By James Hoorman - Posted on December 8, 2022 | Posted in No-Till Farming 101 Source: Ohio Country Journal No-Till Farmer recently put together a report: How No-Till Improves Land Values . This report put an economic value on conservation farming practices that improve the environment but also preserve our soil. While farmers own the land and have the right to farm it how they choose, long-term society has an interest in preserving the land for future generations . Here are some results of research on the benefits of no-till to society. An organization called Rural Investment for Protecting our Environment (RIPE) came up with $112 per acre as the value associated with no-till farming. This included $7 for increased carbon sequestration, $16 for improved air quality and human health, $25 for better water quality and $44 for improved soil nutrient management — all on a per acre basis. No-Till Farmer has been documenting farmer benefits for 25 years with farmers indicating they saved $25-$90 per acre in reduced production costs. A conservative figure is $30 per acre on average for reduced fuel, equipment, labor and nutrient (fertilizer) costs and higher water use efficiency, especially for irrigated farmland. Altogether, no-till farmers gain at least $142 per acre in economic benefits. This value represents $16 billion dollars of value to the 110 million acres in the U.S. that are using no-till farming practices. RIPE recently received an $80 million dollar grant from the USDA farm programs to develop Climate Smart Programs. They are doing a pilot project in four states: Arkansas, Minnesota, North Dakota and Virginia. RIPE pays famers up to $100 per acre to adapt conservation practices like no-till, cover crops and strip-till based on the stewardship value to society. They will compare these conservation practices to farmers who don't use conservation practices. RIPE will document changes in carbon sequestration, reduction in greenhouse gasses, increases in soil health, improved water quality and other environmental benefits (reduced flooding, reduced water usage, wildlife benefits, etc.). RIPE says that their recommended conservation practices would guarantee a fair return to farmers for their voluntary practices that deliver public benefits for clean water, land preservation, healthy soil, climate mitigation and other environmental services. This pilot program may be an indication of how USDA farm programs may be handled in the future, based on public service or benefits to society. North Carolina University also did an economic study comparing the value of no-till on land values. They used government satellite data, which is generated every 5 years to determine how the land is farmed and compared that to actual current land sales. Their results showed that for every 1% no-till in an Iowa county, land values increased $15 per acre. In other states, which covered a much larger area with more diversity of land productivity, the value was about $8 per acre. The researcher’s theory is that the more productive the land, the higher the benefits to no-tilling. Also, Iowa has much better information while the other areas had less information, and it covered a much greater diversity of soil types and soil productivity, so the results were about half as great. The value of cover crops was also studied but the difference was not significant, probably because cover crops are only used on about 3.9% of USA cropland. Is it possible that if an Iowa county or a county outside Iowa increased no-till to 10% to 50%, that could increase land values in Iowa by $150/A to $750/A or about $80 to $400 outside of Iowa? The answer is probably a big YES! Consider what happens when land is put into the government Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) for 10-20 years. That land is usually the least productive, highly erodible land, and the least profitable to farm. After 10-20 years of CRP rest in long-term grass, soil health improves, and the soil begins to heal. Many farmers seek out this CRP land because it becomes highly productive and highly profitable once the soil has been restored. As an example, for the same inputs, a soybean farmer may go from 30-bushel soybeans to 70-80 bushels soybeans (40 bu * $13/bu, 50 bu * $13/bu) or $520-$650 in increased value. For a corn farmer, from 120 bushels corn on highly eroded sloping soil to 180-200 bushels corn, a gain of 60-80 bushels ($6/bushel) or $480-$640 per acre. Current Ohio 2022 government conservation practices payments for a new farmer adapting no-till ($16.22/A), conservation crop rotation ($10.39/A), basic nutrient management plan ($6.98/A), precision ag pest management ($46.43/A), and cover crops ($51.05) total $131.07/A (No-Till Farmer, 2022). Conservation practices do pay , but it’s a long-term investment similar to investing in tile. It takes some time and patience to recover your investment. ____________________________________________________________________ Visit these “Growing Resilience Through Our Soils” information pages: 1. Podcast page for drought planning fact sheets, Q&As, news, podcasts and more. 2. Video page to watch videos of other ranchers’ journeys toward improved rangeland/pasture. 3.Follow Growing Resilience on social media: Facebook - Growing Resilience Twitter - @GrowResilience_ Instagram - growingresilience.sd 4. Our homepage: www.growingresiliencesd.com

Pat Guptill, long time South Dakota cattle rancher and proponent of Year Round Grazing, explains what it is, why it works and how to get started. By Mike Cox Pat Guptill lives in Quinn, South Dakota, a small town just north of the Badlands National Park, on a 7000 acre ranch. In a recent Growing Resilience podcast, he gave great insight into Adaptive Grazing Management. In this conversation with Buz Kloot, he discusses Year Round Grazing. Pat Guptill Pat says the primary reasons for doing Year Round Grazing is to reduce costs and eliminate winter cattle work. " Calving in sync with nature isn't all a bed of roses. No matter what you do, if you own cattle you're going to have issues. But do I want to be out there working with cattle in a blizzard or on green grass at 65, 70 degrees?" When Pat Guptill gets questions about Year Round Grazing, they range from, "Can you teach me that?" to, "You're gonna go broke." There is a wide range of beliefs on this subject based on many factors. " But one of the things that we haven't understood is when you calve away from when Mother Nature says you should; usually when the deer have their babies, that's when (your cows) should be having babies. Okay? The farther away