Recent storms added some precipitation to southwest South Dakota, but the current drought map still shows wide areas of the state in moderate to severe drought. While spring isn’t quite here yet, farmers and ranchers prepare to deal with drier soils. ​ Bart Carmichael knows of drought challenges during his three decades as a cow-calf rancher near Faith, SD. Taking care of grass and soil in his pastures is top priority to optimize current and future grazing and ranch resiliency. “In the 2017 drought, we rotated the cattle quicker between pastures because the grass wasn't growing. After 10 months, we pulled the cattle totally off pasture and put them in the feedlot for four months. That actually turned out to be a good thing.” Write a drought plan His goal is to graze the herd for 12 months a year. “The longest we've ever had cattle rotating between pastures is 11 months. When the weather dictates we can't graze, we'll put them on hay, move them off pasture or do whatever it takes for the time being. But when the drought breaks, we go back right to grazing the same pasture where we left off,” Carmichael says. An important part of his drought plan is herd management by key dates when the rains stay away. “Even just running mother cows on pasture, we have ranked them by A, B, and C herds. When drought forces a stocking rate reduction, the C herd is sold right away. That way you can keep your core. If drought severity continues, then the B group goes next,” he says. This scenario played out in the 2017 drought. “We sold the C and B herds, keeping our core A herd, which we put in a feedlot for four months. When the weather finally changed, we still had grass left that responded to spring moisture, so we were good to go. Our plan to adapt and do what you have to do, is better than holding on to the bitter end,” Carmichael adds. He figures he has enough grass this year until October. Carmichael is one of the growing number of ranchers who subscribes to the “Rotate, rest, and recover” grassland management rule of thumb. Sound economics drive the plan Carmichael has witnessed area ranchers try to graze through a drought. “We heard about someone who one time tried to run an entire herd on pasture through two years of drought. The first year it didn't rain, he grazed all of his old grass off. During the following spring without rain, he sold all of his cows for $1,300 a pair. We had already sold only our C herd at that point, and because of our drought plan we didn't have to pull the plug on all of them. When it finally rained, he ended up buying heifer calves back for $1,300 a head that fall. So economically, it's pays not to hold on to the bitter end, and risk losing everything,” he adds.

By: Buz Kloot I was out in Danielsville Georgia preparing for a grazing field day when my friend, Michael Hall, former NRCS grazing specialist, told me that Stan Boltz passed away. I say this because I cannot imagine how his loss must be felt by his family, friends and community, also his NRCS colleagues as he worked as a Regional Soil Health Specialist. I also say this because the ripple effect of his loss was felt down here in South Carolina and Georgia as well and who knows where else Stan had such an amazing influence. When I was directed by the NRCS to start talking about perennial systems (I had always worked with row crop systems up to that point), the first person I was told to talk to was Stan Boltz. I even remember the date, September 9, 2020. Stan talked to me (keep in mind that I was completely new to prairie habitats) about some of his concerns. His big concern was the loss of prairie habitat – the obvious one was conversion to cropland, especially in eastern South Dakota. This was the first time I heard that nonnative cool season grasses (smooth brome, crested wheatgrass and Kentucky bluegrass) robbed the range of resilience in dry weather, affected aboveground wildlife and was death to soil biology (his words, not mine). This was evident in the visible degradation of soil structure in pastures infested with these plants. Stan was also the first person to introduce the concept of Adaptive Grazing to me. I have since learned a lot about the subject and hopefully this is evident in the body of work (videos, podcasts and written work) at GrowingResilience.com. In that first talk, Stan told me to speak to amazing ranchers like Jim Faulstich, Gene Ausland and Pat Guptill, and it was through Stan and these and other ranchers that I got to fall in love with the prairie. The next time I spoke with Stan was in March 2021 during a podcast interview. We went into more detail on rangeland health. This podcast was aired later that year and the link to the podcast and the associated blog are displayed at the end of this page. Stan and Mitch Faulkner, whom we lost not six months ago, were also deeply involved in developing the SD Drought Tool which in my opinion, is invaluable to the rangeland manager and user friendly enough for even a noob like me to use. When I read through Stan’s obituary, I was struck by the fact that Stan was 4 years younger than I am and that we lost him and Mitch too soon. Yesterday in Church, I was reminded in the sermon of the movie Shadowlands about C.S. Lewis’s life and the untimely loss of his wife who discovered she had cancer even before he married her. Some of Lewis’s confident assertions in his writings that loss makes us stronger and refines us by putting us through “the fiery furnace” came back to him after losing his beloved and suddenly his own words sounded like meaningless platitudes in the face of his own crushing grief. What Lewis was left with was this inexplicable sense that God was somehow not only with him, but actually experiencing his grief with him. This is too deep for me to fully understand as I am only left with questions of why we lose these good people. However, having just ‘celebrated’ my own 65th birthday, I have become aware of my own mortality and realize that I am sure my family and community may experience my passing differently than the community at large. But I would hope that if I were able to have but a fraction of the legacy that Stan and indeed Mitch had on the rangeland and soil health community, I would be content with my fleeting trip on this planet. In South Africa, there is a saying in Zulu that when we part from someone, we say Hamba kahle which means "go well”. Hamba kahle Stan. Your legacy lives on in the people you inspired and the land you cherished. Links: Podcast: “Increasing Rangeland Soil Health with Stan Boltz” Blog: “Increasing Rangeland Soil Health with Stan Boltz” For those of you who may not have know Stan personally, we also leave a link to his obituary: https://www.welterfuneralhome.com/obituary/stanley-boltz ______________________________________________ ______________________ 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

By: Buz Kloot Recently, I visited with my sister-in-law in Cape Town, South Africa and she told me that one of her old friends asked if she was related to me (we share a last name). I met the friend and she told me I had been mentioned in an article in the Farmers Weekly, a South African magazine, about farmer/rancher Barry Meijer’s regenerative journey. Barry Meijer took over a farm near De Rust in the Little Karoo, South Africa, he faced a tough situation: the soil was bare, compacted, and couldn’t hold water. With only about 30 inches of rain in a good year—and at lot less during recent droughts—Barry knew he needed to change something to revive his land. Imagine my surprise to learn that a simple YouTube video could spark such a transformation. Barry watched a conversation between me and Ray Archuleta, where we talked about the power of keeping living roots in the soil to boost water infiltration and water retention. That discussion resonated with Barry and led him to dig deeper into regenerative farming practices. He started learning from others like Gabe Brown, Dr. Christine Jones, and Walter Jehne, and began experimenting on his own farm. Barry adopted no-till farming and started planting a diverse mix of cover crops using a special seeder, which helped improve the soil structure and brought life back to his land. Inspired by studies like the Jena Experiment, he realized that having diverse mixes of plants could enhance soil health, productivity, and resilience. Since making these changes, Barry has seen his farm’s productivity jump from 12 tons of dry matter per hectare to an impressive 48 tons per hectare in 2023. What amazes me is how the stories and ideas we share at SoilHealthLabs.com and Growing ResilienceSD.com can ripple out in ways we never expected, even reaching farmers like Barry in the Karoo. It’s a powerful reminder of how connected we all are in this global community of farmers and ranchers, and how sharing knowledge can make a real difference, not just for the land but for people’s lives too. For the original Farmer’s Weekly article, please go to: https://www.farmersweekly.co.za/animals/cattle/regenerative-farming-from-lifeless-dust-to-productive-farm/ ______________________________________________ ______________________ 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

As part of our SoilHealthLabs podcast series, Joe Dickie and I sat down to talk with Dr. Fred Provenza, who helped us delve into the deep connections between healthy grasslands and healthy livestock. Fred's stories bring those connections to life, beginning with Henry DeLuca, a rancher Fred worked for as a senior in high school, throughout college, and for two years after he graduated. Henry began to ranch in the late 1800s and was a man who knew his land intimately. He retained his own replacement heifers because he understood how crucial it was for animals to “know the range”. Henry’s wisdom left a lasting impact on Fred, shaping his understanding of the intricate bond between soil, plants, livestock, and humans. As our conversation unfolded, Fred shared how livestock mothers teach their young—but also how the young teach the mothers. He told us about a mother cow and her calf, explaining, “The calf might explore a plant the mother won’t touch, and if the calf doesn’t get sick and thus learns to eat the plant, the mother may eventually try it too. It’s a two-way street, and that interaction helps the herd adapt to changes in their environment.” Fred also recounted a fascinating story about training animals not to eat saplings. “We had a problem with cows nibbling on young trees, which was bad for both the trees and the cows. So, we started rubbing the saplings with a bitter, non-toxic substance. It only took a few tastes before the cows learned to avoid them entirely. The key was making sure the experience was unpleasant but safe, so the lesson stuck.” This part of the podcast offers us insights into why healthy prairies (with, say 50 or more species of grass and forb) are vital for healthy livestock. The stories Fred shares highlight the dynamic learning that happens between animals and their environment—a relationship that is essential for the well-being of both. Tune in to our upcoming podcast to hear more about these connections and the wisdom that Fred, inspired by mentors like Henry DeLuca, has gathered over decades of study and experience. Dr. Fred Provenza is professor emeritus of Behavioral Ecology at the Department of Wildland Resources, Utah State University. Fred is also the author of three books, including Nourishment: What Animals Can Teach Us about Rediscovering Our Nutritional Wisdom; Foraging Behavior: Managing to Survive in a World of Change; and The Art & Science of Shepherding: Tapping the Wisdom of French Herders - a book he co-authored with ecologist, animal behaviorist, nutritionist Michel Meuret. In the case that Dr. Provenza may have escaped your attention, we recommend the link below which is a really informative talk given by Dr. Provenza at Utah State University: The Web of Life Event: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZjUgX91VZpk ______________________________________________ ______________________ 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

Dan Rasmussen's family has been on their South Dakota ranch since 1914. As somebody with a family history in ranching, Dan has seen firsthand the endearing, invaluable, and beautiful facets of ranching culture – the deep power it has to bring people closer to themselves, the land, the animals, and each other. He wants to make it clear that he doesn't aim to change this. “We don't want to change our culture completely, but we want to change it for the benefit of the land, the people, our finances, and the livestock. That culture where neighbors are working together, helping each other out, we don't want to lose that or the ability to live that life. But in order to maintain it, we’re going to have to make some changes in ranch country,” says Dan. “There’s no reason to lose the ranch culture that so many of us love and want to maintain. The part of the culture we want to change is the part that doesn’t support land health and soil health.” When it comes to Dan Rasmussen’s pivot down the path of soil health, he says “curiosity killed the cat”. Every farmer or rancher has a turning point where their priorities, strategies and perspective shift, and Dan says he’s so curious that he’s always keeping a keen eye out for facets of his work he may have overlooked.   “That very curiosity is what took me out from the old ranching culture I saw in the 80’s to the new ranching culture that I know now,” says Dan. “In 1991, I went through a program called ‘Bootstraps’, which was an extension program teaching people how to get to the next level of management in ranching. That's where my curiosity kicked in, and I decided I want to learn more. I figure I'm going to be learning until my last day.”   Dan has now been working with the South Dakota Grassland Coalition for 22 years and was a board member for 18. Through this work he saw a need - he watched people emerge from grazing schools with a head full of entirely new strategies, but not enough support or context to follow through in the long run. “So, we started a consulting program we called the Grazing School Follow-Up Program. I’d say we’ve gone through about 120 ranches now in South Dakota and neighboring states.” Dan references the chart in Figure 1  to illustrate that everyone is somewhere on this line and show that the ideal process that ranchers start down, depending on where they are on the line, when leaving a grazing school with new intentions and a new soil-health-oriented approach. Holistic resource management helps managers move to the right on the line. Improved grazing practices improve soil health. To get these improvements, management must give pastures time for soil to become healthier before increasing stocking rate.   Rasmussen emphasizes that any season-long grazing is overgrazing, as indicated by the starting point on the left most extreme of Figure 1 . The first stage in the progression, moving to the right to “slow rotational grazing”, gives plants some time to rest after having been repeatedly grazed by livestock. “The next stop is ‘fast rotational grazing’; this gives those plants a much longer recovery time. And on the far right side is ‘faster rotational grazing’, and that is more like intensive rotational grazing where an example would be 400 yearlings in a pasture for one day, and then they move on and don't come back for 14 months.”   One indicator of healthy soil is that it infiltrates water well. In soil that has been overgrazed, organic matter decreases and water is less likely to effectively infiltrate into the soil, leading to ponding, runoff, and undernourished soil. Rasmussen references the term “effective rainfall,” coined by farmer and resource management expert Alan Savory.   “So, when my neighbors or friends say ‘I had two inches of rain’, I ask them, ‘well, how much of that actually went into your soil?’ If their soil was healthy, they might have had an effective rainfall of two inches. If the soil is not healthy, they might have had an effective rainfall of a quarter of an inch, while the remaining inch and three quarters ran off and went to a river or a dam or something like that. What we want is to keep every drop we can on the prairie, on the grassland, on our property.”   Moving management toward “fast rotational grazing”, the soil receives more rest, allowing root structure, plant diversity, and water infiltration to recover and improve. The principle behind rotational grazing is that the livestock is in a different pasture on the 1st of May every year, allowing each paddock sufficient rest time across differing seasons each year.   “Eventually you come back, and you do it all over again. So, the cattle come in in June and they graze it down to 4-5 inches high and then they move on. Then the grass is growing, growing, growing. Then we’re in September, the grass is pretty high. Now we’re in December and it's snowing. That snow is landing on that grass that had a chance to grow up and now we have insulation for the soil. That's nature's way of protecting that soil. With snow on that grass, there's an insulation factor, and we have soil activity with bugs [soil microbes] thriving longer than if the grass was only 4 inches tall all summer long. We have that bug activity under there because in the middle of the winter there's areas, if the grass is tall enough, that might not even have frost through it. And that allows these bugs to create organic matter and do their work much longer.” Climbing The Learning Curve   While easy to say, it can all be very difficult to execute. Dan wants to offer support for the steep progression from the far-left side of the chart, which is an entrenched ranching culture, to the far right side, which is a new paradigm with a different way to manage soil, land, and livestock.   “We can make a lot of mistakes, costly mistakes, along the way. People can lose interest, lose money – the path is fraught with mistakes. One way to make this journey successful over our years is through education. Holistic resource management is an educational tool originally started by Allan Savory himself that teaches us how to make this trip from seasonal overgrazing to intensive rotational grazing with the least amount of casualties.” When addressing the challenges ranchers face in transitioning to new grazing practices, Dan introduces the Dunning-Kruger effect . This psychological phenomenon describes how people with limited knowledge often overestimate their competence, while those with more experience recognize the complexity and feel less confident. Dan explains that new ranchers often get excited and invest heavily after attending a grazing school, only to face difficulties and become disillusioned. To combat this, he stresses the importance of making small, manageable changes and building a support network of mentors and consultants.  “The reason that we put the follow up program together was that ranchers come to the grazing school, they're there three days, their head is filled with new ideas, then they go home. Now, how do they implement this stuff? That's why we have consultants that will come to the ranch and spend about 40 hours with a rancher, do a grazing plan from the resource inventory and the mapping and help answer these questions. And we have a mentorship program that people can find on our website and call our mentors with questions. – Why did this fail? What should I do here? The tragedy of this is getting started and going too fast, and becoming so disillusioned because you have failures that you quit. We want to avoid that.”   Dan emphasizes the importance of surrounding oneself with a network of resources whose first priority is not profit, so that when the inevitable setbacks arrive, you are not financially being dug further into a hole. “And that's where education comes in. You can take your issues and problems to these workshops and look for answers there, and oftentimes your answer can come from participants. Oftentimes at our workshops, our participants are where we’re getting a lot of good information.” South Dakota Grassland Coalition has a myriad of partners looking to make resources more accessible to ranchers and farmers, partners willing to supply cost-share dollars. Dan explains that through these partnerships, the grazing school can cost $300, about a third of what it costs to actually put it on, and the follow up program can cost $150, which is about a twentieth of the actual cost of the program. A $4000 consulting program can cost $150 through the support of these partnerships.   “We’ve tried to design this so that there is no obstacle financially to doing this. The obstacle that I often hear is: ‘I’m not ready to start yet’, or ‘I don't want you to see the disaster I have at home yet, I want to fix some of it first’. We do not, as consultants, judge anything. We say, ‘this is where you're at’. Everybody is somewhere, and our job as consultants is to say this is where you are, let's get started, what's the first step. Which is often the hardest thing for a lot of land managers, ranchers, to get past– the first step. As a consultant, I can sit down at the kitchen table, and after the resource inventory is done, after the mapping is done, and I know a little more about the operation– I can just say here's the first step– it’s small, it doesn't take much, not very expensive, and once you take the first step and see the results, it is incredibly helpful in taking the next 2,3,4,5, -thousand steps.” In all, Rasmussen wants to be one of the many firmly leading the charge to a new paradigm in ranching culture, one small change at a time. In this process, he takes the human into account by acknowledging how discouraging it can be to shift one’s land management approach, and knowing how imperative it is to have an intuitive, attentive support network.    Find the full interview on the Growing Resilience site at: https://www.growingresiliencesd.com/podcasts/episode/fcf47f11/65-sd-ranchers-tips-for-bridging-traditional-ranching-culture-and-the-best-of-modern-agriculture or search for the SoilHealthLabs podcast on your favorite podcast app.   Other helpful Links: SD Grassland Coalition’s Grazing Schools:  https://sdgrass.org/grazing-school/ SD Grassland Coalition’s Resources:  https://sdgrass.org/resources/   (includes mentoring network, videos, blog, radio spots, weather stations) Check out the feature on Dan in the July issue of  The South Dakota Cattleman , pages 20-21.  https://issuu.com/sdcattleman/docs/july-aug_issuufinal ______________________________________________ ______________________ 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

By Cassidy Spencer Dr. Dwayne Beck recently retired from the Research Manager position at Dakota Lakes Research Farm in Pierre, South Dakota. As a professor in the Agronomy, Horticulture and Plant Science Department at South Dakota State University, he received his B.S. in Chemistry from Northern State University in 1975 and a Ph.D. in Agronomy from South Dakota State University in 1983. Before beginning his current position in 1990, he was the Research Manager at SDSU’s James Valley Research Center near Redfield, SD. Soil Health Labs researcher Buz Kloot spoke with him in 2013 and again in 2024 about his journey at the research center. Beck's emphasis is on developing no-till systems for irrigated and dryland areas in central South Dakota. This mission is forefront at Dakota Lakes Research Farm.  The land and fixed facilities at Dakota Lakes are owned by a not-for-profit corporation whose primary goal is to identify, test, and demonstrate methods of strengthening and stabilizing the agriculture economy by maintaining and encouraging living soils, clean water, healthy foods and ample wildlife. “Dakota Lakes was originally put together in the early 1980’s by area farmers focused on irrigation.  There had been substantial irrigation development in the area that was spurred by technological developments and the unrealistic exuberance of ‘God’s not making any more soil’ movement of the 70’s. ,” said Beck. “They put in a bunch of irrigation development on the loess soils along the Missouri river. and were experiencing excessive runoff losses because these souls tend to seal easily when water strikes bare soil... Things were not going well”.” In addition, the OPEC oil embargo of the mid-70’s caused energy costs to skyrocket.  Commodity prices were going down and interest rates increased.   Something had to change. At the time, Dr. Darrel DeBoer from SDSU and Beck (still a graduate student at the time) were doing research on irrigation sprinkler options and tillage types relative to the amount of runoff. This work led the farmers to realize they needed to make more informed farming decisions based on research. They asked SDSU if they would begin irrigation research in this area.  SDSU did not have the resources to do that but said they would operate the research enterprise on a farm if the group could purchase the land, equipment, and erect a building.  The group decided it would be best if the farm were owned and operated by producers whilst allowing SDSU to do appropriate research on the land.  The not-for-profit Corporation was created but it took 8 years or so before the Dakota Lakes Research Farm became a reality. A Holistic Approach The sprinkler/tillage study identified the importance of not doing tillage but did not define the techniques needed to properly manage no-till irrigated crops. As a researcher, Beck warns that no-till is just one piece in the puzzle of soil health. It is not enough to simply redact tilling from a conventional system– farmers must pay attention to mimicking the natural water cycle, nutrient cycle and energy cycle (sunlight capture), and biological diversity of natural systems.  