Soil Health Recent Initiatives

1. Inter-jurisdictional Review Report (Pending)
2. Fact Sheet on Monitoring Soil Health
3. Soil Health Brochure
4. Soil Health Monitoring Project Summary Report - Ausable Bayfield Conservation - 2016-2017
5. Measuring Soil Health at different landscape scales – Workshop – March 8, 2018:
   • Draft Workshop Proceedings
   • Research Opportunities – Asim Biswas
   • Updating Ontario’s Soil Maps – Daniel Saurette
   • Study of Agricultural Soil Health in Quebec – Marc-Olivier Gasser
   • Ontario Soil Network – Mel Luymes
   • ABCA Approaches to Soil Health – Abbie Gutteridge
   • Inter-jurisdictional Review – Ross Wilson

Cover Crops in Sixty-Inch Corn

Ausable Bayfield Conservation is working with agricultural producer Bill Gibson, and family, and other partners on a field site to demonstrate successfully establish cover crops using 60-inch corn rows.

Thanks, on this project, go to Bill Gibson and Family; Hensall Co-op; Pioneer Feeds and Corteva Agriscience; Claussen Farms; and the Fred A. and Barbara M. Erb Family Foundation; among others.

Certified Crop Advisor (CCA) and Professional Agrologist (P.Ag) Ross Wilson, of Ausable Bayfield Conservation, provides updates, in new videos, on the work to use #covercrops after corn and #60inchcorn in a trial south of Clinton, Ontario, Canada.

You may watch the videos here:

• Cover Crops in Sixty Inch Corn – Cover Crop Solutions – Video One
• Cover Crops in Sixty Inch Corn – Video Two – Update

Ausable Bayfield Conservation improving cover crops with 60-inch corn

#healthylakehuron #landtolake #pieceofthepuzzle 

This Cover Crops (#CoverCrops) in Sixty Inches of Corn (#60inchcorn) research project observes the effect of different cover cropping strategies within a 60-inch twin-row corn scenario.

Variables include population size (70,000 versus 48,000).

Another variable is the effect of different cover crop mixes. For example ... tailored either to the corn crop (mostly legume, especially early maturing); or the subsequent bean crop (mostly Italian ryegrass with some clovers and a little brassica and radish).

Other variables are cover crop seeding rate (30 pounds per acre versus 60 pounds per acre); and effect of pruning corn after maturity to enhance cover crop biomass production, in the 30-inch-row scenario.

Ausable Bayfield Conservation is working with the participating landowner and with agricultural industry partners to monitor.

The project partners will be monitoring 2020 corn yield; 2020 cover crop biomass production; autumn 2020 soil health indicators; 2021 bean yield; and autumn 2021 soil health indicators.

Strips are 60-feet wide to accommodate three passes of eight row planters and four passes of 15-foot drill. Strips about 700 feet long equate to about one acre in size.

(A football field is about 1.32 acres in size. An acre is more than 4,000 square metres.)

The 60-inch corn twin rows are planted by the two-pass, every-other-row method, offset by seven inches.

Cover crop mixes are drilled into the corn at the 'V4' stage.

There is a common fertility program for all strips.

The project uses GPS (Global Positioning Systems) to locate strip boundaries for furture reference.

The damage to corn is minimized, when planting the cover crop, by splitting twin rows with drill-seed openers.

Cover crops featured in article

The importance of cover crops was shared in the November 2018 article, Sunflowers improve soil and public relations, by Frances Anderson, published by The Ontario Farmer in the November 2018 corn+soy+wheat HANDBOOK. 

The article mentions the role of the sunflower as a cover crop ambassador (“They are the most obvious variety in a cover crop mixture that may contain six different plants ...”). The piece also goes into more depth about the positive role cover crops play.

The photo captions summarize much of cover crops’ importance: “A mix of cover crops improves soil quality, alleviates compaction and holds phosphorus over the winter ... The sunflowers feed pollinators and make people smile ...”

The catchy headline captures the public interest in, and love of sunflowers, but the article goes on to explain much of what’s happening under the ground, below the surface of the photogenic plants, and into the active microbiology in the soil beneath: 

“Sunflowers have a great taproot as well as a very fibrous root system,” the article quotes Stefan Zehetner. “They leave the ground very mellow, especially in my seed crop fields. They are also great at extracting zinc from the soil, and the residue that remains in the spring is black, which helps warm up the soil in the spring.”

The article also shares some of the cover crop planting, after wheat, by Tom Hayter and sons Justin and Adam, in the Dashwood area at Hayter’s Turkey Farm. 

“We want to harvest sunlight, and the way to do that is to keep something growing,” Tom is quoted in the article. “We used to plant oat and peas, but in the last five or six years, we have gotten into growing more complex cover crops. Our aim is to have something growing year ‘round.”

Ausable Bayfield Conservation was pleased that the article feature Professional Agrologist (P.Ag.) and Certified Crop Advisor (CCA-ON) Ross Wilson. When 34 diverse community members, from all walks of life, developed our Conservation Strategy, they said it was important to protect water, living things, and soil. Ross is one of many staff members putting the community’s soil focus into action.

Ross, in the Ontario Farmer article, said an agricultural producer’s choice of cover crop depends on what they want the cover crop to do.

In Anderson’s article she paraphrases Ross that “... if you want to improve soil condition, a fibrous root, like buckwheat is a good choice, while sunflowers and oilseed radish will send down deep taproots to alleviate soil compaction.” She goes on to say that “ ... to reduce soil erosion, you need a cover crop that will overwinter – and a plan to terminate it in the spring.”

The article also captures the important point (mentioned by Tom Hayter) that overwinter vegetative cover can help to retain phosphorus. By retaining phosphorus, the cover crop prevents it from leaching out and becoming a problem for creeks, rivers, and the Great Lakes.

The article acknowledges some of the challenges to growing cover crops but also the tangible benefits.

A sidebar article in the Corn, Soy and Wheat Handbook also acknowledges the success of the cover crop incentive category of the Huron County Clean Water Project. The program is funded by the county and delivered by the Maitland Valley and Ausable Bayfield conservation authorities. The article notes that in Ausable Bayfield’s part of Huron County there are more than 4,000 acres of land, on more than 40 farms, with cover crops planted with support of this incentive category thanks to the county program and the participating landowners. 

The sidebar article mentions Ross’s decade of experience with Ausable Bayfield Conservation and that “ ... he’s one of the few Certified Agrologists on Conservation Authority staff in the province, and he can help get farmers get growing.”

For the complete article please read the November 2018 corn+soy+wheat HANDBOOK, published by Ontario Farmer. To learn more visit: ontariofarmer.com

To download the full article, courtesy of The Ontario Farmer click this link:

• Sunflowers improve soil and public relations

To find out more about cover crops visit abca.ca or contact Ausable Bayfield Conservation’s stewardship staff at 519-235-2610 or toll-free 1-888-286-2610.

World Soil Day

World Soil Day 2020 is Thursday, December 5, 2024.

Local research has shown how covered soils store water and help to limit water running off of land during storm events. Soil health actions like cover crops can help to preserve topsoil, contribute to the long-term ability for that soil to produce food, and protect local creeks, rivers, groundwater, and Lake Huron.

People and groups around the world promote the value of soil health leading up to World Soil Day. A local ABCs of Soil Health social media campaign, spearheaded by Ausable Bayfield Conservation, ran each day, for 26 days, with the posting of a daily soil health message for a different letter of the alphabet from A to Z.