from that point you get, the higher the input cost is going to be." According to Guptill, the first thing a rancher should do if he's beginning Year Round Grazing, is to get the calving process in sync with Nature. Have babies when the deer and bison do, typically in May. Once this is achieved, everything else should fall into place. Perception is a major reason some folks don't try this method. "Let's say we're going to calve in March. Now that cow has to be in body conditions, score five and a half to six, or she won't re-breed real easy." Pat's cows run about a 4 body condition score (BCS) in March, which doesn't look good to ranchers used to calving that early. To have a cow at a BCS of 5-6 to calve in March requires that rancher to feed mama cows all winter with high quality feed. That's really expensive. "The whole thought process is let that cow slip all winter and then when March arrives, she starts to gain. That's what the Buffalo did and our cows are not going to fall apart if we let them slip, if we're calving at the right time for our area. Does that kind of make sense?" Pat can have cows at a 5-6 BCS on May 20, ready for calving, and not spend anywhere near as much on premium feed. 80% of winter feed costs is preparing cows for March calving. Hay may still be necessary for winter grazing as insurance, but the rancher can determine when and how much hay to feed based on weather and grass conditions. As long as cattle are able to graze, hay isn't necessary. If ice forms, or high protein grass isn't available, then hay may be required. However, feeding hay isn’t part of the daily winter routine for Pat. During Winter, cattle can graze in the snow, but not on ice. With the snow, they use their snouts to move snow aside to reach grass. Water isn't as necessary when cattle are snow grazing. They will eat a few mouthfuls of grass then lick the snow for moisture. Hay is drier and requires water tanks to be filled, and the surface ice broken regularly. "Study more and do the paperwork. Figure the savings. We can't make our cattle worth more but we can reduce cost input." Pat has also found that calving in late Spring results in more pounds sold. "Our cattle may be smaller at sale but there are more of them." Pat suggests to anybody that wants to start this, they need to " put their feet under the table with somebody that's already doing it," and sit down and figure. One afternoon, a cup of drinking coffee, and visit; and a lot of things will fall in place for them. "A lot of us have done this. We've already made mistakes. There's no sense other people making our mistakes. You go make your own mistakes, but don't forget to share them with me so I don't make them." In addition, we provide some links that feature Pat: For more information on Year Round Grazing, watch this podcast: https://www.growingresiliencesd.com/podcasts/episode/cfd5ac2a/33-calving-with-nature-cuts-costs-for-year-round-grazing Video: “Year Round Grazing: A Change you can believe in”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YYczr2Lv-SA 2013 SD Leopold Award: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DGsjUdScWZM A 2014 video by SDSU visits with Pat about High Stock Density grazing (Pat doesn’t necessarily like to use the words “Mob Grazing”) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fWC9qkYdDNA In 2021, Pat and wife Mary Lou, through the SD NOLO (Non-Operating Land Owner) project, discuss “Understanding the Connection: Stress Reduction Through Soil Health” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FfIJp-M1K5U Also please visit the SD NRCS Range and Pasture website for more information at: https://www.nrcs.usda.gov/conservation-basics/natural-resource-concerns/animals ____________________________________________________________________ Visit these “Growing Resilience Through Our Soils” information pages: 1. Podcast page for drought planning fact sheets, Q&As, news, podcasts and more. 2. Video page to watch videos of other ranchers’ journeys toward improved rangeland/pasture. 3.Follow Growing Resilience on social media: Facebook - Growing Resilience Twitter - @GrowResilience_ Instagram - growingresilience.sd 4. Our homepage: www.growingresiliencesd.com

“How the microbiomes develop in their community and how they change throughout the time until they reach maturity. If you break out the fungal hyphae and you disturb microbiomes, they won't be able to develop, establish, and flourish from that point on.…we realized how important it is to have the fungal community in the system.” David Johnson is a molecular biologist and research scientist residing in Las Cruces NM,investigating soil microbial community population, structure, diversity and biological functionality and their influence on plant growth and soil fertility development in farm and rangeland ecosystems. While working on a project that involved composting excess cow manure that needed a lot of turning, David brought home a lot of dirty laundry. David’s wife, Hui-Chun Su-Johnson, says she grew tired of washing David’s clothes from turning cow poop, and this changed their lives. David and Hui-Chun Johnson David and Hui-Chun started to work on the idea of a compost system that was aerobic, yet did not require turning – a tall order indeed. Hui-Chun joined David in the field and the couple co-developed the no-turn, aerobic Johnson-Su Bioreactor (compost system) that provided a fungal-dominant, biologically diverse compost. The use of Johnson-Sucompost, integrated with land management, then became known as BEAM, or Biologically Enhanced Agricultural Management . What started off as an effort to reduce the laundry load in the Johnson household resulted in a unique compost with a globalfollowing (for example, see the Johnson-Su Facebook group )!! Given that ruminant animals are also “great composting machines”, the Johnsons turned their attention to examining the biological benefits of Adaptive Multi Paddock (AMP)Grazing Systems. AMP is based on the use of ruminant animals to mimic nature not unlike what we may have found a few hundred years ago as bison roamed the prairie in herds that constantly moved in search of food and were kept tight by predators, leaving behind urine, dung, and hoofprints and other animal residue that fed soil organisms. The leftover grass, trampled by bison hooves, covered, protected and fed soil microbes, especially fungi, facilitated the capture and incorporation of more organic matter into the soil profile. In short, this process of herds of ruminants moving through the landscape “ inoculated the soil as the bison passed through each area.” Whether you call it Adaptive Multi Paddock grazing, or Adaptive Management, the watchwords for this process are: O bserve, A dapt, R epeat. Each area is different. Each herd, each ranch, each pasture is different, and each day’s weather is different. The key to moving this system forward in the regenerative process lies in observation and subsequent adaptation. In 2022, Johnson and colleagues produced another peer-reviewed article on the benefits of AMP grazing . This research, based on 5 paired across-the-fence pastures (one conventional pasture, one AMP pasture) in the Southeast, fit nicely with similar efforts across the country with a group of researchers that include Richard Teague, Steven Apfelbaum, Ry Thompson, and Peter Byck (also co-authors with Johnson). This group is conducting other across-the fence experiments, on real farms and ranches, in different parts of the United States and Canada, keep an eye out for their names, also see a list of some of their peer-reviewed articles at the end of this piece. Results from the Johnson et al . study showed (1) AMP grazing systems significantly outperformed their conventional across the fence counterparts in standing crop biomass (2) increased fungal/bacterial ratios and (3) increased predator/prey ratios. This meansthat ranchers converting to AMP grazing strategies will see improved soil structure, improved forage production, increased soil organic matter, improved nutrient efficiency along with increased resilience of their systems to weather extremes. To be sure, AMP grazing is an appreciable departure from conventional systems and what was considered “the right way” for decades. “But now that we have more information out there as tools for [producers], hopefully there will be more ways to show people that there is a more defined, more reliable path.” Says Johnson. He continues: “For [producers] to transition to regenerative and be profitable will only be positive and beneficial for everybody when they are able to make more money and be a better steward of land.. it's all positive feedback loop…and I think we just need to find a way to show people that OK, here is a path that you can go forward with or without having to take on so much risk of unknown.” More science like this is making its way to peer review literature, validating what some regenerative ranchers and farmers have known and practiced for decades. This science, paired with living working examples on farms and ranches across the country, across the globe, provides more evidence and incentive for producers to rethink their business models for the better. __________________________________________________________________________________________ For more on Adaptive Grazing, please search Adaptive Grazing and Allen Williams . For more peer review literature on the Science of AMP by this group, please see: Apfelbaum et al. 2022. Vegetation, water infiltration, and soil carbon response to Adaptive Multi-Paddock and Conventional grazing in Southeastern USA ranches . Journal of Environmental Management 308:114576 Mosier S et al. 2021. Adaptive multi-paddock grazing enhances soil carbon and nitrogen stocks and stabilization through mineral association in southeastern U.S. grazing lands . Journal of Environmental Management 288:112409 Teague WR. 2018. Managing grazing to restore soil health and farm livelihoods . Journal of Animal Science 96:1519-1530 Teague WR et al. 2011. Grazing management impacts on vegetation, soil biota and soil chemical, physical and hydrological properties in tall grass prairie. Agriculture Ecosystems and Environment 141:310-322 Teague WR et al. Assessing optimal configurations of multi-paddock grazing strategies in tallgrass prairie using a simulation model . Journal of Environmental Management 150:262-273 Teague WR and Kreuter U. 2020. Managing grazing to restore soil health, ecosystem function, and ecosystem services . Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems 4:534187 Teague WR et al. 2013. Multipaddock grazing on rangelands: why the perceptual dichotomy between research results and rancher experience? Journal of Environmental Economics and Management 128:699-717 _____________________________________________________________________________________________ Visit these “Growing Resilience Through Our Soils” information pages: 1. Podcast page for drought planning fact sheets, Q&As, news, podcasts and more. 2. Video page to watch videos of other ranchers’ journeys toward improved rangeland/pasture. 3.Follow Growing Resilience on social media: Facebook - Growing Resilience Twitter - @GrowResilience_ Instagram - growingresilience.sd 4. Our homepage: www.growingresiliencesd.com

For this week’s “Resilience Rodeo”, rancher Doug Feltman tells us the importance of controlling Missouri River’s ever-expanding “Green Glacier” through the use of prescribed fire. About 7 miles southwest of Chaimberlain, SD, Doug Feltman lives on the land he grew up on alongside the Missouri river. He’s seen a lot of changes occur over the years, but none as threatening as the “Green Glacier”; the encroachment of the Eastern Red Cedar up the river and into the prairie. “It just slowly, they got more, and more, and more. And people, the farmers and ranchers didn't realize that, I guess, and they never made an attempt to try to control them. Now, some of the trees are 15, 20 feet tall. They're tremendously hard to control then. When they're a foot and a half or two feet tall, that's when you should control them. And that should be done by fire, prescribed fire. But prescribed fire is a process that all of us are going to have to sell to people.” As a rotational grazer and proponent of prescribed burning, Doug’s ranching success comes from not only managing his livestock and land in a healthy way, but also from combatting invasive species by mimicking natures history of fire. Doug Feldman 1) What is the one thing that you’ve done that has been the most important to the success of the operation? The one thing that I noticed that really changed the grazing practices here is when dad died and we moved back here, he had two pastures. Only divided into two pastures. I started to go to the NRCS meetings and every class I could on grazing and the Grassland Coalition and everything and started learning about rotational grazing. So, I started running electric fence through the pasture. Today, the place is divided up into six pastures. We rotate through those six. If possible, I don't go back into the same pasture every spring to give the cool season grasses a different outlook. I do not, I probably should, but I don't, go through and measure the grass and weigh it and all of that. I just go by sight. But I move them through the pastures that way. 2) Can you recall a moment or a time when the lightbulb went on for you that changed the way you were grazing? The light bulb for that went on for me when I started going to the Grassland Coalition meeting. They talked a lot about the rotational grazing, and it really seeing the slides and the people that really did the studies with it, I could see the advantage to it. And I started that here and like I say, it's not scientific at all. It's just an old guy looking at the pasture, but it is obvious that that is a great benefit for the range. 