The entirety of what affects plant life Beck also understands the impact of appropriate SYSTEMS research and demonstration work to change mindsets. Through the process of developing Dakota Lakes and its research philosophy, Beck found thatwhile it is important to make water go into soils under irrigation, it is more important to maximize infiltration rates under rainfed conditions. Under irrigation, if water runs off, they can pump more– if they have the time and money. On dry land, if water runs off the loss is permanent. This realization shifted the research focus at Dakota Lakes to focus at least equally on rainfed systems. With the increasing cost of energy, the farmers in the area began to re-evaluate the relative profitability of irrigated and dryland systems.  Rainfed systems began to outperform irrigated systems in profit per acre as no-till began to tip the scale.  At DLRF, much of the planned future irrigation was not developed and existing operations with high vertical lifts were returned to rainfed operations. When European settlers began to populate the drier portions of the US, there was an intense effort to “harness” the waterways and develop irrigation projects.  In many cases, the desire was to create something the settlers wanted instead of developing ways for them to fit into the existing ecosystem.  Irrigation should probably be used as a last resort after the water that occurs naturally is used to its greatest efficiency.  Irrigation projects are expensive to build and to operate.  They become obsolete quickly and, in some cases, lead to degradation of the ecosystem.  Having some irrigation in an operation or area can provide stability when rainfall is highly variable. Irrigation was initially at the center of Dakota Lakes’ mission; it is now one piece of its research and operation strategy. Having about 20% of the land base irrigated provides stability in cash flow for the production enterprise and meets the research needs of those that still irrigate in the region.  It also allows doing research that serves farmers in wetter areas of the State and country.  Topics such as cover-crop use are different in wet and dry ecosystems, DLRF has both. Beck's observations on the soil conditions of the region throughout history, informed by historicaljournals like Lewis and Clark's expeditions, highlight the extent of environmental degradation caused by modern grazing and crop production practices. Despite challenges such as shallow soils with high clay content, Beck notes the resilience of native prairie species and their potential for restoring degraded landscapes. From 2013 to 2023 Since Soil Health Labs first spoke to Dwayne Beck 2013, Dakota Lakes has seen still more development toward regenerative and adaptive practices. They experimented with bringing cattle onto the land, first with a fall-calving beef herd, selling the calves the following summer if necessary or backgrounding some if weather was favorable. “But as we got into it more, we brought somebody in, an expert on the range side of things. He had a desire to try to finish cattle as well. So it ended up that we had at times three herds that we were trying to manage, and that was just frankly too much,” said Beck. “So, when I retired, the BOD made the decision to simplify things, the mama cows were sold and now stocker cattle are brought in when needed.  They are not owned by DLRF. The goal with the cattle is to try to cycle nutrients, number one. We have been doing forage crops (a lot of people now call cover crops) and can tailor rotation diversity and intensity by utilizing livestock grazing.” Beck emphasizes this aspect of regenerative agriculture:  it is not one prescriptive system, but a SYSTEM based on natural cycles based on outcomes (mimicking natural cycles) that is designed for one’s own land, and resources and personality. Dakota Lakes began to employ a new fencing system several years ago, where electric fences are attached to the lateral-move and pivot irrigators during the wintertime when they are not used for irrigation.  When the irrigators move, so do the fences. “This really simplifies the moving. Especially in the winter, it's tough to put posts in frozen ground, so having irrigators helps with that quite a bit,” said Beck. “We’ve also recently added one more property that kind of fills our suite of research tools– when we started, we had a long list of things we felt we needed to have– access to the river for water, some different types of soils– ground marine soil is a predominant soil for most of eastern South Dakota. And we had none of that. And we always had that on our list to purchase some of that someday, and finally this fall we had three quarter sections come up for sale and we ended up getting those purchased.” Local Change Since beginning the Dakota Lakes operations, almost 40 years ago, Beck notes a regionalrejuvenation of small towns and local culture. “We were losing some small towns. Some had gone from having two sections of each grade level in their elementary school, to having one section, to the point of considering consolidating with their neighboring district, because they were getting below the point that they could support even one. And now they're back to two sections again up through probably the sixth grade. So, it's building, there's young families coming back in and coming back to the farm and starting an enterprise because now they're raising a lot more stuff,” said Beck. Dakota Lakes Research Farm has helped to raise the productivity of local land and therefore the value of local land. There has been a local increase in employment opportunities that support farming and cropping systems, and increased adoption of regenerative agricultural practices. Beck has noted cultural change in the community regarding farming practice and perspective. “In the old days, if we had soil erosion happening, ditches filling with dirt (which was common) that was just seen as an act of God, something beyond the farmer’s control,” said Beck. “It's really interesting to see how that has changed. Because if somebody has their dirt blowing off their property now, they become shunned, so to speak, by the neighbors.” There is a broaderunderstanding of the causes of soil degradation, erosion and poor soil health. The community understands that it is a farmer’s responsibility to seek to remedy those issues, which are now seen more often as a reflection of the community’s viability and sustainability. The community has a stronger understanding of soil health as a reflection of community health and local land value, a paradigm shift which has brought more of a sense of agency and resourcefulness to local producers. Dakota Lakes Research Farm can be contacted through their website, dakotalakes.com They hope in the future to further involve non-farming landowners and absentee landowners, concerning them with the health of their land and soil. Visit: http://dakotalakes.com/ Consider membership of DLRF: http://www.dakotalakes.com/membership/ Listen to the full interview at GrowingResileinceSD.com https://www.growingresiliencesd.com/podcasts/episode/ff122cab/62-future-focused-farming-exploring-the-intersection-of-science-and-soil-with-dr-dwayne-beck OR find the interview (62 Future-Focused Farming: Exploring the Intersection of Science & Soil with Dr. Dwayn Beck) on the SoilHealthLabs podcast wherever you get your podcasts. ____________________________________________________________________ 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

