Use of Whole Farm Analysis to Reduce Nutrient Losses, Improve Nutrient Cycling, Carbon Status and Energy Use on Small Dairies in New York State

Use of Whole Farm Analysis to Reduce Nutrient Losses, Improve Nutrient Cycling, Carbon Status and Energy Use on Small Dairies in New York State

Summary

In 2011, four on-farm meetings were held to discuss the results of 2010 Corn Stalk Nitrate Test assessments and 2010 Mass Nutrient Balance. The results were pulled together with an end-of-project farm report and all information reviewed all by the farm management team. Each farm management team reviewed the results, discussed implications, and identified potential impacts on 2011 farm nutrient decision-making. Two different farm maps, a large wall map and a map booklet of fields and soils were reviewed and their potential uses on the farm for improving communication and nutrient use efficiency were discussed. After the final meeting interviews were conducted for the management teams on three of the our participating farms to capture their impressions of the project, the tools presented, to identify which tools will be used on their farm in the future and to understand how each farm team felt the tools impacted farm economics. In addition two more farm impact stories were published in the Small Farm Quarterly which each featured a farm team and the tools they saw as having the most impact on their farm.

Objectives/Performance Targets

Four small dairy farms, through the use of the AEI-based whole farm analysis, implement management changes that resulted in improved nutrient use efficiency and farm energy use. Four county extension educators will become well-versed in the AEI-based data collection and whole farm analysis process with an additional eleven county educators being trained at bi-annual extension retreats. Seventy-five small farms will use the new AEI’s through the voluntary MNB program. At least 35 percent (combination of MNB farmer meetings and popular press articles) of the small dairy farms in New York will become aware of the project and the benefits of the whole-farm analysis and 15 additional farms will start implementing changes to improve nutrient use efficiency by the end of the project.

Accomplishments/Milestones

Milestone 1: A research team will be formed for each participating farm made up of the farmer, county extension educator, and Cornell campus staff. This team will complete baseline, year one and year two whole-farm analysis to identify nutrient use efficiency, carbon status and energy use. The annual results will be used to identify and implement changes to improve nutrient, carbon and energy use efficiency during the second and third year. Efficiency gains will be quantified at the end of three years. (3 years)

12/2009-12/2010 – 2009 MNB, 2010 field cropping data, and manure application information were collected and summarized (188 fields, 2000 acres).

9/2010-11/2010 – Corn stalk nitrate test samples were collected from a subset of fields on three farms (17
fields, 183 acre).

6/2010-8/2010 – Farm were mapped, verified by farmers and farm maps with soil layers were compiled for each farm.
1/2011 – 2010 MNB analysis were conducted on two of the four participating farms

3/2011 – Four farm meetings were held to review three years of farm analysis, evaluate the effectiveness of the tools and process, answer farmer questions, and identify next steps.

Milestone 2: The team will assess the farm data for potential internal (herd and cropping) system efficiency indicators and a list of data pages will be generated. This information will be used to develop and implement record keeping systems (farm specific) to address data gaps. A protocol will be developed to calculate and interpret each of the herd and cropping efficiency indicators that are feasible with data found or generated easily on the four small farms and this will become part of the annual assessments (3 years).

1/2010-3/2010 – Four on-farm winter meetings were held. Annual Mass Nutrient Balance summaries were reviewed and verified by farm management teams. Where mass balances summary data were identified as potentially inaccurate, original data were summarized into formats that farm management teams used for quickly identifying potential inaccuracies and correcting them. This new data reporting format was found universally useful for the case-study farms and the formats are being incorporated into standard reporting procedures for the nutrient mass balance summary now. In addition, each farm management team also discussed the other tools that had been used to measure nutrient use on the farm. Two of the three farm management teams that grow corn silage identified the corn stalk nitrate test (CSNT) as an important tool for decision-making and wanted to continue in 2010, the third farm wanted to concentrate on pulling together more in-season N, P and K supply information on each field in addition to the CSNT. Three farm management teams identified the soil test results displayed graphically across the whole farm (fields ranked form low to medium, to optimal, to high in soil test results) as useful and also gave suggestions on additional display and table formats to create a complete Farm Soil Test Report for 2010. This format allows farm management to quickly look at whole farm and field specific trends over time for three soil test parameters:
(1) Illinois Soil Nitrogen Test (ISNT)
(2) Soil Test Phosphorus (STP)
(3) Soil Test Potassium (STK)
Two of the farms identified booklets of farm field maps with field boundaries and soil overlays as a tool that they would like to develop in 2010. An additional tool, a Precision Feed Management (PFM) Benchmarking tool, was identified as potentially useful by one member of two management teams. Each management team decided to focus on another year of crop management indicators and not enough interest was held by the whole group to engage the PFM tool. All four teams set it aside as something important to look at in the future.

3/2011 – farm maps were supplied to the farm management teams for use in the 2011 crop season.

Milestone 3: Four Extension educators will gain skills and experience throughout this process in data collection and whole farm analysis. They will collaborate with university staff to provide training for fellow extension educators at bi-annual field crop extension retreats (1-2 day events). A total of 15 dairy and field crop extension educators will be educated on implementation and interpretation of whole farm analysis through these professional retreats (2 years).

1/2009-3/2010 – Farm management teams expanded and on-farm meetings included four Cornell Cooperative Extension educators (3 field crops 1 dairy), two dairy nutritionists/feed sales persons, three
certified nutrient management planners/crop consultants.

3/2011 – Twenty-two (22) Conservation District Employees, partner agency staff, and private sector planners were trained to better understand the concepts and tools available to better manage nutrients on cropland.

Milestone 4: The most relevant AEI indicators will be included in the MNB Project annual mass balance assessments in which 75 small farms participate. Of these 75 farms it is expected that at least 15 farmers will implement management changes, the results of which will be tracked through annual assessments that are part of the Mass Nutrient Balance Program.

12/12/2010 – 2009 MNB reports were sent to 30 farmers. A subset of the reports included new reports for quick identification of potential data inconsistencies and herd and crop AEI’s that had been developed as a result of feedback from 2008 on-farm winter meetings in this project. These indicators and additional reports were considered helpful in whole farm analysis during the on-farm meetings with all four casestudy farms.

3/2011 – 2010 MNB reports were sent to 29 farmers. A subset of the reports included new reports for quick identification of potential data inconsistencies and herd and crop AEI’s that had been developed as a result of feedback from 2008 on-farm winter meetings in this project. These indicators and additional reports were considered helpful in whole farm analysis during the on-farm meetings with all four casestudy farms.

Impacts and Contributions/Outcomes

We collected three years of data for Mass Nutrient Balance data showing farm trends since inception of the project. We developed standard reporting formats based on feedback from 2008 and 2009 on-farm winter management meetings. We developed the Whole Farm Soil Test Report based on feedback from 2009 on-farm winter management meetings. The new reporting format allows farm managers to see whole farm and field specific nutrient trends and guides strategic planning. We developed a standard reporting format for corn stalk nitrate test results based on 2009 on-farm winter management meetings. We developed standard reporting format for manure analyses aimed at improving use in for farm decision making. We developed a standard format for farm-map booklets aimed at improved tracking, planning, communicating and implementation of farm nutrient use decisions. We interviewed farm management teams to assess which indicators had the most impact on farm management teams and which would have the largest impact on farm profits. We used the experiences of this project to fine-tune the development of the most effective tools and to teach the use of these tools to audiences of professional farm advisors. In addition two more farm impact articles were published in the Small Farm Quarterly which highlighted the tools that farmers felt had the most impact on their decision-making.

Collaborators: