Researchers, educators, elected officials, farmers, agribusiness professionals and agricultural and environmental agency representatives gathered for the 2016 Penn State Agricultural Research Tour in late September to learn about current water quality and soil health research relevant to the Chesapeake Bay watershed.
Organized by Penn State's College of Agricultural Sciences and the Penn State Ag Council, the day-long event included visits to two large dairy farms in Clinton County, Pennsylvania. On the tour, Penn State researchers and partners shared innovations that could help maintain Pennsylvania's productive agricultural industry while addressing water quality goals, and discussed research initiatives that have combined multiple agricultural disciplines and cooperative projects between Penn State and its partners.
On planning this year's research tour focus, Penn State Ag Council president Matt Ehrhart said, "Water quality issues are front and center now, especially the discussion around state goals, so water quality made a lot of sense, as well as the topic of soil health, which has many related applications.
"This tour highlighted producers who are working with the University on these topics and also have really strong farm performance levels. These farmers are excellent managers, and the questions we're examining are about how we magnify that knowledge and management capacity," said Ehrhart, who also serves as the director of watershed restoration for Stroud Water Research Center.
This year's theme also aligned closely with research priorities for Penn State's College of Agricultural Sciences, according to Rick Roush, dean of the college.
"Addressing water quality is a major goal for the college," Roush said. "This is a topic that affects agriculture and the environment across the state, and our researchers and educators are working hard to develop science-based strategies and partnerships to promote water quality in Pennsylvania and the bay."
Water quality and the Chesapeake Bay
Representatives from several key environmental agencies involved in water quality issues and Chesapeake Bay conservation attended the tour, including the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection and Chesapeake Bay Commission.
"For me, with the bay, it's about how we come up with efficient, effective solutions, and I personally place a lot of value on seeing the work that people are doing on the ground and getting that perspective," said Patrick McDonnell, the state secretary of environmental protection.
"It was great to see so much interest in water quality and agriculture, and how they co-exist," said Marel King, director of the Chesapeake Bay Commission's Pennsylvania office. "The role of research and extension in helping to expand our knowledge about these issues and communicating to the farm community and to others is so important."
In addition to their dairy operations, the farms on the research tour included acreage that is dedicated to Penn State research projects to test cultivation and management strategies intended to promote efficient agricultural production while reducing nutrient and sediment inputs to Pennsylvania's waterways.
Both farms participate in the Pennsylvania No-Till Alliance, an organization of producers who collaborate on sharing and promoting no-till crop production practices and related research and technology innovations. Tour participants learned about the benefits of combining no-till practices with cover crops, including the improvement of water infiltration into soil, which reduces field runoff of water and associated nutrients and sediment into local streams. Presenters explained how the use of cover crops such as ryegrass and clover also can suppress weeds, take up excess field nutrients and add to the organic and nutritional content of the soil – improving soil biology and composition and yielding production benefits for field and forage crops rotated on the same fields.
"At the end of the day, water quality issues and agriculture affect everyone," said Chris Houser, one of the tour presenters and interim assistant director of agronomy and natural resources programs for Penn State Extension. "We visited farms that host research and include a lot of best management practices. They're demonstrating what agriculture can contribute to water quality, and we're showing what Penn State and the college can do to help."