Updated March 16, 2020:
During the last 3 months of 2019 (October 1 to December 31), each state collaborator collected all the field data from the participating farmers in his/her state. Data cleaning and entry to excel sheets followed and all data were sent to the NCSRP core team (WI and NE) for synthesis. The core team merged the data and performed additional quality control procedures. Preliminary data analysis was performed in late December and final 1st year results will be sent in February to all project collaborators. All project collaborators meet in November during the ASA meeting and discussed different aspects of the project based on the 1st year experience and developed a plan for field identification and data collection for year 2020. Additionally, during these 3 months, two papers lead by Spyros Mourtzinis and Juan I. R. Edreira respectively, were submitted for publication and another paper lead by Spyros Mourtzinis is being finalized for submission.
We had a kick-off meeting with project collaborators on November 5, 2018. At this meeting we discussed project objectives, outputs and logistics, and we agreed on the protocol to follow for site selection and management practices evaluation. Briefly, collaborators will try and identify a minimum of 20 field trials (one per farmer field) per state. The goal is to compare the yield and profit measured for the treatment of interest against the replicated strips that represent the average management (control). The treatment of interest in each state has been identified utilizing the results of the previous NCSRP project (Benchmarking soybean production system in the North-central USA).
Project PIs Grassini (NE) and Conley (WI), along with Dr. Juan Ignacio Rattalino Edreira (NE), Dr. Jose Andrade (NE), Dr. Antoine Couedel (NE), Dr. Spyridon Mourtzinis (WI), Mr. Adam Roth (WI) and Mr. John Gaska (WI) will supervise data collection and will be responsible to quality control the data and input them into a digital database. The NE-WI core team has had bi-monthly Skype calls to discuss and monitor project progress. We also had a 2-day meeting at UW in January to finalize project protocols and discuss outcomes derived from the project results. After substantial input from all project collaborators, we designed the survey form to be used in the project to collect all necessary field data. State collaborators were requested to identify fields before April 15, 2019. The final number of collected fields are 52. From these 52 plots we will collect and analyze 669 seed samples for seed composition. These plots are located in environments that are representative of 52% of US soybean area.
State: Number of fields
IA: 12
IL: 1
MI: 10
MN: 4
ND: 6
NE: 4
OH: 8
WI: 7
Total: 52
To promote our NCSRP research project we conducted live Twitter interviews with several of our farmer cooperators. On July 17th, we interviewed Ethan Imoehl in Iowa and Tom Novak in Wisconsin. On July 31st, we interviewed the Poltermanns, who farm both Wisconsin and Illinois. When we got to Ohio on the 29th, we interviewed Keith Kemp and Bill Hamman. The next day we went to northern Ohio where we interviewed the Durbin family and their county extension agent, Chris Zoller. In summary, we had four states covered and nine people on camera in six interviews.
The NE-WI core team has been actively utilizing the legacy data from the initial project. The team delivered five oral presentations during the 2018 ASA/CSSA meetings showing results from the project.
To date we have published two manuscripts from this legacy data (listed below) one in review and five in preparation.
• G. Azzari, et al. 2019. SATELLITE MAPPING OF TILLAGE PRACTICES IN THE NORTH CENTRAL US REGION FROM 2005-2016. Remote Sensing of Environment 229: 417-429. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rse.2018.11.010
• Andrade, J.F. et al, 2019. Assessing the influence of row spacing on US soybean yield using experimental and producer survey data. Field Crops Research 230: 98-106. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.fcr.2018.10.014
By the end of this 3-year project, we will have validated a novel research approach that utilizes self-reported on-farm production practices, together with on-farm validation, to identify management practices with greatest impact on farm yield and profit. Consequently, we will strengthen state-to-state research collaboration through the managed coordination of the on-farm partnership, build farmer-to-farmer networks and identify and communicate key management practices that increase soybean productivity and return of investment. We will also build a framework through our farmer-to-farmer networks, farmer video profiles, and field labs to communicate findings directly to farmers from farmers.
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By the end of this 3-year project, we will have validated a novel research approach that utilizes self-reported on-farm production practices, together with on-farm validation, to identify management practices with greatest impact on farm yield and profit. Consequently, we will strengthen state-to-state research collaboration through the managed coordination of the on-farm partnership, build farmer-to-farmer networks and identify and communicate key management practices that increase soybean productivity and return of investment. We will also build a framework through our farmer-to-farmer networks, farmer video profiles, and field labs to communicate findings directly to farmers from farmers.