By Amanda Douridas
OSU Extension Champaign County and the Champaign Soil and Water Conservation District are offering a Soil Health Workshop Series beginning in September. This workshop is designed for farmers interested in learning more about soil health and fertility and will be limited to 25 participants. The registration is cost is only $25 for four meetings thanks to a Top of Ohio RC&D grant, 4R Tomorrow grant and Ohio Soybean Council. Registration includes two soil samples, dinner at the evening meetings and class materials.
Participants will learn about agronomy, the importance of soil fertility and nutrient management, how to pull soil samples and read lab results. They will also tour Brookside labs to see how scientist process soil samples. Different nutrient sources will be discussed during later sessions to provide participants with the knowledge they need to correctly determine which source is best for different field situations. They will also receive their Agricultural Applicator Fertilizer Certification required of most people applying commercial fertilizer to more than 50 acres.
Presenters include specialists from OSU Extension, USDA-NRCS, Sloan Ag Consulting LLC and Dallas Ag LLC. During the final workshop, these specialists will help each farmer create a farm plan based on soil test results from their farms.
Farmers will come away with the knowledge they need to make informed agronomic and economic decisions about soil health and nutrient management.
The session dates are:
September 2, 2015 6-9pm at the Champaign County Community Center Auditorium
December 2, 2015 8:30 am-noon: Tour of Brookside Labs
January 13, 2016 6-9pm at the Champaign County Community Center Auditorium
January 20, 2016 6-9pm at the Champaign County Community Center Auditorium