By Cassidy Spencer Tate Lantz grew up on a small cattle ranch near Winner, South Dakota. After high school he attended South Dakota State University, initially for engineering but eventually shifted his studies to range science. Currently, he serves as Assistant State Conservationist for field operations in Rapid City, South Dakota. Throughout his agricultural career, Lantz has taken positions in conservation, administration and rangeland management with South Dakota farmers, educators and coordinators. Through his expansive agricultural experience, both on the ground and within policy, Lantz has seen firsthand the many moving pieces involved in making large-scale agricultural change. The Central Grasslands Roadmap aims to bring all of these disparate pieces together to enact streamlined change. Their intentions are not only to save grasslands, but the farmers and communities that are sustained by the health of grasslands, as well as the human health and culture that is dependent upon diverse, enriched grassland habitats. The Central Grasslands Roadmap The Central Grasslands Roadmap, an initiative catalyzed by the Bird Conservancy of the Rockies, aims to generate partnerships across three countries— the US, Mexico, and Canada— and eight sectors— indigenous communities and first nations, private land managers, owners, and ranchers, federal agencies, provincial & state agencies, industry (agriculture and the private sector), academia (scientists, researchers, professors), non-governmental organizations, and foundations/funders. Between tree and shrub encroachment, urban sprawl and conversion to agriculture, 60% of native grasslands have been lost. This totals to 360 million acres of habitat lost, and 120 million acres at high risk of loss in the near future. “The number that sticks in my head is 32 million acres of grassland lost since 2012. We’re really losing 3-4 million acres of grassland every year,” said Lantz. “I work with really large ranchers in Western South Dakota-- that’s the size of 3 to 4 Black Hills National Forests, a year.” Grassland bird population reflects the health of grasslands at large. The initiative began when the Bird Conservancy of the Rockies observed that total populations of grassland birds had declined more than 40% since the late 60’s. “When the Bird Conservancy of the Rockies started this roadmap, they realized that they alone could not solve the problem. The problem is not going to be addressed by only focusing on grassland birds. It’s a gigantic phenomenon-- they realized that we need all these partners involved,” said Lantz. “So, if we save the dung beetle, if we save the skipper, if we save the butterfly, we’re saving the bird. That’s the need for the roadmap—to address that the grassland is a deeply diverse, multidimensional community.” The roadmap seeks to unite diverse stakeholders in a common goal of grassland preservation. One sector addressed with the roadmap is the indigenous population, as 19-20% of South Dakota is indigenously inhabited. Traditionally, industrial efforts and interests are far removed from indigenous interests and perspective. The roadmap aims to bridge that gap, to streamline overall efficiency and represent all voices that are impacted by land management decisions. “There’s a lot of opportunity right now with industry to help with this cause. There’s a big push for carbon sequestration, and obviously the grassland is one of the best carbon sequesters we have, while also being very low input,” explained Lantz. “That’s where industry can see the benefit. If they were buying carbon credits, why not work with a producer or an indigenous community that manages millions of acres of grasslands that are sequestering carbon every day?” For 70 plus years, the NRCS has been involved in grassland inventory, national resource inventory, and ecological site description. The forest service has their own differing methods and protocols for managing and measuring land. Lantz explains that in order to make the needed grassland change, each of these disparate organizations need be represented so that data collection and agricultural effort move as efficiently as possible, factoring in all relevant interests. “You know that there is no way that the Bird Conservancy of the Rockies is using NRCS protocols to do their inventories. This is an opportunity for these different entities to come together with all this information,” said Lantz. “I didn’t know about the Plowprint Report until I started working with the Roadmap, these kinds of resources and insights are hopefully what we’re bringing together with the Roadmap, so that we can paint a better picture of the issue, so we can know what we need to concentrate on, where our resources will be most effectively used, where we can get the wins, ensure the wins. Because if we’re not winning, we’re losing.” While the conservation goal is 100 million acres of grassland, Lantz says that the acreage goal is more of a guideline. “The technical goal is just something you put down so you have something to aim at. In truth there is no hard-and-fast end to this mission.” Bolstering Local Support and Strategy The Central Grasslands Roadmap draws attention to the direct correlation between grassland resilience and the functional financial resilience of small grassland communities. As the health of grasslands has declined, the communities on the land have become less economically viable and in places have disappeared entirely. Lantz emphasizes that the effort to enrich the grasslands is consequently also an effort to save many rural grassland communities. “The producers go to the sale barn, pay taxes on their grasslands to support the schools, engage in business with the hardware store, restaurant, the barber—this is how we keep those circles in a functional homeostasis,” said Lantz. “If the people working on the grasslands are not making enough money to survive, they will sell it and leave. And who knows what the priorities are of the next person who buys it.” One strategy to bolster the resilience of small grassland communities is to stack enterprises. A large effort within the roadmap is education. If producers are shown the breadth of opportunities beyond cow-calf management, including hunting enterprises, birdwatching enterprises, and local greenhouse efforts, they can safeguard their operations more thoroughly. The roadmap not only intends to save the grasslands, but to provide producers with the understanding and the tools to build sustainable industry within regenerative strategy. Education is key to the Central Grasslands Roadmap.  The team behind the roadmap shares an understanding that only by effectively illustrating the gravity of the crisis will human behavior shift to prioritize grassland health. At the center of the roadmap is this: elevating the importance of what the grasslands provide to the public, and why they should care. “Think of the rainforest movement. People still are directing a lot of attention there—and they should, it’s obviously an important biome as well. But they’re throwing money at a resource thousands of miles away, while they’re living in a resource that is being actively degraded and that we’re losing as fast or faster than the rainforests,” Lantz explained. “How do we get people to understand, 50 miles from you is a depleted resource that arguably is one of the major factors in the climate crisis on the continent and possibly even the world? At the end of the day, we need to elevate the urgency and relevance of grassland health to community and human health.” The Central Grasslands Roadmap continues to gather and publish relevant resources and make efforts to preserve this vital ecosystem. The key partners of the roadmap are the NRCS, the Fish and Wildlife Service, the World Wildlife Fund, Audubon Rockies, and the American Bird Conservancy. Listen to Tate Lantz’s conversation with Buz Kloot and Joe Dickie at: https://www.growingresiliencesd.com/podcasts/episode/1d51ac39/57-preserving-americas-grasslands-insights-from-tate-lantz-on-the-central-grasslands-roadmap Visit Central Grasslands Roadmap Website at: https://www.grasslandsroadmap.org/ ____________________________________________________________________ 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

