Strengthening Knowledge, Skills and Networks for Soil Security in Maine

The State Coordinator held a conference call with the advisory board to introduce the new 3-year project, confirm team leaders for the new project, and to start planning for the Year 1 workshops.  Leadership of the Mixed Vegetable team was passed from Caragh Fitzgerald to Jason Lilley.  The leadership team decided to hold one centrally located workshop (instead of two) in Waterville and to focus on dairy cropping systems.  Ideas for topics and speakers were generated.

All 54 ASPs who attended the Soil Health Workshop on December 5, 2017 (see milestone 4 below for more information) were invited to continue or join as a member of one of the Soil Health Teams.  Additionally, during team meetings, members brainstormed individuals to invite to join and those invitations were sent out individually over the winter. This milestone, while completed in one sense, will continue as new ASPs are hired in the state.

Thirty-five ASPs are members of at least one of the Soil Health Teams, of which 18 are "core" members and 17 are "associate" members.  Team members come from Extension (15), NRCS and other agencies (4), non-profits (4), and industry (12).  Teams have the following member numbers, with one trainee associated with two teams: Potato-grain (13), Mixed Vegetable (12), and Dairy Cropping (11).

a. All 35 team members received an email in September notifying them of updates to the project website including a new case study and video highlighting no-till and cover cropping for corn silage, a key topic for the Soil Health Workshop. Members also received links to videos of relevant presentations from the 2017 National Conference on Cover Crops and Soil Health, as well as notification the NT intensive Training webinar series for ag service providers in the Northeast, which held three webinars before our workshop.

b and c. Twenty team members attended the 2017 Maine Soil Health Workshop on December 5, 2017. The workshop was open to the public and in addition to the 20 Soil Health team members, 34 other ASPs, 14 farmers and 7 students attended. The workshop agenda was:

• Our New Understanding of Soil Organic Matter (Ellen Mallory, UMaine) - discussed our new understanding of organic matter composition (dead microbial bodies rather than recalcitrant plant matter) and stability (protection in aggregates rather than biochemical recalcitrance) and what it implies for soil management.
• No-Till and Cover Cropping in Corn (Rick Kersbergen, UMaine, and a farmer panel of Bob Fogler, Stoneyvale Farm, Jeff and Penny Stevens, Wind Gate Farm, and Roger Whitney, Corinna) - Covered benefits, barriers and challenges to adoption, and best practices, followed by an open discussion. This panel discussion was so successful that the Dairy Soil Health team decided to repeat it and video record it) at the Maine Dairy Seminar on March 20, 2018.
• Reducing Tillage in Vegetable Production (Natalie Lounsbury, UNH, and Mark Hutton, UMaine) - Topics covered included tarping to kill cover crops for no-till seeding, permanent beds, and zone tillage.
• Water Infiltration and Runoff Demonstration (Tom Molloy, UMaine) - Tom introduced and demonstrated the demo kit we purchased for use by team members and others doing soil health educational events.
• Cover Crop Mixes and Report from Northeast Cover Crops Council (Carl Johanson, Goranson Farm and Jason Lilley, UMaine) - Carl and Jason reported about the newly formed Northeast Cover Crop Council.  Jason is our Maine representative to the Council and both attended the first NCCC meeting with support from this project.  Jason discussed the theory behind cover crop mixes and how to choose species, and Carl reported on his experiences using mixes on his farm.
• General Discussion: Barrier to Adoption of Soil Health Practices and Ways to Address Them - Jason Lilley facilitated this session of small group discussion, followed by reporting out to the group and further discussion. We ended by having participants fill out the survey reported on under "Learning Outcomes".

Immediately following the workshop, the 20 Soil Health Team members who attended met with the State and Outreach Coordinators for an hour. The new 3-year project plan was introduced and discussed including explanations of project goals and activities, team member expectations, and financial and technical support available.  Members then grouped as teams to identify potential new members to invite to join, to begin discussing the specific topics and projects the teams want to address this year, and to set dates for follow up team meetings.

