nematodes/ Mycorrhiza.  Protozoa, --best with high numbers for Flagellates and Amoebae and a balance between the two. Flagellates move fast and like large pore spaces.  Amoebae are slow and like small pore spaces.  Balance with high numbers indicates your soil structure is probably good.  Ciliates are anaerobic.  High number indicates water logged soil, --zero is best.
           Nematodes are mostly good.  Root feeders are the problem.  The following numbers are best.   Bacteria/fungal feeder numbers (>4), fungal/root feeder numbers (<2), root feeder numbers (<1), predatory feeder numbers (1-2, they eat root feeders).
           Mycorrhizal Colonization can be measured if a plant root ( > 10") is included in the sample.  I'm confused as to what crops can benefit form mycorrhiza.  There is conflicting information.  My understanding is that Brassica's don't use mycorrhiza, and our wheats have had the benefit bred out of them, --mostly from lack of understanding of it's importance.
--Bottom Section: Organism Ratios, --indicate the relative balance between the organisms.
       Nitrogen Cycling Potential, -- calculated mostly from the numbers and balance of Flagellates and Amoebae.  These both eat bacteria and fungi and convert their nutrients to plant usable form.  Nematodes do a little of this also but play a minor role.  This potential is calculated for three months activity.
       All the above statements are subject to interpretation and an understanding of interacting properties.   I have attended four, one hour webinars, and I will attend more in the future to develop a better understanding of what is going on in the soil biosphere, and how we can exploit it.
       The lab provided me with a summary or their findings on twelve points of this test.  This soil has been cropped more than 100 years, mostly with wheat, barley, and fallow.  This test indicates that the field is in poor condition:  It needs organic matter.  The fauna is starving, they need food.  Nematode numbers are low, but diversity is OK.  Total fungi/bacteria ratio is too low for most plants.  Active fungi to bacteria ration indicates soil is dominated by bacteria and becoming more bacterial.
        This field is capable of 100b/a of wheat when moisture is available.  There is a lot of potential for the future.

                                    SO, TODAY, HOW DO WE PROCEED??
       ---All the literature recommends that you select cc cultivars for a specific goal you wish to reach. There seems to be mixed opinions on the number of cultivars needed in a mix from 5 - up.  With each cultivar having it's own signature about the exudes it leaks, and the depth it roots, in my opinion you ought to plant as many different cultivars as you can find and afford. 
      In 2015 we planted two different mixes.  One was a (10 cultivar) mix for biomass, nitrogen, and nutrient recovery as a goal.  The second mix (5 cultivars) was a recommendation to us for what goal (?).  We planted cultivars with a mix of seed from very small (cabbage) to very large (pea).  All was seeded with the CrossSlot and emerged, so that was a favorable outcome.  The large seed was planted through one rank and the small seed through the other rank.  Is it important to do it this way, --probably not, at least with a CrossSlot!  We had great emergence of tiny seed placed many times deeper than recommended.  That is one of the benefits of the CrossSlot, --it's ability to bring up a crop in adverse conditions.
      ---The bio. tests last year identified: --tight soil, no mycorrhiza, poor balance between bacteria, fungus, protozoa.  That was surprising to me considering the top 4" of soil was made up of worm castings.  Hopefully we addressed the tight soil this year with the radish, cabbage, and mustard cultivars in the cc mix.
       ---This spring we'll take three biological tests.  One from the 10 cultivar cc mix, and one from the 5 cultivar mix area to see if differences can be identified, along with one from the adjoining CF field that was part of the original CRP field.  This, hopefully, will show some differences that we can react to.
       ---Since these fields are planted to WW for 2016, options are limited, but not stopped, in the attempt to improve soil health.  We're looking  at slow developing and low growing legumes to inter-seed that possibly will thrive after harvest of the cereal grain (ww) and leave a live root growing after the cash crop is matured. 
       ---If weather cooperates, after harvest, consider planting radish, cabbage,+, into the legume cultivars.  We'll try to matchup cc cultivars to match the soil needs identified in the biological tests.
       ---Late fall 2015, there was a huge emergence of radish.  What to do about them this spring,--if anything?  There are a lot of large Graza radish plants surviving to this point in time after some cold temperatures.  Our biggest problem is Rush Skeleton Weed.  If the crop and cc stand doesn't compete it out, we'll have to rethink it's management.
       I'll be updating this post from time to time as the 2016 crop develops and differences express themselves.