From the Ground Up: Revealing How Regenerative Agriculture Nurtures Soil Arthropod Communities

Commodities

Practices

From the Ground Up: Revealing How Regenerative Agriculture
Nurtures Soil Arthropod Communities

Farmers play a crucial role in society, not just as food
producers but as stewards of the land. Despite the enthusiasm
surrounding RA and implementation by farmers around the U.S.,
there remains a gap in documenting the on-farm benefits of
regenerative practices, particularly for soil biodiversity. This
knowledge gap is likely due to the complexity and costliness of
traditional monitoring methods, which are ill-suited for
widespread implementation in commercial agricultural settings.

To bridge this gap, I propose utilizing soil environmental DNA
(eDNA) metabarcoding to monitor soil arthropod biodiversity in
commercial agroecosystems. I have partnered with 16 farmers
across Indiana, Illinois, and Iowa to sample soil in 25
commercial fields (>25 acres) representing a regenerative
spectrum. All decisions regarding management practices, including
tillage, chemical use, and crop rotation, will remain with the
farmers. Crops vary from agronomic row crops to alfalfa to
horticultural crops, but all fields include corn as part of their
rotation scheme. I will sample soil from each field, extract DNA,
and sequence a well-known, effective arthropod metabarcoding
region. I will then use multidimensional scaling (NMDS) and
canonical correspondence analysis (CCA) to assess relationships
between RA practices and soil biodiversity.

To communicate how farmers can support and benefit from soil
biodiversity, I will host an informational webinar during the
post-harvest pre-planting period. I will also collaborate with
the Purdue University Extension Office to create a publication
for large-scale commercial farmers in the Midwest that clearly
describes RA practices that maximize biodiversity and natural
pest suppression. Pre- and post-webinar surveys will gauge
changes in farmers’ knowledge and attitudes.

This research will elucidate regenerative agriculture (RA)
practices that maximize soil arthropod biodiversity and provide a
rapid assessment tool to facilitate future research and increase
awareness of emerging technology. The knowledge provided by this
research will streamline adoption of RA practices to maximize
soil arthropod biodiversity, ecosystem services, and soil health.
Furthermore, this research builds upon previous SARE-funded
research examining how RA practices impact biodiversity and
investigates barriers to RA adoption. By increasing adoption of
RA, I propose to improve environmental stewardship, prosperity,
and quality of life for farmers and rural communities.

This research will develop a rapid, standardized and
reproducible method to monitor soil biodiversity in
agroecosystems. This will allow rapid monitoring for specific
taxa, such as invasive species, or
disease vectors, as well as soil faunal
communities within agricultural fields. This project also
provides farmers with a novel method of soil
health monitoring, giving them access to real-time biodiversity
data for making informed management choices. I
aim to analyze insect biodiversity as a proxy for soil health in
25 agricultural fields representing a regenerative gradient to
discern which RA practices maximize biodiversity. I will create a
webinar and an extension
publication to inform farmers and other stakeholders of
the agricultural benefits of biodiversity. In those resources I
will communicate which RA practices maximize biodiversity to
promote adoption of those specific strategies.
Farmers will understand the benefits of
arthropod biodiversity in their fields and be empowered
to adopt practices that maximize those benefits. I will
use pre and post webinar surveys to evaluate how
farmers’ knowledge and attitudes of insect biodiversity and RA
have changed. Questions will also address likelihood of adopting
specific practices. The intended action outcomes from this study
include increased adoption of RA practices that
support  biodiversity and increased ability to
monitor biodiversity at the commercial field-scale.