Each team met one time over the winter to finalize their plans for developing educational materials and conducting on-farm demonstrations.  The SARE Outreach Coordinator participated in all of these meetings. The meetings occurred on January 16 (potato-grain), February 12 (dairy), and March 22 (mixed vegetable).

The SARE Outreach Coordinator and State Coordinator met with the team leader of the mixed vegetable team on March 30 to begin planning for the first Soil Health S.W.O.T. event to be held this summer.

a. Twenty-one team members worked with at least two farmers to implement soil health strategies such as integrating cover crops into their rotation, implementing no-till systems, and postponing tillage from fall to spring.

b. Four members conducted an total of 4 on-farm demonstrations, 9 took the lead organizing and holding educational events (8 total), and 5 took the lead on a fact sheet (2), case study (2), or video (2).

Seven team members did both a. and b., whereas 22 did either a. or b.

When the target audience for an activity included project trainees as well as the public, it is reported under Project Educational Activities and under Performance Target Outcomes, as was the case for 4 educational events, 2 on-farm demos, and 1 factsheet.  When the target audience for the activity did not include project trainees but only farmers and other ASPS, it was reported only under Performance Target Outcomes.

Examples of educational events:

• Soil health demonstration at the Maine Agricultural Trades Show, January 10-12, 2018.  Included the runoff/infiltration demonstration kit.  Organized by members of the Dairy and Mixed Vegetable Teams.
• Soil health session at the Maine Dairy Seminar, March 20, 2018. Organized by Dairy Team members.
• On-farm demonstration, twilight meeting, and case study on reducing field traffic by using a center pivot to spread milk room waste. March 23, 2018. Organized by Dairy Team members.
• Soil Health Reading the Farm training (see Milestone 8).
• Opportunities to Reduce Tillage in Potato Systems, part of the Rogers Farm Sustainable Ag Field Day, June 27, 2018. Organized by Potato-Grain Team.
• Cover Cropping and Water Infiltration Demonstration at Maine Farm Days, August 22-23, 2018. Included the runoff/infiltration demonstration kit.  Organized by members of the Dairy and Mixed Vegetable Teams.

Educational resources developed are posted on the UMaine Extension Soil Health website, https://extension.umaine.edu/agriculture/soil-health/, (maintained by the Maine SARE Coordinator) and include :

• "Planning for Your Cover Crop", video
• "No-till Corn and Cover Crops: Farmer Panel Discussion", video
• "Piper Farms Saves Big with a Center Pivot", case study
• "Cover Crop and No Till Management on Hewett Farm", case study (will be posted once photo releases are received)
• "Winter Rye Variety Trial 2017 Results", research report on variety performance for cover cropping or grain.

Team members from Extension collaborated to include a soil health demonstration in the Extension booth at the 2018 Maine Agricultural Trades Show (January 10-12). This included runoff/infiltration and slaking demonstrations.

The Dairy Team hosted a farmer panel on no-till and soil health at the Maine Dairy Seminar (March 20) that was recorded and posted on the Soil Health website. They also hosted an on-farm demonstration/tour (April 23) on using a center pivot to spread milk room grey water instead of trucking to reduce field traffic and compaction, and produced a case study of the technique, also posted on the website.

The Mixed Vegetable Team, in collaboration with the Dairy Team, planned and implemented a soil health station at Maine Farm Days (August 22-23) featuring demonstrations on the effects of soil health on soil runoff/infiltration, slaking, and settling as well as information on cover cropping.

The Potato-Grain Team collaborated with a Central Maine farmer to host a twilight meeting (August 8) on strategies to improve soil health in potato systems that featured demonstration plots looking at the effects of delaying tillage from fall to spring on potato growth and yield.

(Note the number of ASPs above is the number who were active in hosting the events.)

The Mixed Vegetable Team hosted our first Soil Health S.W.O.T. at Belanger Farms near Lewiston, Maine on August 7, 2018. Two weeks prior to the event, the 9 team members who participated received an overview of the farm, a summary of their practices related to soil management, crop rotation, cover cropping, and a list of their soil health goals and concerns, as well as soil test results from a set of representative fields. On the morning of the event, the farm owner gave us a tour of most of his fields and equipment, answered our questions, and asked many of his own.  The group then reconvened at the Extension office to go through a Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats analysis focused on soil health but in the context of the farm's other objectives. We highlighted several successful practices they are already implementing and generated a list of possible changes to address his soil health concerns. The report has been sent to the farmer. This winter the Mixed Veg Team leader will meet with the farmer to get his feedback, and a case study will be developed to post on the Soil Health website.