3) What surprised you most when you changed the way you were grazing? I guess what surprised me the most, and it didn't take a long time after I got the pastures divided, was that it was as obvious as it was. We put in a water tank that was not there before. Naturally, the cattle, if they were up on top, had to walk clear down to the river for water. Well, that wasn't working very good. So, with some help, we put in a water tank up there. Now, the cattle utilize the grass up there and they don't eat it down to the, like the kitchen floor, down by the river. That was the most surprising to me, is as obvious it was when you started doing it. 4) What would you say is the biggest misconception people have who are not managing their grazing systems for resiliency and soil health? I think the biggest misconception of rotational grazing, and I guess I might've been part of that also, is you wondered if it worked. If you went to all the work to put a fence from here to the river, down through the hills, was it going to be worth it? I think that's probably the biggest misconception I would think there would be. And it happened to me too, but I'll tell you straight out, it does work. I was surprised at how obvious it was that it does work. 5) Is there something you'd still like to do that you haven't quite managed to do yet on your operation? What I'd still want to do is work on the prescribed fires and get more of the neighbors involved here. That's the only way we're going to control these cedar trees and that's what I want to do, but it takes time. My recommendation to the people here is to really look at your pasture. If you aren't sure about the fire, contact somebody from the [Mid-Missouri River Prescribed Burn] Association. We'll come up and look at it with you and give you some ideas. You, the landowner, you're still the boss, but we could give you some ideas. And just really look at it and try to change your mindset that it's something that's going to have to happen. Look down the road. If you don't do anything, pretty soon your stocking rate isn't going to be what it is today, because it's only going to get worse. The cedars aren't going to stop. 6) When you walk across your grasslands, what and where are you looking for indicators of healthy grassland? What I look for is the amount of grass that's there. And like I say, I don't measure it and weigh it all that. But you look at the amount of grass that's there, the different kinds of grass. I don't know exactly how to say it. You look to see if the pasture's healthy, I guess. 7) Can you give us an example of a change that you made that at first you thought would never work? When we moved back here, I never thought, and I just really never gave it a thought, of a prescribed fire. Since I've been involved with the Burn Association, I have seen that if you write the plan, follow your plan, it will work. And I guess that's the only thing I can say there. I was like everybody else, didn't want fires, but I have seen that it does work. 8) We have a number of words that begin with R, but the three that we've settled on, Rotate, Rest, Recovery, that are really key to healthy and resilient range land. Which one would be your favorite and why? With rotation, rest, and recovery, I guess maybe the one I would think would be the most important would be the rest. The grass has to rest to build the root system to have enough nutrients and stuff. You just can't graze the pastures down like the kitchen floor and keep it at that. It just isn't going to work. That's why the rotation, the recovery, and the rest is so important. And I think probably for me, I think the rest would be the most important. ______________________________________________ _______________________ Visit these “Growing Resilience Through Our Soils” information pages: 1. Podcast page for drought planning fact sheets, Q&As, news, podcasts and more. 2. Video page to watch videos of other ranchers’ journeys toward improved rangeland/pasture. 3.Follow Growing Resilience on social media: Facebook - Growing Resilience Twitter - @GrowResilience_ Instagram - growingresilience.sd 4. Our homepage: www.growingresiliencesd.com

Candice Olson-Mizera’s family roots have been in a North-central South Dakota ranch just west of the Missouri River for decades. The fourth-generation rancher from McLaughlin now firmly believes the key to keeping those family roots intact is to nurture the deep roots of grasses native to her ranch. Candice Olson-Mizera In the last two decades, Candice made it a point to understand her pastures better. She educated herself on how to work with nature to make the most of native rangelands. The changes she made on the 4,000-acre operation were bold––adding the fencing and water needed to divide the four pastures when she took over to rotating through over 20 pastures. The bold moves have doubled the carrying capacity and literally changed how she views the ground beneath her feet. She admits she didn’t know what to look for, below or above the ground, before she began looking into management ideas like intensive grazing and the need to rotate and allow pastures to rest and recover. She didn’t know in detail what was in her pastures. “Well, 15 or 20 years ago, I’m not sure what the pasture was composed of because I didn’t know the differences; even today, I still feel don’t know a lot, there's just so much more to learn. I knew we could do better, be more resilient and more profitable, so we needed to figure it out” While the new management ideas helped the ranch progress as a whole from the changes made, there were still some problem pastures. “Some of those pastures, they're kind of on the farther end of the ranch. We kept having trouble with our neighbor’s bulls getting in with our cows and so on, and we'd have calves earlier than we wanted to. So, we started kind of babying those pastures and letting them rest too much. So they would never