Just like a spreader used for commercial fertilizer, a manure spreader must also be calibrated. If you don’t know the rate you’re applying, how can you possibly calculate the nutrients you’ve applied? And if you’re not factoring in the nutrients in the manure, you’re wasting money. And who wants to do that?

Agriculture today is not what it was a decade ago. We are at an interesting pace of agricultural technological innovation and development in sensors, controls, robotics and technology, including irrigation scheduling applications. The declining quantity and quality of freshwater resources in many parts of the world, including the United States, imposes significant challenges for producers, managers, advisors and decision-makers to produce more yield with less water. It is necessary to promote sound management strategies to improve irrigation efficiency and conserve water resources. By using irrigation scheduling applications, producers can make more informed decisions that can lead to higher yields with fewer irrigation inputs. Nebraska is one of the top states that produces maize under different irrigation methods, in third place after Iowa and Illinois. The total irrigated area in Nebraska reaches about 9.3 million acres. More than 85% of the total irrigation areas use the center pivot irrigation system, while about 15% is covered by furrow irrigation and less than 1% is managed by subsurface drip irrigation systems (see fig. 1). A new irrigation scheduling application is being developed to improve irrigation scheduling that can have a substantial impact in using limited water supplies more effectively and increase yield per unit applied of irrigation water and sustain agricultural productivity. At the request of Irriga Global, Lutry, Switzerland, a field test was initiated for the 2022 growing season on maize fields to evaluate the irrigation scheduling application in one of the Irrigation Today.

During the Soil Health School, presenters will cover many aspects of the science related to soil health, including foundational soil health principles, the evaluation of soil health management practices, and get to experience many hands-on soil health investigations and demonstrations. As a bit of a sneak preview, this article highlights what Leslie Johnson, Nebraska Extension Statewide Manure Educator will be sharing that day. Of course, she’ll be talking about how manure can impact soil health, but the role she’s the most excited about because it will be the most hands-on, is getting to show different ways of determining root growth.

Every month the UNL Animal Manure Management Team produces graphics on the benefits of manure application and manure best practices and we want your help sharing them. The graphics are for educational purposes and for use by the public. Oftentimes the graphics we create include a link to an article featured on the UNL manure website, manure.unl.edu.