Brief Summary of Minutes of Annual Meeting

Location: Oakwood Room, Student Union, South Dakota State University, Brookings,SD Meeting Agenda: Tuesday AM, June 29, 2010 8:00 to 8:20: Welcome by the SDSU VP for Research, Kevin Kephart 8:20 to 8:40: Administrative Advisory Report, Gary M. Pierzynski 8:40 to 9:00: USDA NIFA Report, powerpoint handout 9:00 to 10:00: NC-1178 Business Meeting Business Meeting Agenda: 1. Election of Incoming Secretary 2. Approval of Minutes 3. Committee Reports 4. Selection of 2011 Meeting Location and Dates 5. 2010 Committee Responsibilities & Calendar of Due Dates 6. Other Business 10:00 to 10:15: Break 10:15 to 10:30: Call-in from Nancy Cavallaro, Washington D.C. (Q/A) 10:30 to 12:00: Project Coordination and Planning Tuesday PM, June 29, 2010 12:00 to 1:00: Lunch (At the Union) 1:00 to 2:00: Project Coordination and Planning 2:00 to 4:00: Station Report (Nebraska, Minnesota-ARS, Guam) 4:00 to 4:30: Travel to EcoSun Prairie Farms 4:30 to 6:00: Research Plots (South Dakota Report) & EcoSun Farms Tour, 6:30 to 8:30: Dinner (Mad Marys - Flandreau) 8:30 to 9:00: Return to Brookings Wednesday AM, June 30, 2010 8:00 to 10:00: Station Reports and Discussion (Iowa, Missouri, Illinois) 10:00 to 10:15: Break 10:15 to 12:00: Station Reports and Discussion (North Dakota, Wisconsin) 12:00: Adjourn (Lunch on your own) Summary of Decisions made: Meeting leadership was confirmed. Since chair G. Steinhardt was unable to attend the meeting it was decided to alter the committee leadership for 2010. T. Schumacher was chosen as chair and M. Golabi as secretary for 2010. The committee decided to have G. Steinhardt serve as chair and T. Schumacher serve as secretary in 2011. M. Golabi will continue as chair in 2012. Past meeting minutes were read and approved. A discussion was made concerning how to formally recognize non-state participants in the multi-state project. In particular the committee wished to formally recognize the participation of D. Lobb from the University of Manitoba. Our administrative adviser, G. Pierzynski, will check into procedures needed to accomplish this action. A meeting location was discussed for next year. The committee decided to select the University of Guam as next year's meeting location. The first week in August 2011 (August 1-5) was chosen as the preferred meeting time. The committee decided to pursue a conference theme related to understanding soil carbon sequestration within eroded landscapes. A committee (M. Golabi, B. Lowery, and M. Al.Kasi) was appointed to apply for grants in support of a workshop/conference to occur in conjunction with the NC-1178 meeting. A major part of the committee meeting concerned a discussion of basic design and procedures to be used by participating states within the multi-state project. T. Schumacher was appointed to write a summary of the discussion and decisions made by the attending committee members. Individual state progress reports were distributed to committee members and presentations were given by attending members.