get grazed early in the spring. I remember there being more of a monoculture; it just seemed like it wasn't doing as good or the cows weren't doing as good when they'd go up to those pastures, and it would just dry out too fast.” All about the roots What Candice learned was grasses like western wheatgrass and big bluestem could he overrun by cool season invasives like Kentucky bluegrass, crested wheatgrass, and smooth bromegrass. While those cool-season invasives may be able to grow in abundance during the early part of the growing season, they tend to smother the native grasses. Because of their shallow, turf-like root systems (and lack of a mycorrhizal relationship to prairie soil microbes), the cool season invasive grasses soon become unpalatable and dried out as the season progresses, leaving a weak forage base by the time it gets warm and dry. If the deeper-rooted and better-adapted natives are smothered out in rank growth and thatch layers, they slowly begin to disappear, further degrading the forage base and the soil’s resilience. As Candice became more educated through organizations like the South Dakota Grassland Coalition and the South Dakota Soil Health Coalition and worked closely with Ryan Beer, a conservationist with the USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service, she began working on a plan to combat the Kentucky bluegrass. Part of this plan required her to graze more than 600 cows in a quarter at a time. This intensive grazing helped break through the Kentucky bluegrass thatch layer that shaded out natives and repelled rainwater. Still, sometimes, grazing was not hard enough. “And then we were only in that pasture, probably, I think it was 12 to 14 days. And then we moved to the next pasture. Ryan [Beer] came out and looked and actually, we hadn't hit the second pasture enough. So he thought we should let the cows back in there. And that really worked out well.” The plan was not always easy to implement. Instead of using yearlings, they turned to their cow-calf pairs. Matching momma cows to calves, finding calves that were bedded down, and moving from pasture to pasture were labor-intensive activities, especially during calving, but Candice’s eyes were on the prize. “In the end, it was just more babysitting,” Candice says. “Our biggest objective was tackling the Kentucky bluegrass problem and improving the rangeland.” As time went by, Ryan Beer suggested they leave the gate open for a day after a move; this solution seemed to work for the pairs. “We found that worked the best,” Candice says. “Even now when we rotate in the summertime, we open the gates and call them and they want to move and come back the next day. Then we shut the gates, and make sure the pastures are cleared out.” While the operation was labor intensive and there were kinks that needed to be worked out, the reward was significant. “We had a lot of big bluestem come in that same year. We couldn't believe the difference and the diversity that came, it was awesome and beautiful!” Candice says. “And I was really happy with the response. It made me a believer, I guess as far as management intensive short duration––get them in, get them off, let's have some hoof impact, you know.” She employs a metaphor to describe the therapeutic and aggressive nature of intensive grazing to control invasives, one we can all relate to: “It’s kind of like getting a massage. Sometimes you have to have a little bit of pain to feel better.” PODCAST LINKS: From this story with Candice Mizera . With Justin Thompson on Adaptive Grazing With Dr. Allen Williams on Adaptive Grazing OTHER LINKS: On Adaptive Grazing: https://www.csuchico.edu/regenerativeagriculture/ra101-section/managed-grazing.shtml _____________________________________________ _______________________ Visit these “Growing Resilience Through Our Soils” information pages: 1. Podcast page for drought planning fact sheets, Q&As, news, podcasts and more. 2. Video page to watch videos of other ranchers’ journeys toward improved rangeland/pasture. 3.Follow Growing Resilience on social media: Facebook - Growing Resilience Twitter - @GrowResilience_ Instagram - growingresilience.sd 4. Our homepage: www.growingresiliencesd.com

On this weeks “Resilience Rodeo”, Eli Little shares how goals, patience, and bugs are all key to resilient soils. Eli Little (right) of Castlewood, SD, pictured here with his father, Barry, are both holding daikon radishes that they’ve become confident are just one of many pieces to the puzzle of improving the health of the soil on their farm and rangeland. For Eli Little, he has been implementing regenerative practices for so long that their economic benefit is no question. In his area, it’s said that you need 4-5 acres per cow-calf pair. On his pasture they’re using less than 2. They often do not use pesticides or fertilizer and are on the path to not using them at all. The land is richer with crop and insect diversity, soil aggregation and root systems; all adding up to land that’s much more resilient to inclement weather, excess moisture, cold, heat, and drought. This makes for a much more financially resilient operation. Eli emphasizes that the implementation of regenerative practices is a journey that takes time. Even with all his progress, he has goals for his future and emphasizes the importance of always having goals on the farm. Regenerative agriculture a process that is never over, it’s always a growing and changing relationship with the land. Eli Little (right) with his father, Barry 1) What is the one thing you've done that has been the most important thing to the success of your operation? I think cover crops, because that kind of led to everything else, really. 2) Can you recall a moment in time or time when the light bulb went on for you that you realized soil health practice makes sense or that you should change the way you were farming? I think about when, in 2015, I was only a couple of years out of college and was trying to get a loan from FSA. I hadn't quite paid off the last one, and they denied me. The guy there told me that maybe farming wasn't for me, and I took that quite personally. Four years later, I went back to them, and I’ve had operating loans through them for the last three years and I'm getting another one renewed. So, things look a lot better now than they did then. 3) What surprised you the most when you started implementing soil health practices? I think just seeing how great our pastures could look, even though we’re not putting fertilizer on them. They're just green and lush using the rotational grazing and soil health practices. It's always fun to see in the summer. 