The participants decided to change the name of this learning activity from Soil Health S.W.O.T. to Soil Health Reading the Farm.

Soil Health Team members received the following support from Tom Molloy and Ellen Mallory in Year 1:

• Assistance scheduling and participating in team meetings
• Coordinating and making purchasing of cover crop seed and other supplies for on-farm demos
• Submitting travel reimbursement forms
• Advertising educational events
• Coordinating lending of and providing training for use of infiltration / runoff demonstration kit
• Assistance organizing and holding SH Reading the Farm training and follow-up
• Assistance organizing SH session at the Maine Dairy Seminar
• Assistance planting, sampling, and harvesting of on-farm demonstration of interseeding cover crops into NT silage corn
• Planning and editing for case studies, on-farm demonstration reports, and videos

As reported in the Learning Outcomes, we did not verify learning outcomes in this initial year. Instead we focused on getting a better understanding of farmers (or for ASPs, what they see as their clients') main motivations for improving soil health, which practices they are most interested in, what are the major barriers, and what types of resources would be most helpful. We distributed a survey to the 75 people who attended the Maine Soil Health Workshop in December 2018. Twenty-five people responded. For motivations, almost all fell within four general categories: save money and time (28%), soil health and resiliency (24%), environmental concerns and sustainability (24%), and improve crop productivity (20%). Respondents were interested in a variety of practices including interseeding cover crops, no-till, terminating cover crops with rolling or tarping, and changing rotations. Money, time, equipment, and fear of the unknown were the major barriers mentioned. Resources the respondents thought would be most helpful were: more educational events and resources, access to equipment, financial incentives, side-by-side field comparisons, peer groups and on-farm demonstrations.

The State Coordinator and Outreach Coordinator spoke individually with each of the team leaders to discuss the outcomes of their Year 1 projects and plans for Year 2 projects. Team leaders also provided input into topics and speakers for the Year 2 Workshop.

The State Coordinator forgot to send materials specific to the December workshop. However, participants did receive, via email, several soil health resources and opportunities ahead of the workshop including release of the Living Soil film and other resources at the Soil Health Institute website, and notification of a No-Till Intensive Training opportunity for ASPs (part of NE-SARE LNE18-361).

16 team members attended a day-long workshop on December 5, 2018 in Presque Isle (northern Maine) co-organized by the Potato-Grain team and the State Coordinator. The workshop was open to the public.  The agenda included topics identified in the survey (no-till, rotation crops, and interseeding cover crops; see Milestone #1) as well as others:

• Soil health benefits and strategies (Ellen Mallory, UMaine Extension and Maine SARE Coordinator)
• Experiences with no-till in Northern Maine and New Brunswick: Drill set up, crops, fertility, and opportunities for potato rotation crops (Perry Lilley, Lilley Farms, Smyrna, Maine, and Cedric MacLeod, MacLeod Agronomics and Local Valley Beef, Florenceville, New Brunswick, Canada)
• Potential alternative crops for rotating with potatoes (Jake Dyer, Maine Potato Board and Potato-Grain team member)
• On the ground changes as a result of interseeding cover crops in Southern Aroostook (Helena Swiatek, NRCS District Conservationist)
• Results from on-farm and research station experiments using fly ash as a soil amendment. (Sukhwinder Bali, UMaine Extension and Potato-Grain team member)

In southern Maine, the Mixed Vegetable team decided to host two evening sessions specifically targeting farmers instead of hosting one day-long workshop for ag service providers and farmers. The two sessions were “Intro to Soils for Farmers and Gardeners” and “Building Healthy Soil for Your Farm” and were offered in Falmouth on April 2 and 9. Two team members attended.

