Water News Archive

With ongoing drought, conserving water in home, business and public landscapes is important. One way to conserve water is selecting drought tolerant plants. As a rule, a drought tolerant plant is one that can survive on average rainfall with little or no supplemental water once established.

It’s that time of year again and I’m here to help you stay on track for that New Year’s resolution to “Manure Better”. That wasn’t your resolution? I’m sorry, but it would be a great resolution and an achievable one at that, so add it to your list. My New Year’s resolution is to help crop farmers “Manure Better”. The annual land application (manure) training events are coming up soon and may be just the ticket to “help me, help you”.

As we are ending 2023, the temperature high and/or low could be consistently at or less than 32°F with a possible chance of snow precipitation. For turfgrass areas in December, the process of dormancy for both warm and cool-season grasses has already occurred. In regards to water use in dormant lawns in cooler temperatures, December is not the time to use irrigation in grass areas. The Photo above is from Pioneer Underground Lawn Sprinklers. https://pioneerunderground.net/sprinkler-winterization-omaha/

Manure application on frozen or snow-covered soil poses a higher risk of nutrient loss through runoff.

Available now on CropWatch, the web-based tool allows users to input data for individual fields to help fine-tune their nitrogen applications, and maximize yield and profitability.

Manure is like a slow-release fertilizer for our crops, sort of like the gift that keeps on giving. Kristen Sindelar with the Midwest Messenger shares what she learned by attending the "Saving Money by Using Manure on Crops" workshop.

The Importance of Maintaining High Uniformity of Water Application of Center Pivot

The Soil Health Exchange team shares insights and potential solutions for a southwest Nebraska farmer who has observed a significant yield decline in a field after terraces were built in 2010.

Leaves. Useful to the tree. Great for jumping in. Not much fun to clean up. Find out what you should be doing with those fallen leaves to let them help you and your landscape in the long run.

Soil moisture supplies and pasture conditions in Nebraska were on a downward trend as of Nov. 12. Corn and sorghum harvest remain on track, with less than 10% of each crop to be finished.

I often hear from vegetable or flower gardeners who are unhappy with their soil quality. They routinely incorporate organic matter in the soil each fall, but are still disappointed with their heavy soil. Why aren’t they developing beautiful crumbly dark brown soil that’s easy to plant and great for vegetable root crops? Routinely tilling your garden soil each fall and spring could be the culprit.

This article provides a brief summary of the irrigation decisions made in the TAPS sorghum, popcorn, SDI corn and sprinkler corn competitions this year.

A new pivot valve, created by KZValve of Greenwood, Nebraska, has self-power generating capabilities that could potentially be used in partial variable rate irrigation.

October has had a wet start in most of the state, with some areas receiving several inches of rain. Considering potential impact on yield and ability to harvest these fields will be critical in the next few weeks.

Mulch is very important to the overall health of our plants, but are all mulches created equal? Some may have more benefits than others and some may not be as helpful as we think they are. Benefits of Mulch Mulch, when properly applied, can provide a lot of great benefits to our plants, including:

Recommendations for collecting soil samples to ensure the quality results needed for good management decisions about fertilizer, manure and lime application rates.

Harvest updates for sugarbeets, dry edible beans and corn in western Nebraska, and insights on the availability of water in reservoirs for the 2024 growing season.

Results of a three-year study investigating the impact of mitigating water stress during soybean reproductive stages on the two components that comprise yield — seed number and seed mass.

Researchers involved in a UNL-USDA NRCS study on cover crops highlight the importance of species selection, as each type of cover crop has a unique root system that contributes differently to soil health.

Throughout the field day, educators shared insights and conducted live demos on optimizing management of nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium, including via sensor-based fertigation.