In this week’s “Resilience Rodeo”, Ryan Urban talks about the importance of long-term thinking and doing the best you can to leave the land better for future generations. ​On a third-generation diversified cattle and grain operation in south central SD, Ryan Urban continues to build on the beneficial practices that his dad raised him doing, including planting cover crops, rotational grazing, and fostering wildlife. While his mindset has always revolved around these practices, he’s acutely aware of the importance of mindset when others try to adopt them for the first time. When producers, including himself, get stuck in their ways, Ryan suggests they ask themselves “Why are you doing what you’re doing?”, and have the mindset of borrowing the land from future generations to come. These will help direct goals and change a mindset to one that will build long-term success rather than only focusing on the short-term. 1) What is the one thing that you have done that's been most important to the success of your operation? I guess if I had to quantify it down to one thing, it's more of an idea: being open-minded. My dad loved wildlife, so everything he did was geared towards wildlife, pheasants, deer, whatever. I don’t remember how many years ago he first started planting cover crops, rotational grazing, those sorts of things. A lot of guys are implementing new practices and this and that, and they're getting their “aha” moment, but I don't know that we've ever really had one of them, because doing those things is the only way I’ve ever known. The practices that my dad implemented 30, 40 years ago for wildlife, we're still doing them, and we've improved them. We’ve found out what works better, and what doesn't. It's always evolving, and every year comes with its challenges. So more or less, being open-minded is probably the single most important thing to the success of this operation. 2) Can you recall a time or a moment when the light bulb went on for you when you realized that soil health practices make sense or that you should change the way you're farming? There are “aha” moments in everything you do. There are little things like when you’re stuck in your ways and suddenly you think about it like, “Why are we doing what we're doing?” Every year, on virtually every acre of farm ground our place, we'll get soil samples, and we’ve been watching our organic matters climb. In this part of the state, we don't get a lot of rain. We average around 16 inches of rain a year. We don't have real deep topsoil. I've had people look at our samples and compare the organic matter levels in my soils to that of Minnesota where you think of deep, deep topsoil. That's where I can look at things and say, “Yes, we're making progress, we're doing what we want to do.” Our soil profile can only hold so much water and we only get so much water. So, we've got to be able to maximize absolutely every bit that we get, we’ve got to be able to hold it. The biggest first step to that is organic matter in our soil, and I've seen our yields steadily increase in the last 20 years. I can see how the fields will hang on through a dry spell. 3) What surprised you most when you changed the way you farm to include soil health practices? I don't feel like we've necessarily changed anything, so nothing surprised me. The idea here has been the same since I was super little or probably even started before I was born. It's kind of always been the way we've done things, you know. I know that may sound a little cliché and again, I don't like to get caught up on doing things a certain way just because that's how the older generation did it. But, the goal that was established then is still the same now, so I can't speak to a time when we weren't implementing a whole lot of soil health practices. 4) What would you say is the biggest misconception people have who are not managing their farming systems for resiliency and soil health? The idea that we can just be here, you know, trying to make money off a piece of ground by any means possible. In my opinion, this land that I operate, I'm borrowing it from the next generations to come. I owe it to them to make sure I do the best I can with it. And I see that with a lot of people, maybe they're not thinking long term on things. I’ve got four boys. Hopefully at least one of them wants to come back to the farm when they get old enough. I feel like we owe it to them to do the best we can to make it better when they decide to come back and take over. So, I would say that as far as the misconception, it's that people think they can farm a piece of ground and just take, take, take, and not give back to it. Looking at things near-sighted, not looking at the long-term, big picture. 5) Is there something you'd still like to do that you haven't yet done to improve the soil health on your farm? I’ve got a big one I've been working on trying to figure out how we can implement it. If I can put a cover crop on an acre of ground, I'm going to do it. One area I've struggled with is in-crop cover crops, like standing corn and standing beans. We've tinkered with aerial application of cover crops. As far as our moisture goes, there's years that let it work, there are years that don't. We're 100% no-till, and have been for years. I own a disc, but I'd have to go cut some trees down to get it out. So, with aerial application of cover crops in standing corn and beans, we've struggled with seed-to-soil contact. That's something I'd like to be able to figure out how to do. 6) What advice do you have for someone who's considering changing their farming system to be one that's better for building soil health? I tell them it's a no-brainer. But I will also say don't be discouraged if you don't see your results immediately. It's not something where you're necessarily going to see an improvement across all the practices in one year. Building organic matter with cover crops, for example, it can take you two, three, four, or five years of being committed to that before you really start seeing the noticeable results. And with rotational grazing, you can't just start one day in and all of a sudden everything’s going to be all better. It takes time. You have to build that resiliency with the soil. So, I guess my advice is to try new ideas but don't be discouraged if you don't see immediate results right off the bat. 7) When you walk across your croplands, what do you look for as an indicator of healthy soils? Earthworms! I love earthworms! One concern with being a no-till farm though, is I feel like we will run into a problem with stratification of our phosphorus. Well, those earthworms are one way of opening that soil to allow it to breathe, to allow that phosphorus to go down. They're constantly moving nutrients. Seeing the earthworms in the ground, seeing how the microbes and such are working in the ground, that’s an indicator to me of our ground being healthy. 8) What change have you made that at first you thought would never work? Decreasing our commercial fertilizers and gearing more towards keeping that microbiology working in the ground. We’ve cut our commercial fertilizer use down by a third. We went to a variable rate, only putting it in places where it's needed and not where it isn’t. We've cut back, but I have seen just a real steady increase to our corn and soybeans and wheat yields since we've been doing it. So, I guess to be able to decrease the use of commercial fertilizer and still be able to see our yields continue to rise was kind of the correlation to go fully management zone base on the whole farm. 9) What are the signs your cropland is resilient and what does resiliency mean to you? We get 15, to 16 inches of moisture on an average year. It's not a matter of if, but when we will see a dry spell during the growing season. The joke around here is that we're always only one week away from being in a drought. So, being able to see how the crops handle that. How the crops still look healthy going through the hot, dry spells, you know. Whether it's being able to keep our ground cool, or being able to hold more moisture in our soil profile. That to me is a big one. 10) What indicators do you have that healthy soil practices also make sense economically to you? Watching our crop yields climb while our fertilizer use decreases. On the pasture side of things, it's seeing the grass, seeing the health of the pastures. Being able to increase our stocking densities, you know, being able to run a few more cow-calf pairs without being detrimental to the ground. ____________________________________________________________________ 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