In addition to the 5 educational resources listed in Milestone #6 of Year 1, the following new resources were sent to the State Coordinator and posted to the UMaine Extension Soil Health website (https://extension.umaine.edu/agriculture/soil-health/):

• "Farmer Experiences with No-Till and Cover Cropping", newsletter article
• "Cover Cropping for Success", fact sheet

The Mixed Vegetable team met by conference call on March 18 and received assistance from the SARE Outreach Coordinator with planning a coordinated multi-site evaluation trial of cover crop species and mixes.  The Potato-Grain and Dairy teams did not meet as groups, but the Outreach Coordinator talked individually with the core team members of each group to help them plan activities for the field season.

a. Fifteen team members reported working with at least two farmers this year to implement soil health strategies such as integrating cover crops into their rotation, implementing no-till systems, and postponing tillage from fall to spring.

b. Four members conducted a total of 3 on-farm demonstrations, 10 took the lead organizing and holding a total of 16 educational events, 6 gave a total 19 talks educational events organized by others, and was involved in writing a fact sheet.

Seven team members did both a. and b., whereas 19 did either a. or b.

When the target audience for an activity included project trainees as well as the public, it is reported under Project Educational Activities and under Performance Target Outcomes, as was the case for 4 educational events and 1 factsheet.  When the target audience for the activity did not include project trainees but only farmers and other ag service providers, it was reported only under Performance Target Outcomes.

Examples of educational events:

• Rootbox demonstration at the Maine Agricultural Trades Show, January 15-17, 2019. Organized by members of the Dairy and Mixed Vegetable Teams from Extension.
• A two part soil health workshop series for farmers held in Falmouth Maine: Intro to Soils for Farmers and Gardeners on April 2, 2019 and Building Healthy Soils for Your Farm on April 9, 2019. Organized by Mixed Vegetable Teams members.
• Building Soil Health: No-Till Veg Field Tour on August 29, 2019 in Windham. Organized by Mixed Vegetable Teams members.
• Soil Health and Cover Crop Demonstration Plots at Maine Farm Days on August 21-22 in Clinton. Organized by Dairy Team members.
• Rainfall simulator demonstrations by NRCS at 4 events across the state from May to August. Organized by Dairy Team members.
• Soil Health and Climate Change talk at Southern Aroostook Soil & Water Conservation District Winter Ag School on March 28 in Littleton. Organized by Potato-Grain Team members.

Educational resources developed are posted on the UMaine Extension Soil Health website, https://extension.umaine.edu/agriculture/soil-health/, (maintained by the Maine SARE Coordinator) and include the two new ones reported under Milestone 5.

Members from the Mixed Vegetable and Dairy teams planned and implemented a soil health station at Maine Farm Days (August 22-23) featuring plots with different cover crop species and a rootboxes with different crop and cover crops. The Mixed Vegetable team also hosted an on-farm demonstration and field day of cover crops and tarping.

Members of the Dairy Team co-hosted three workshops on September 3, 4, and 5 in Southern, Central and Western Maine at MOFGA certified organic dairy farms to demonstrate the principles of soil health, and how livestock management can influence soil quality and the environment. Co-hosts included Maine Grass Farmers Network, Maine Organic Farmers and Gardeners Association (MOFGA), University of Maine Cooperative Extension and Wolfe's Neck Center for Agriculture and the Environment. Members from this team also organized the rainfall simulator demonstrations at 4 events.

The Potato-Grain Team lost two members and had one member on sabbatical this year. They did not host any field days or farm tours but did organize the SWCD Winter Ag School session mentioned under Milestone 7 and a winter webinar on January 29 on using cover crops and organic no-till for soybean production.

 (Note the number of ASPs above is the number who were active in hosting the events.)

The project advisory team and state coordinators decided to forgo offering a Soil Health S.W.O.T. analysis in the second year of the project for a two reasons. The Dairy Team, who were to host this year's event, were helping offer a regional series of No-Till Intensives for technical service providers as part of another SARE-funded project (LNE18-361). We encouraged our team members to attend and at least 9 members attended at least one of the events in the series. The Mixed Vegetable Team, who hosted last year's S.W.O.T. event, felt they wanted to have more time to complete a follow-up with the farmer host, conduct soil analyses, and develop the report into a case study rather than participate in another event. These efforts are still under progress. The Potato-Grain will host a Soil Health S.W.O.T. in year 3.

