Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture

Flood workshop: farmers share experiences, ideas

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You cannot stop the rain but farming practices can go a long way in keeping rainwater – and soil – close at hand. Presenting at the Farm Systems panel were Francis Thicke, who operates a grass-based, organic dairy near Fairfield; Rick Juchems, who had 80 acres under water in Butler County; and Rick Cruse, agronomy professor and director of the Iowa Water Center.

Thicke said his farm is all grass and legumes, rotationally grazed twice daily by 75 dairy cows, a system that mimics Iowa’s native prairies in building soil organic matter. The system also infiltrates more water from rainfall, evidence of which he saw last summer.

“I had about a two-inch rain in one hour and my farm soaked it up. But upstream, where the land was used mostly for row crops, the water did not soak in,” he said. “The whole valley was one raging river just from that rain.”

He said studies have shown that switchgrass, a perennial that returns year after year, absorbs five to seven times more rain water than annual crops. That’s why grassed waterways next to crop fields are so important, he said, adding that he would like to see more cover crops used with annuals such as corn and soybeans.

Juchems farms along the Cedar River that was heavily flooded last summer. He said three newly installed terraces all held. “It’s kind of a no-brainer to put a grassed waterway on your farm where it’s needed, but you have to maintain it.” He also recommended filter strips and grassed headlands to keep water from running up and down hills, and proper tiling underneath terraces. He has multi-year leases for the land he farms, a necessity for sustaining critical conservation practices.

He advocated no-till because it keeps nutrients in the soil and holds soil particles in place. “The ground that I saw that was no-till had the least amount of impact from the rain that fell this year,” he said.

Cruse said different practices are appropriate for different parts of the landscape. The key is to see conservation as a system, rather than a single practice.

He said erosion can be reduced by strengthening soil structure with techniques such as reduced tillage, adding organic matter, or intercepting raindrop energy with living cover, grassed waterways or crop residues. However, he warned that no-till is not a replacement for grassed waterways.

Another problem is that a majority of Iowa farmland is rented rather than managed by an owner-operator, which removes the incentive for long-term conservation practices. “It comes down to the fact that farmers need to own the land they farm,” Cruse said. “Those individuals who have the most to lose by making inappropriate decisions should be the ones to make the land management decisions.”
 

 

Back to Leopold Letter Winter 2008