This week in the “Resilience Rodeo”, Keith Lambert shares his experience of pushing through the first few rough years to get to the long-term benefits when managing your farm for soil health. In the James River Valley in northeastern SD, Keith Lambert farms in an area dominated by corn and soybeans, with little evidence of small grains or livestock. When it comes to starting soil health practices and getting out of that strict corn-soybean rotation, Keith suggests starting small, learning how things work, and then scale up. 1)    What one thing have you done that's been most important to the success of your operation? Probably having a better understanding of how the soil works. 2)    Can you recall a moment or a time when the light bulb went on for you that you really realized soil health practices make sense or that you should change the way you were farming? I was at a soil health event and heard Dr. Dwayne Beck speak about how the water cycle works in healthy soil and how, well, it doesn’t in poorly managed soils.  Hearing that and remembering how many times we said “just pull it over in the grass at the edge of the field so we can get to it” with machinery, it began to click that we were creating a lot of our own problems with soil. 3)    What surprised you the most when you changed the way you farmed to include soil health practices? How long it takes to see results.  In farming we’re somewhat trained to spray this on or plant this type of seed and you have an instant result, or a result in that growing season. That's not the right measuring stick to use when you're doing this stuff. Realistically, it's at least three, if not five years before you start noticing significant changes, significant results. 4)    What would you say is the biggest misconception people have who are not managing their farming systems for resiliency and soil health? Probably the biggest misconception is some of what we talked about previously. How long it takes to see success in the cover crops and that they don’t just cost money and waste time. They do cost money, and it does take time to implement it. But if you measure it over a larger timeframe, they work pretty well. 5)    Is there something you'd still like to do that you have not yet tried to improve your soil health on your farm? Trying to integrate livestock in some fashion, on a larger scale than what we do currently. We don’t have our own livestock right now. We've used some neighboring cattle to try some things out. I'd like to expand on that. 6)    What advice do you have for somebody who's considering changing their farming system to one that's better for building soil health? Sometimes we want to change things too fast when we’re 20 and not fast enough when we’re 70. So, I’d say start small. Pick one small corner of a field or one small area, whether it's an acre or ten acres or 50, whatever you have available to you. Pick one small spot and try one, two, or three things, as much as you can implement in that small spot. Try anything and begin to learn what might or might not work for you. 7)    When you walk across your crop lands, what are you looking for as an indicator of soil health? The texture of the soil would be the first thing. When you stick a shovel in the ground and pull it out and see what it looks like, that's probably the first thing. 8)    What change have you made that at first you thought would never work? I was a little skeptical about growing soybeans into standing rye. It seemed like an awful big ask to drive through a 3-foot-tall rye crop that was green and growing, expecting soybeans to grow.  The spring was unbelievably late and wet, and I hadn't sprayed it yet. I was forced into it.  The previous year was prevent plant and we seeded rye out there in late summer and with the extreme moisture the following spring the rye went crazy.  I no-tilled planted through the standing rye, sprayed, and rolled it.  The beans came up better than expected and had no crusting issues with the rye covering the soil, it was fun to watch. 9)    What are the signs your cropland is resilient and what does resiliency mean to you? Resiliency would be seeing a large rain event and not losing 30% of your field due to ponding, or watching muddy water run off through the field. That's what we’ve struggled with here in the past. 10) What indicators do you have that healthy soil practices also make economic sense? A good set of yield maps over several years and a basic break-even figure shows the gains made along with the areas to be worked on yet. ____________________________________________________________________ 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

As the world grapples with the challenges of climate change and biodiversity loss, the preservation of our natural landscapes has never been more critical. In a recent enlightening episode of our podcast, we had the privilege of hosting Tate Lantz, the Assistant State Conservationist for Field Offices in Rapid City, SD. Lantz, with his extensive background in range science and conservation, shared valuable insights into the Central Grasslands Roadmap, an ambitious initiative aimed at preserving one of America’s most vital ecosystems. To listen to the full podcast, CLICK HERE. Tate Lantz’s journey is deeply rooted in the grasslands of South Dakota. Growing up on a cattle ranch near Winner, SD, he developed an intrinsic connection with the land that shaped his career path. After majoring in range science at South Dakota State University, Lantz embarked on a career with the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS), where he now plays a pivotal role in grassland conservation. The Central Grasslands Roadmap, spearheaded by the Bird Conservancy of the Rockies, represents a significant effort to address the alarming loss of grasslands. Over the past decade, the United States alone has seen the disappearance of approximately 50 million acres of grasslands – an area roughly the size of South Dakota. This loss not only threatens biodiversity, particularly grassland birds but also impacts the carbon sequestration capacity of these ecosystems, a crucial factor in climate change mitigation. Lantz’s involvement in the Roadmap began in 2019, focusing on fostering collaboration and partnerships to preserve grasslands. The initiative spans across three countries – Mexico, the United States, and Canada – and encompasses 600 million acres. It brings together various sectors, including indigenous communities, landowners, ranchers, federal agencies, industry, state and provincial agencies, NGOs, academia, and foundations, highlighting the need for diverse and inclusive conservation strategies. One of the most compelling aspects of the Roadmap is its commitment to economic sustainability. In South Dakota, the initiative focuses on making grassland farming economically viable, recognizing the interconnectedness of environmental health and economic resilience. This approach includes exploring innovative solutions like carbon credit systems and educating producers on sustainable management practices that enhance biodiversity and productivity. The challenges facing South Dakota's grasslands are significant. Urban sprawl, agricultural conversion, and tree encroachment continue to threaten these ecosystems. However, the Roadmap’s comprehensive strategy, which emphasizes community involvement and education, offers a beacon of hope. It acknowledges the critical role that grasslands play in our environment and the necessity of preserving them for future generations. Tate Lantz's insights during the podcast were both informative and inspiring. He highlighted the importance of the Roadmap in not just preserving grasslands but also in fostering a deeper understanding of their value. The initiative goes beyond conservation; it's about transforming the way we view and interact with our natural landscapes. It's a story of hope, collaboration, and the potential for positive change. As we continue to navigate the complexities of environmental conservation, the Central Grasslands Roadmap stands as a testament to what can be achieved through collective effort and innovative thinking. Tate Lantz’s perspective sheds light on the challenges and opportunities ahead, reminding us of the critical role each of us plays in safeguarding our planet's ecosystems. Stay tuned for more discussions on grassland conservation and the roadmap's impact across North America. The preservation of our grasslands is not just an environmental issue; it's a matter of our survival and the legacy we leave for future generations. Let's join forces, as Tate Lantz and many others have, to ensure that these vital ecosystems continue to thrive. To listen to the full podcast, CLICK HERE. Useful Links: Central Grasslands Roadmap Home page: https://www.grasslandsroadmap.org/ Our recommendation for understanding the roadmap: Roadmap Executive Summary ____________________________________________________________________ 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