Soil Health Team members received the following support from Tom Molloy and Ellen Mallory in Year 2:

• Providing power point slide sets for team members to use in their soil health presentations to farmers
• One-on-one consultations and guidance for team members' demonstrations and educational events for farmers
• Coordinating lending of and providing training for infiltration/runoff demonstration kit and rootbox demonstration kit
• Assistance scheduling and participating in team meetings
• Workshop registration and submission of travel reimbursement forms
• Advertising educational events
• Assistance planning and planting a coordinated multi-site cover crop demonstration trial

The survey was emailed to 35 team members in December 2019 and 10 team members completed it.

This meeting never occurred. It was delayed until spring and then, given the COVID situation, the State Coordinator decided to forgo any further project training.

Two soil health winter educational events were held in 2020. The first featured Wayne Honeycutt of the Soil Health Institute. Team members received an email inviting them to the workshop and encouraging them to familiarize themselves with the various resources available on the SHI website and to read those of interest. For the second workshop, all team members received an email invitation with links to background information on the speakers.

The two soil health winter educational events held in year 3 were developed, organized and delivered in partnership with other Maine organizations. On January 14, in collaboration with the Maine Sustainable Agriculture Society (MESAS), we held an afternoon soil health workshop at the Maine Agricultural Trades Show in Augusta, Maine. Dr. Wayne Honeycutt, President and CEO of the Soil Health Institute, discussed the institute's key priorities and strategies, as well as the results to date of their efforts to develop standard soil health measurements. The SARE Coordinator followed with a talk on how to get started with soil health in Maine, highlighting the work of the Maine Soil Health Teams and the resources individual team members and their respective organizations, agencies, institutions, and businesses can offer farmers. Thirty people attended, including 10 farmers and 10 agricultural service providers. Five MESH team members participated.

The second soil health winter workshop, "Healthy Soils, Healthy Farms," was a day-long workshop held on February 19th in Presque Isle, Maine. It was a collaborative effort among Maine Farmland Trust, the Southern and Central Aroostook Soil and Water Conservation Districts, and the SARE Soil Health PDP program. The organizers from the SWCDs are MESH team members. Talks were focused on potato production systems, and topics included reducing tillage, cover cropping, crop rotation, and the economics of soil health. Speakers included two potato farmers, Brendon Rockey from Colorado and Matt Ramsay from Prince Edward Island, Canada, a panel of field crop farmers from across Maine, and University of Maine researchers. 75 people attended including 45 farmers and 25 agricultural service providers. Twelve MESH team members participated, 4 of who also attended the prior workshop.

The SARE Coordinator posted the Hewett Farm case study completed by one of the dairy team members.

These meetings never occurred, nor did any of the demonstrations and education events planned for the remainder of this project. The coronavirus crisis and ensuing COVID-19 restrictions made it impossible to hold in-person events. As well, there was little interest in participating in virtual events or other aspects of this project given the enormous needs in the agricultural community that arose from the coronavirus crisis.

Given this situation, and the fact that this project was unlikely to get closer to its performance target in terms of the number of agricultural service providers trained (and had well exceeded its performance target for farmers reached), the Maine State PDP and Outreach Coordinators decided to forgo any further programming related to this project aside from conducting a final end-of-project survey.

Seven team members responded to the end-of-project survey. Of these, five said they had worked with at least two farmers this year to help them implement a soil health practice, one said they had also done an on-farm demonstration, and one said they had led an educational event.

See explanation under Milestone 25.

See explanation under Milestone 25.

Soil Health Team members received the following support from Tom Molloy and Ellen Mallory in Year 3:

• One-on-one consultations and guidance for two team members' planned demonstrations (only one was implemented due to COVID-19 restrictions)
• Workshop registration and submission of travel reimbursement forms
• Facilitating participation in development and review of the Northeast Cover Crops Council cover crop selector tool

The State PDP Coordinator asked the soil health team leaders, and all soil health team members, for any additional products and resources to be posted to the website.