Extension recommendations for calculating the amount of nitrate-nitrogen in irrigation water and optimal timing of applications to reduce the cost of nitrogen inputs in irrigated corn.
In a dry spring like 2025, early irrigation may be needed — but applying too much water too soon risks losing nitrogen and rainfall storage. Learn how soil moisture monitoring and timing can protect yields and inputs.
Access to quality water is critical. Testing can indicate whether water is safe for people to consume. Know Your Well is a program used to test well water across Nebraska at no cost to the community, while teaching local high school students valuable skills.
In the past seven years, Know Your Well has been implemented in more than 28 school districts throughout the state. The program has received funding to grow to 50 or more schools over the next few years and expand its curriculm.
How nitrogen moves and is changed in the soil is important to help protect Nebraska's groundwater from contamination. However, these changes are not fully understood. To help understand these processes, a research team led by Dr. Arindam Malakar, scientist and research assistant professor in the School of Natural Resources and the Nebraska Water Center part of the Daugherty Water for Food Global Institute at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, has begun a statewide study to uncover nitrogen transformation in the vadose zone.
Continue reading about their project across Nebraska.
Scheduling the last few irrigations of the season deserves extra attention because the goal is not only to focus on keeping the crop wet enough to produce optimal yields, but also on using up stored soil water. Leaving the field a little drier at the end of the season will save irrigation costs, decrease leaching losses, improve soil conditions for harvest traffic, and save water for future years. Growers also don't want to miss out on capturing off-season precipitation.
Nebraska means “flat water” from the Omaha Sioux “ni braska” and Oto “ni brathge”/ Nebraskier describing the Platte River. The Platte River was named by early French explorers, also meaning “flat.” The Panhandle is almost 6.5 times higher elevation than the Southeast. (5,424 ft above sea level versus 840 ft). Southeast NE receives 2.5 times as much annual precipitation as the Panhandle (average 33” versus 13”).