Sites selected in 2010 include newly initiated sites and previously established sites that are being re-purposed for the study. North Dakota established a site at the Oakes Research Station that has had residue removal since 2008. At this site, removal rates of 0, 33, 66 or 100 percent of the residue have been applied using a small plot forage chopper. The treatments have been applied by removing none of the residue,chopping and removing residue from 1 of 3 rows, 2 of 3 rows, or 3 of 3 rows. The rows being chopped with residue removal are rotated each year so that each row has been removed at least once over a 3-year cycle. A second site has been established at the Carrington Research and Extension Center in spring 2010 using the same residue removal plan. At both locations, the residue removal is being done in continuous corn and corn either preceding or following soybean. Deep cores have been collected from both sites and the cores from the Carrington site are currently being processed. Guam is taking an integrated approach to evaluate the effect of conservation tillage, crop rotation with leguminous crops as well as green manure for organic matter build up. Residue management for soil conservation will be evaluated Tillage is an important component of this study and included no-till, reduced till, conventional till and conventional tillage with rotation to a legume, Sunhemp. Soil carbon contents are uniformly low at the experimental site with soil organic carbon at the surface <1.5 percent on a mass basis. Past work has shown reduced soil carbon on the conventionally tilled soils compare to no-till and reduced till treatments. South Dakota has an experimental site that includes continuous corn, switchgrass, and a mixed grass-forb treatment. An extensive prairie remnant maintained by the Nature Conservancy exists and will be used as a non-cultivated benchmark. Each plot is split into harvested biomass and biomass (minus corn grain) retained treatments and includes a landscape component with summit (crest), backslope, and footslope treatments. A second experimental site does not have a landscape ccomponent. Residue removal treatments were established in 2000 at this site and includes a cover crop treatment started in 2005. The experimental design is an RCBD with split plots (cover and no-cover crops) and 3 replications. Management practices include a no-till corn-soybean rotation in which each part of the rotation is represented every year in the study. Removal of residue is reducing the labile soil carbon fraction of the surface soil. Measurements during the life of the project will document the effects of residue removal treatments on soil surface properties. Residue harvest experiments in Ohio are being conducted at Coshocton on Rayne silt loam with a 10% slope, South Charleston on Celina silt loam with a 2% slope, and at Hoytville on a Hoytville clay loam with <1% slope. Crop residue are removed at rates of 0, 25, 50, 75, and 100%. In one treatment, the residue amount is doubled. Past research on these long term plots have demonstrated significant yield losses at the Coshocton site with grain yield losses of 1.4 Mg ha-1 with 50% stover removal and 3.1 Mg ha-1 with >75% stover removal. In comparison, the stover yield in 2005 decreased by 2.2 Mg ha-1 with 50% stover removal and by 3.9 Mg ha-1 with >75% stover removal. Effects of stover removal on corn grain and stover yields were less drastic at South Charleston and Hoytville. Two Iowa locations established in 2008 are being studied using a complete randomized block design in a split-split arrangement with two tillage systems as main plots, three levels of residue removal, and six N rates. The project has five anticipated outcomes which include reliable estimates of: (1) amount of C and nutrients removed and returned to the soil by residue, (2) soil C and N sequestration potential with different residue management practices, (3) amount of greenhouse gas emissions, (4) assessing needs for supplemental fertilization of following crops and the cost thereof, and (5) impacts on soil physical properties. After the second year of continuous corn in 2009, the well drained soils had significantly greater yields than the poorly drained soils. There were no observed yield reductions due to removal of residue at agronomic and high N rates. On the contrary, corn yields increased for the 0N rate treatment when 100% of residue was removed. In addition, there were no differences in yield between no-till and chisel plow for both sites. Wisconsin has established a research site at the Arlington Agricultural Research Station on a ~6% slope with Griswold silt loam soil (fine-loamy, mixed, mesic, Typic Argiudolls). This growing season (2010) the plot area was planted to soybean to establish uniform conditions. There will be four treatments and a control as following: (1) conventional corn planted with 76.2 cm (30 inch) row spacing, (2) narrow 38.1 cm corn row spacing, (3) narrow 17.7 cm twin corn rows with alternating plants for the two rows, (4) the control, no residue removal which will include all row spacings, and (5) switchgrass. A low and high residue removal treatment (20 and 90% of the residue removed, respectively) will be established.To remediate the impact of residue removal on soil quality (organic matter/carbon and physical properties) no-tillage will be used and a cover crop (annual ryegrass or Austrian winter pea) planted prior to crop harvest and residue removal. Each treatment will be replicated three times in a randomized complete block design. The plots will be setup as continuous corn and switchgrass, thus plots will not be rotated. Kansas has established two sites on fully-irrigated, continuous-corn, producer-owned fields near Hugoton, Kansas. Soil types being evaluated are a Hugoton loam, 0-1% slope, and a Bigbow fine sandy loam, 1-3% slope. Annually, irrigation water applied averages approximately 57 cm for both sites. Residue was harvested at rates of either 0 or 9 Mg ha-1of residue removed. The treatment design is a randomized complete block with four replications, and plots are 9.1 m by 15.2 m in area. The experimental factors are residue (removed and returned) and frequency (every other year versus annual removal). Corn grain yield was lower at both sites following 70% removal (by mass) of the previous year corn stover. The difference between treatments was more pronounced for the sandier Bigbow site (6% less for removed) than the Hugoton site (3% less for removed), though these differences were not significant. Stover yields appeared very similar across treatments, but were generally lower at the Bigbow site. Illinois is utilizing an existing 13 year corn-soybean rotation established under a related previously funded regional project (NC-174 phase 1) . The study has 3 treatments (no-till, chisel plow, and moldboard plow) established on a backslope with an average slope of 6%. The 18 plots (3 treatments with 6 replications) were split with half of each plot planted with a rye cover crop in fall of 2001, 2003, 2005, 2007 and 2009 and a vetch cover crop in fall of 2002, 2004, 2006, and 2008 (phase 2 of the project). Cover crops did not affect the 4 year soybean plant populations or yields of the tillage treatments; however the 2006 CP with cover treatment had significantly lower soybean yield. The corn plant populations and yields were not affected by tillage treatment with and without a cover crop. The annual estimated soil loss during the 18-year period was 8.0(6.1), 22.1(18.3), and 30.0(26.0) Mg/ha (tons/ac) in NT, CP and MP systems, respectively. In the fall of 2009, the third phase of this tillage experiment was initiated. Corn stover was be removed from 3 replications of each tillage and cover crop treatment. The other three replications of each tillage and cover crop treatment was left with the residue. Indiana (USDA-ARS) has an ongoing study examining corn stover removal with removal rates of 0, 50, 75, and 100% along with bare soil plots that will be used for this project. Missouri has established an experiment using a modified split plot design. The main plots include crop rotation of soybean-corn and corn-soybean with two removal treatments (no removal and 70% removal). The subplots consist of cover crop and nitrogen treatments. Cover crops, cereal rye and austrian winter pea, included 3 nitrogen treatments of 0,90, and 180 lbs./a. The no cover crop treatment has 0, 30, 60, 90, 120, and 180 lbs/a N rates. The soil at the site is a Mexico silt loam fine, smectic, mesic Vertic Epiaqualf. Sanborn field studies will also continue to be used to evaluate the effects of crop residue removal on soil properties.

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