4) What would you say is the biggest misconception people have who are not managing their farming systems for soil health and resiliency? There's a lot of misconceptions. Sometimes I feel like people try to make it fail. You know, they don't give it enough time, they try something and it doesn't work, so that means it just doesn't work. You’ve got to be patient with it, and you’ve got to work with it. It's not a one-year thing, you know, it's a journey. 5) Is there something you'd still like to do that you haven't yet done to improve soil health on your farm? Yeah, you’ve always got to have a plan or goals. We'd like to be able to get rid of the strip tiller and go a completely no till with our corn planter. We just have to get the right corn planter. We’ve had the strip tiller since 2013. You have to get rid of that stuff and get the right planter to fit all your needs. 6) What advice would you have for someone who is considering changing their farming system to one that's better for building soil health? I would say, looking at pasture side of things, if you want to do rotational grazing, you’ve got to have a plan. And a lot of times the NRCS will help you with those things; getting cost share for fencing and things like that, and help with paddocks if need be. But yeah, especially our in our FSA office, the ladies, they're great. They love what we do, and they love helping people get on this track. So, just talk to your [USDA] office. 7) When you walk across your crop lands what do you look for as an indicator or as indicators of soil health? Bugs. That's one thing that we like. We like to see bugs in our soybean fields, something that a lot of people get scared of. For every bad bug there are 1,700 good bugs. If we can get by without spraying an insecticide, which we typically do get by, that's just another year we built towards soil health and regenerative ag. 8) What does resiliency mean to you and what signs are you seeing in your cropland that your croplands are getting more resilient? Well, I would say the ability to handle harsh weather. Last Spring, we were out planting corn and a neighbor of ours came by and asked “how are you able to plant your corn right now? We can't get into a field”. I said, “well, we do no-till, we do a lot of cover crops, we do rotations”. Then the next fall they went and tilled up their field anyway. I think the harsher the weather is, the more you see in our fields that we're able to handle the excess moisture and the droughts and the heat and the cold and all those things. That's where your resiliency comes into play. 9) What indicators do you have that healthy soil practices also make sense economically to you? On the pasture side of things where, in our area, they say you need 4 to 5 acres per cow-calf pair. And we're looking at less than two acres per pair out there. So, we can double the size of our herd and get as much or more out of the out of the pasture. The proof is in the pudding, right? ______________________________________________ ______________________ Visit these “Growing Resilience Through Our Soils” information pages: 1. Podcast page for drought planning fact sheets, Q&As, news, podcasts and more. 2. Video page to watch videos of other ranchers’ journeys toward improved rangeland/pasture. 3.Follow Growing Resilience on social media: Facebook - Growing Resilience Twitter - @GrowResilience_ Instagram - growingresilience.sd 4. Our homepage: www.growingresiliencesd.com

For the “Resilience Rodeo” this week, South Dakota’s Ducks Unlimited manager of conservation, Bruce Toay talks about the overlap in importance of wetlands and cropland in the prairie pothole region, and that fostering the health of soil and wildlife can easily go hand-in-hand. Barry Little (left) of Castlewood, SD, pictured here with his son, Eli, is heartened to work in tandem with Mother Nature. To him, a strong indication of success is the return of wildlife on his farm– bugs, cottontails, deer. This means that he is successfully building a habitat for the animals of the land. To him, resilience calls back to the 1800s; imagining what the land looked like before it had ever been plowed. To get in touch with that, he listens to Mother Nature– “she has built in the systems to bring back what was here when white folks first crossed the plains, and I think we're making progress to bring that back,” explains Barry. Since beginning to follow nature’s lead, water is now going into the soil that used to run off, his pastures stay green through the summer where they used to turn brown early in August, he’s reduced machinery, fertilizer and chemical costs, and his yields are going up. A major misconception he has observed regarding regenerative practices is that in the first years of implementation farmers will witness a dramatic fall in yields. Barry didn’t witness that– but rather has seen a steady increase in his yields. Barry Little (left) pictured with his son, Eli 1) What is the one thing you've done that has been the most important to the success of your operation? You know, there's a lot of things, but I'm just going to say integrating livestock on every acre. 2) Can you recall a moment in time or time when the light bulb went on for you that you realized soil health practice makes sense or that you should change the way you were farming? I think that's happened every time I've gone to hear someone like Gabe Brown or Jim Gerrish speak, or at least one or two speakers at every soil health conference. There's always something that someone is doing or has thought up that is completely foreign to me. And it's just like, I don't know why I didn't know that. 3) What surprised you the most when you started implementing soil health practices? I think probably the first surprise for me was that my yields weren't going down. The conventional wisdom is you do these things and you're going to lose some yield right away, but our yields actually continued to go up. 4) What would you say is the biggest misconception people have who are not managing their crop farming systems for soil health and resiliency? I'm going to go back to my last answer. The misconception is that you do this and all of a sudden, you're not going to raise as much grain as you did. 5) Is there something you'd still like to do that you haven't yet done to improve soil health on your farm? We've been dabbling with grass-finished beef for many years now. I would like to purposely plant a full season cover crop on some acres and then graze it with the yearlings and pull them off in the fall and have them be finished and ready to go to market. Because there's folks that are doing that. It's just my mindset, the idea that I could plant a corn crop here, but I'm going to plant a whole season cover crop and graze. 