Annual Meeting: NC-218

Assessing Soil N Availability in Regional Corn Cropping Systems

 

Kansas City, MO

March 19-20, 2003

 

Minutes

 

Opening Remarks and Introduction

 

 

Administrative Advisor            Chair                                        Secretary

Gary Lemme                            Warren Dick                             William R. Horwath

lemme@msu.edu                    dick.5@osu.edu                     wrhorwath@ucdavis.edu

 

 

The meeting was called to order March 19 at the Airport Holiday Inn in Kansas City, Missouri by Warren Dick.

 

Members in Attendance: Larry Bundy (Wisconsin), Alan Olness (Minnesota/ARS), John Schmidt (Kansas), Gyles Randall (Minnesota AES), Warren Dick (Ohio), Carrie A.M. Laboski (Michigan), Daniel Walters (Nebraska), Robert Hoeft (Illinois), Ali Tabatabai (Iowa), Peter Scharf (Missouri), William Horwath (California), David Clay (South Dakota),

 

Members Absent:  Chuck Rice (Kansas), Silvia Brouder (Indiana), Gary Harmon (New York)

 

Guests: none

 

The following agenda items were approved for discussion.

 

Summaries on past year research by members

 

All members presented summaries of their past year’s research efforts.  A major topic of most of the discussions was the Illinois Soil Test.  Many members have implemented the test in their own labs.  Values for predicting responsive soils were similar in different states and cropping systems but a wide range in values raised some concern.  There was consensus that more work needed to be done on calibrating the test.  A suggestion was raised by G. Randall to initiate a calibration study. 

 

2002 Minutes

 

Minor corrections were cited and a motion to accept the 2002 minutes was given by G. Randall and a second of the motion by A. Olness followed by a unanimous acceptance of the minutes by the committee.

 

CSREES Report

 

No CSREES formal representative’s report was presented in the absence of Ray Knighton.  G. Lemme presented some discussion on the Farm Bill and possible increases in funding to the NRI initiative.

 

Administrative Advisors Report

 

Gary Lemme presented the administrative advisors report.  He stressed the following:

1.      Midterm review needs to be submitted by the end of 2003 stressing goals achieved.

a.      Demonstrate linkages among members.

b.      Demonstrate production of products from the group research and attaining extramural funds to support the groups’ research. 

    1. Technology transfer through coordination with NC-59.
    2. Most importantly pay attention to “Goals and Objectives” and document any changes.

2.      Gary presented the multi-state “National Information Management System that all committees need to report to at the following web address: http://www.lgu.umd.edu/logon.cfm.

3.      Dan Olk from the ARS in Ames, Iowa is petitioning to join the committee.  L. Bundy motioned to accept D. Olk’s petition and was seconded by D. Walters followed by unanimous approval by the committee.

 

Business

 

L. Bundy nominated C. Laboski for Member-at-Large and was seconded by D. Walters followed by unanimous approval by the committee.

 

Committee leadership for the 2004 meeting is:

 

William Horwath            Chair

John Schmidt                Secretary

Carrie Laboski             Member-at-Large

Warren Dick                Past Chair

 

The dates of the meeting will be March 17 and 18, 2004 and the location will be at the Holiday Inn-Airport in Kansas City, MO.

 

Review on efforts for Publications from last project

 

The members agreed to assign tasks and authorship to publish the results from the data collected from the last project.  The following reports on progress of the anticipated publications were made:

 

1.   L. Bundy reported no progress on an overview paper on “Methods and data collected during last project” that will include:

                  -characterize crop response

                  -gather state specific data on field histories

                  -publish in Advances in Agronomy

 

Authors:      Bundy, Brouder, Clay, Schmidt and Walters

 

2.   D. Walters reported that the paper on “Potential N mineralization quick test and their relationship to thermal units” was started and showed figures of the results to be included in the manuscript.  Additional data from C. Rice from the long-term incubation data is needed to recalculate the N0 value.  J. Schimdt agreed to talk to C. Rice and get the needed data. 

 

Authors: Walters, Horwath, Rice and Tabatabai

 

3.   P. Scharf reported that the paper on “Plant sensing of N status” was started and showed an outlined of the manuscript.

 

Authors: Brouder, Hoeft, Scharf and Walters

 

4.   The authors need data from C. Rice to begin writing the manuscript entitled “Relationship of soil mineralizable C to mineralizable N”.  J. Schimdt will query C. Rice on the needed data.

 

Authors: Rice, Dick, Horwath, Tabatabai and Walters

 

5.   J. Schimdt reported that the authors met last July to begin work on the manuscript entitled “Using testing techniques to predict soil N mineralization and develop fertilizer recommendations”.  J. Schimdt presented an outline and figures. 

 

Authors: Schmidt, Bundy, Olness, Randall, Scharf and Walters

 

Maize Growth model presentation by D. Walters

 

D. Walters presented a new Maize Growth model.  Initial results of model simulations suggest that planting date is critical to avoid high night temperatures during the latter part of the growing season. 

 

Data management

 

Dan Walters presented continued a discussion from last year’s meeting that detailed the use of Excel spreadsheet format to enter data collect from the individual state research projects.  D. Walters will provide an FTP protocol for individual researchers to upload their data in a standard format.  D. Walters will also supply Excel worksheet templates to standardize the data submission process. 

 

A. Olness raised the question on the project objectives

 

A. Olness raised a question concerning the analytical nature of the Illinois Soil Test, specifically what fraction of soil was being measured.  After some discussion it was agreed that the fraction of soil N being measured in the Illinois Soil test obvious and that more work will probably be needed to determine the relationship of amino sugar N to available soil.

 

Protocol discussion for new project

 

Gyles Randall continued the discussion from last year on small plots and field strip studies.  G. Randall summarized the 2002 projects and the anticipated 2003 projects in the following Table. 

 

 

                                                           

State

New small

New field

Existing small

Temporal

Spatial

 

 

 

 

 

 

CA

 

 

(1)

 

 

IA

25* (12-14)**

(20)

 

2 (2)

 

IL

20 (20-25)

(10)

 

4

3

IN

 

4 (4)

 

 

 

KS

3 (3)

1 (1)

 

 

 

MI

7 (7)

(10)

 

2 (2)

 

MN

1

 

 

 

 

MO

 

2

 

 

 

NE

12 (12)

 

4 (4)

 

 

OH

(1)

 

 

 

 

WI

(2)

 

4

1

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

*values represent 2002 activity

**values in parentheses represent 2003 activities

 

W. Horwath advised that there will be a change in protocol for light fraction determination.  The change is to air-dry soils and sieve to 6mm.

 

It was also noted that on the temporal sampling scheme that sampling does not need to be done on a specific time frame or frequency on all fields.  Most importantly the sampling times need to recorded.

 

A. Tabatabai questioned if we should analyze for soil C and N in the temporal sample.  It was agreed we should.  A. Olness agreed to provide the analysis.  Members doing temporal analysis should send A. Olness 10 g of air-dried soil.

 

 

Adjourn