All of our resources are available from this page. You can also visit the specific pages for individual topics to get focused information on those areas.
Conservation encompasses many areas - soil, water, and crop considerations all play a part. We offer a variety of practical resources to help you find the answers to your questions.
"How resilient are our lands here in the Midwest? What is our ability to retain productivity if we have another long drought or continual flooding? Will people still be farming in Iowa 1,500 years from now? Or even 200 years from now? The decisions we make today about our natural resources will affect agricultural production 50 years from now." --from the video "The Work of Our Hands"
Cover crops are a great way to improve soil health. Many Iowa farmers are adding cover crops to their crop rotations so soil stays covered when the fields are not growing other crops. Cover crops also improve soil organic matter and slow water runoff.
Farmers have many questions about incorporating cover crops. Most asked questions include: what kinds of plants can be used, when and how to seed and when and how to terminate. With field days and workshops, Iowa Learning Farms strives to help farmers, and other interested people, find the answers to these questions and more.
Edge-of-field practices play a crucial role in meeting the Iowa Nutrient Reduction Strategy goals of improving water quality through reducing nitrogen and phosphorus in Iowa's water bodies. Edge-of-field practices involve drainage water management, bioreactors, buffers, saturated buffers, denitrifying wetlands, terraces and sediment control.
Relay intercropping is a multi-year, multi-species cropping system that allows for 3 harvestable crops (small grain, soybean, corn) in 2 years.
View recent webinars, blogs and publications from ongoing research farm and on-farm demonstrations.
These toolkits are the product of Iowa Learning Farms’ many years of planning and hosting field day events across the state of Iowa, as well as our newer Conservation On Tap gatherings. While ILF utilizes many different outreach approaches, the importance of farmer-to-farmer interactions cannot be overstated. Field days do matter!
Iowa Learning Farms (ILF) has successfully produced its Conservation Webinar Series since 2011, offering opportunities for online audiences to learn about the latest research and implementation efforts of conservation-related practices. To aid other organizations in producing webinars, ILF has created this toolkit which includes information on planning, promoting, designing, hosting, archiving, and evaluating a webinar, based on experience gained from producing and archiving hundreds of webinars.
Though the back roads of Iowa on a clear July morning may reflect the beauty of a Grant Wood painting, the underlying canvas for some who methodically farm those acres of corn and soybean reveals something much less placid—boredom brought on by structural strain. A venturous group of Iowa farmers, however, has found that boredom can also be the brushstroke that inspires innovation.
Read MoreWith Derek Franklin
Read MoreManaging Manure Transport with Prairie Strips
Recent science suggests yet another benefit of prairie strips: manure management to prevent the spread of antimicrobial resistance.
Read MoreWith Andrew Hillman
Read MoreWith Roland (Roli) Wilhelm
Read MoreWith Wenjuan Huang
Read MoreWith Alejandro Plastina
Read MoreA study looking at the impact of winter cereal rye on crop yield and soil 12 Iowa farms from 2008-2019.
Read MoreAnaerobic Digesters for Renewable Natural Gas
One way farmers can participate in the shift towards more renewable energy is by building an anaerobic digester on their farm or supplying feedstock for a nearby digester.
Read MoreWhat is redefining the field edge?
A land-use-change concept that alters a field’s cropping boundaries, converting some parts of the field to perennial prairie vegetation.
This publication provides best management recommendations for farmers and landowners getting started with conservation and water quality practices by helping select and incorporate in-field and edge-of-field conservation practices most appropriate to the decision maker's land and preferences.
Read MoreIn this infographic, learn strip tillage basics including equipment needs, timing, fertilizer application and the advantages compared with traditional approaches.
Read MoreIowa’s fertile soil has helped the state become a global agricultural leader. However, that same soil and the fertilizers used to boost crop production contribute to water quality challenges when nitrogen and phosphorus leave through drainage, runoff and erosion. The Iowa Nutrient Reduction Strategy set statewide goals for reducing nutrient losses through a variety of practices.
Read MoreA study estimating the value of retained nutrients and land value from the use of cover crops.
Read MoreA case study using rainfall simulation to estimate soil erosion and water infiltration rates in a corn silage/soybean rotation when a cereal rye cover crop is added compared to no cover crop.
Read MoreDownloadable recipes for going from soybeans to corn, and from corn to soybeans using cover crops.
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