6) What advice would you have for someone who is considering changing their farming system to one that's better for building soil health? I would say that if you're going to make the change to start with a small grain, preferably winter wheat seeded in the fall, that's a good place to start because there's a lot of things you can do with it. 7) When you walk across your crop lands what do you look for as an indicator or as indicators of soil health? Bugs. And kind of going along with that, I guess what I like to see is some wildlife, whether it's a songbird, or a cottontail, a deer, or whatever it is. If the wildlife is there it means we're making a habitat for them. 8) What change have you made that you at first thought would never work? Oh, that's a difficult one, because just about every change I’ve tried somebody else said they did it. And since they said they did it, I believed that it would work. 9) What does resiliency mean to you and what signs are you seeing in your cropland that your croplands are getting more resilient? For me, I take a more long-term view on resilience and see, I like to imagine what our area looked like in 1850 and how it had been thousands of years of migrating ruminants that had created this vast grassland that was teeming with wildlife and just, you know, like a paradise. Then in a very short time, my ancestors plowed it up, and some would have you believe it's been destroyed. But what gives me hope is the fact that Mother Nature is much wiser than we are. She has built in the systems to bring back what was here when white folks first crossed the plains and I think we're making progress to bring that back. Water is going into the soil that used to run off. Our pastures stay green through the summer where they used to turn brown early in August. We're going down the right road. We've got a long way to go. 10) What indicators do you have that healthy soil practices also make sense economically to you? Well, that's the easy one. I mean, all you got to do is go through your corn budget and see that we've reduced the machinery side of things and we reduce the fertilizer side of things and we've reduced the chemical side of things. But our yields are going up. ______________________________________________ ______________________ Visit these “Growing Resilience Through Our Soils” information pages: 1. Podcast page for drought planning fact sheets, Q&As, news, podcasts and more. 2. Video page to watch videos of other ranchers’ journeys toward improved rangeland/pasture. 3.Follow Growing Resilience on social media: Facebook - Growing Resilience Twitter - @GrowResilience_ Instagram - growingresilience.sd 4. Our homepage: www.growingresiliencesd.com

We wanted to make you aware that yellow bluestem, a non-native, invasive bluestem, was first found this year near Mitchell, South Dakota, and subsequently in several other locations and is a new threat to South Dakota rangelands. The yellow bluestem is one of a number of Old-World bluestems (OWBs) that was introduced into the US for erosion control and as a forage. A few characteristics of the yellow bluestem: · It’s non-native and highly invasive warm-season grass · It’s not as palatable or nutritious as native bluestems · It reduces rangeland diversity · It changes the soil carbon to nitrogen ratio and affects soil microbial communities like mycorrhizal fungi Yellow Bluestem - Photo courtesy of Rod Voss, USDA-NRCS The end of the growing season is probably the best time to identify the plant, so if you do suspect yellow bluestem, getting a positive identification is important. Do not transport the plant but contact the NRCS or SDSU to help with identification. Once a positive identification is made, contacting SDSU extension specialist for control methods is appropriate. For more information on the yellow bluestem, it’s impact and how to identify it, please go to the following resources. SD Grassland September 2023 Newsletter page 4, article by SD NRCS’s Rod Voss USDA Forest Service webpage on Yellow and Caucasian bluestems _____________________________________________ _______________________ Visit these “Growing Resilience Through Our Soils” information pages: 1. Podcast page for drought planning fact sheets, Q&As, news, podcasts and more. 2. Video page to watch videos of other ranchers’ journeys toward improved rangeland/pasture. 3.Follow Growing Resilience on social media: Facebook - Growing Resilience Twitter - @GrowResilience_ Instagram - growingresilience.sd 4. Our homepage: www.growingresiliencesd.com

When we talk about resilience, we are talking about the land’s ability to rebound and be productive even under the harshest conditions. South Dakota is no stranger to extremes in temperature and moisture; sometimes, the land needs a little help. We think the most important investment a producer can make is in education. For example, do you know how granular soil structure is created and how it may affect your land’s resilience bottom line? South Dakota is blessed with many grassroots organizations that work to educate farmers and ranchers who may be interested in rangeland, farmland, or wildlife; to mention just one or two would mean we’d leave others out, so take a look at the list of organizations below. While education will allow producers to stretch their dollars on the ground, programs like EQIP and CSP can provide essential funding for farmers and ranchers to help their lands become more resilient, and when the lands are more resilient, it translates to improved farming and ranching businesses. We think the 2024 EQIP and CSP funding is a huge opportunity to change or to add value to any farming or ranching operation. This is a reminder to all of our producer friends out there that the sign-up deadline for 2024 EQIP and CSP funding consideration is on November 3, 2023 . If you’re thinking about applying, please don’t delay getting to your USDA field office to sign up – help the NRCS help you to help the land! Link to the SD announcement is here . Organizations that are Currently Partnered with NRCS South Central RC&D, SD Grassland Coalition, National Fish and Wildlife Federation, SD DANR Resource, Conservation and Forestry, SD Stockgrowers Association, American Bird Conservancy, SD Discovery Center, National Wild Turkey Federation, SD Soil Health Coalition, SD Association of Conservation Districts, Bird Conservancy of the Rockies, Ducks Unlimited, Inc., The Nature Conservancy, National Cattlemen’s Beef Association, Society for Range Management. _____________________________________________ _______________________ Visit these “Growing Resilience Through Our Soils” information pages: 1. Podcast page for drought planning fact sheets, Q&As, news, podcasts and more. 2. Video page to watch videos of other ranchers’ journeys toward improved rangeland/pasture. 3.Follow Growing Resilience on social media: Facebook - Growing Resilience Twitter - @GrowResilience_ Instagram - growingresilience.sd 4. Our homepage: www.growingresiliencesd.com

(AKA… the new Climate-Smart Agriculture and Forestry (CSAF) Mitigation Activities List) By Buz Kloot For those of you swimming in the alphabet soup of acronyms, you are not alone (full disclosure, I am a state employee, so I should do better…), I just found out what CSAF stands for… it’s “Climate Smart Agriculture and Forestry”. OK, the word “climate” can be controversial, and I get that, but the good news is that I don’t know of anyone who doesn’t think more soil organic matter and improved soil structure are a bad thing, at least I haven’t heard of any arguments on these subjects around the Thanksgiving dinner table! My point is that farmers and ranchers have a huge opportunity to make big changes to their businesses with the 2024 EQIP and CSP programs ( remember, the sign-up deadline is November 3 ). We have a link below to what is called the “Climate-Smart Agriculture and Forestry (CSAF) Mitigation Activities List”, sounds kinda boring, but there are a few CSP enhancement activities added to the activities list that caught my eye: · Cover crop to improve moisture use efficiency and reduce salts · Strategically planned, patch burning for grazing distribution and wildlife habitat · Improved grazing management through monitoring activities · Contingency Planning for Resiliency (Grazing and Pasture) · Grazing-maintained fuel break to reduce the risk of fire (Under Fuel Break) These additions caught my eye because we have so much expertise in South Dakota that can make these activities really work on the ground and if the producer is being rewarded for these activities, so much the better. So take a dive into the alphabet soup and check out the CSAF Mitigation List for 2024. If you are a producer, I’m pretty sure there are going to be a few things that work for you! Here’s the link to the list _____________________________________________ _______________________ Visit these “Growing Resilience Through Our Soils” information pages: 1. Podcast page for drought planning fact sheets, Q&As, news, podcasts and more. 2. Video page to watch videos of other ranchers’ journeys toward improved rangeland/pasture. 3.Follow Growing Resilience on social media: Facebook - Growing Resilience Twitter - @GrowResilience_ Instagram - growingresilience.sd 4. Our homepage: www.growingresiliencesd.com

While we talk a lot about the loss of grasslands to cool-season invasive species, the conversion of grassland to cropland is another significant source of loss of grassland habitat. The 2023 Plowprint Report highlights the extensive plowing of grasslands in the US and Canadian Great Plains. Using data from the USDA and Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, the report shows that in 2021, 1.6 million acres of grasslands were converted to cropland, totaling nearly 32 million acres since 2012. However, hope remains as 377 million acres of grasslands are still under various forms of management. To protect these crucial ecosystems, policy interventions are essential. Enforcing policies that promote conservation can help preserve the remaining grasslands in the Great Plains, benefiting both people and wildlife. The entire Plowprint Report is available at: https://www.worldwildlife.org/projects/plowprint-report _____________________________________________ _______________________ Visit these “Growing Resilience Through Our Soils” information pages: 1. Podcast page for drought planning fact sheets, Q&As, news, podcasts and more. 2. Video page to watch videos of other ranchers’ journeys toward improved rangeland/pasture. 3.Follow Growing Resilience on social media: Facebook - Growing Resilience Twitter - @GrowResilience_ Instagram - growingresilience.sd 4. Our homepage: www.growingresiliencesd.com

We’re excited that Dakota Farmer has published an article (11/3/2023) by veteran journalist Kurt Lawton on adaptive grazing. Lawton draws you in in the first line (you’re going to have to read the article ) and from there takes the reader through the nuanced world of adaptive grazing. He draws from the principles of adaptive management set out by grazing management practitioner, consultant, and former academic, Allen Williams. Still, he applies this to a real-world picture that Rancher, Justin Thompson (Mobridge, SD) paints for us based on his experience with the cool season invasives, namely smooth brome, crested wheatgrass, and especially Kentucky bluegrass. Justin Thompson (left) with Rayn beer(right), SD NRCS Area Rangeland Management Specialist. Photo was taken by Mitch Kezar. Learn why sticking to prescriptions may get us into trouble, why sometimes, more hoof action (disturbance) is called for, and why observation is key to adaptive management. Here are a few quotes to whet the reader’s appetite: “I’ve never been more passionate and excited about agriculture now because of adaptive stewardship,” Williams says. “Good observation creates a keen intuition that makes producers far better decision makers.” Justin Thompson says: “There are no cut-and-dried answers, but I have the responsibility to improve and do the best I can while raising a family with this livelihood” Kurt Lawton used materials produced by GrowingResilienceSD including the ‘ Adaptive Grazing Masterclass ’ podcast , the ‘SD Rancher's Unique Approach to Manage Cool Season Invasives” podcast , and video material from a feature on adaptive grazing that GrowingResilienceSD will soon release. Read the full article [ here ] and start implementing these valuable insights on your own land. Your pastures will thank you for it! _____________________________________________ _______________________ Visit these “Growing Resilience Through Our Soils” information pages: 1. Podcast page for drought planning fact sheets, Q&As, news, podcasts and more. 2. Video page to watch videos of other ranchers’ journeys toward improved rangeland/pasture. 3.Follow Growing Resilience on social media: Facebook - Growing Resilience Twitter - @GrowResilience_ Instagram - growingresilience.sd 4. Our homepage: www.growingresiliencesd.com