This week on the “Resilience Rodeo”, Bruce Carlson shares how water, going into the ground rather than running across it, was a big part in starting his long journey in improving his soils. Bruce Carlson has been dabbling in farming ever since high school. He went to school to be a diesel mechanic and worked as a service technician for John Deere before finding an opportunity to farm full-time. Since then, he has gone from a conventional minimum tillage and cow calf operation, to slowly toying with no-till soybeans in 2004 and exploring other soil health practices since. As of 2018, his operation in Garretson, SD has been 100% no-till. Bruce is a proponent of soil health but understands that every producer is on their own journey, and on their own time in learning what works for their soil, their budget, and what they may need to change. 1) What is the one thing you've done that has been the most important thing to the success of your operation? One thing I’ve done on this journey that’s been a big key, I think, is putting the cows into the cover crops, getting them that supplementary source to eat. 2) Can you recall a moment 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 the time that the lightbulb really went on for me was in 2018. We went to a soil health school, and they brought a rainfall simulator. We were able to see how much runoff there is in conventionally tilled land compared to no-till. What really impacted me was seeing what was absorbed by each soil when they flipped it over– in the conventionally tilled soil, the bottom was dry, and the no-till soil was moist. Sometimes we don’t get very much rain in South Dakota, so every drop counts and none of it should be running off. 3) What surprised you the most when you started implementing soil health practices? What surprised me the most was how we didn’t have so much runoff. One field in particular, if it rained hard, there would be a gully that would run all the way down to the end of the field, underneath the railroad track, and then back into another field of ours. Since changing our practices, we’ve seen a lot less water pooling and running off, and more water retention. 4) What would you say is the biggest misconception people have who are not managing their farming systems for soil health and resiliency? The biggest misconception is that “it won’t work here”. People feel like they need to “warm up” the soil to make things grow, that tillage has to happen, and I think that is a misconception. Using the proper tools and methods, I think it can be done, you just have to change your mindset of what you expect and how to go about it. 5) Is there something you'd still like to do that you haven't yet done to improve soil health on your farm? I’d like to progress in interseeding corn; I’d really like to make that work consistently. And, I’d like to try planting green a little bit more. 6) What advice would you have for someone who is considering changing their farming system to one that's better for building soil health? My advice to someone who wants to start their soil health journey is to keep an open mind. Go to some of these schools– that rainfall simulator was just huge for me– so you can see for yourself what’s going on. Or talk to others that have tried it. Just know that you’re going to have to change some things, like how you used to think these things work. There’s going to be challenges. Just keep an open mind. There’s a lot of resources on the internet, and other producers that are willing to tell you what they’re doing. 7) When you walk across your croplands what do you look for as an indicator or as indicators of soil health? When we walk across our land looking at what has changed or what looks healthy, to me, if you look on the ground and you see earthworms, that tells me there’s a lot of activity going on below. Normally I’ve got my pliers with me, and if I shove my pliers into the ground and it goes in nice and easy, and I flip the soil out and it crumbles real nice, that’s my indication we’re doing something better than we did before. 8) Was there a change that you’ve made that at first you thought would never work? A change that we made that I didn’t think would ever work is planting into some of these heavier residues or planting into standing green crops. I would have never thought that would work, I would have never dreamt of doing that, but surprisingly, it works. 9) What signs are you seeing in your cropland that your croplands are getting more resilient? Signs that cropland is more resilient than it used to be, is that you don’t see the corn curling up quite as quickly. You know, it still will, but it seems like it hangs on better in this drier weather. Also, on the flip side of it, when it’s wet, it seems like the water goes into the soil, and we don’t have standing water or erosion problems as much. You can actually go out and walk across a field and the soil’s not going to stick to the bottom of your shoes. And, I feel like you could drive a tractor across it a lot quicker than something that was tilled. 10) What indicators do you have that healthy soil practices also make sense economically to you? Some of the indicators that have probably helped us in the pocketbook is definitely having the cows on the cover crops. We’re not using as much feed we did before, we have narrowed the window of when we feed hay, we don’t spend a lot of time hauling manure that we would if we had cattle in the lot, and fuel and time savings alone with the no-till have been noticeable. ____________________________________________________________________ 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 the “Rodeo” this week, long time cow-calf operator, Frannie Fritz, doesn’t hold back in sharing her opinion that generating resilient soils is a process, and that you have to understand that it takes time to make things right. Frannie Fritz is a cow-calf operator south of Iroquois, South Dakota. After studying animal science and dairy production at SDSU, Frannie returned to the family operation and has been there ever since. Much of her land she has seeded back to grass, but she is always open to seeding new things simply to try them out. To Frannie, health below ground and the health above ground mirror each other, and she knows that you cannot have one without the other. Frannie is also an elected chairman for the Beadle Conservation District and represents South Dakota in the National Association of Conservation. 1) What is the one thing you've done that has been most important to the success of your operation? Make doggone sure that I have fresh water in every single pasture. Water is the most important nutritional need for my cattle. That’s the most important thing. Rotational grazing and fencing, planting everything to grass, that’s all important, but making sure I have fresh water is the most important. And it took me years to do. That’s one point I want to make about all this. Planting grass is a mindset completely different than a corn and soybeans mindset. Producers that are into corn and beans, their mindset is that you plant a seed, it comes up in maybe ten days. But if you plant grass seed, it might come up in three years, depending on the conditions. It’s a mindset. And if you’re not willing to change your mind, you can’t change your system. 2) Can you recall a moment in time when the light bulb went on for you that you realized soil health practices makes sense or that you should change the way you were grazing? There wasn’t a moment, and I don’t do things ‘right’, I do things the way I have to do them. I want to do better, everybody wants to do better, but not all conditions are perfect. I think there wasn't a specific time that the light bulb came on, it’s a process; working with all of these guys, gleaning information, learning from them, being around them. I wouldn't say there was a light bulb moment, I would say over the years it was just a gradual learning process. I’ve been trying to change things at my farm since probably the 80’s, and I’ve been in it too long to pinpoint the moment it all changed. Every year things change, every season things change. 3) What surprised you the most when you started to change the way you grazed? The amount of time and work that it takes, and it does take time and work. Anybody that tells you that some of this stuff does not take a lot of time, they either got way too much time on their hands or they really don’t know what’s going on. But I’m a single operator, I’m out there by myself, I don’t have help, it’s just me. 4) What would you say is the biggest misconception people have who are not managing their grazing systems for soil health and resiliency? Those guys are out of the business, pure and simple. Those who are stuck to their misconceptions are out of the business. This isn’t nice to say and I’m ashamed to say it, but it’s greed. A lot of improper farming is greed. 5) Is there something you’d still like to do that you haven’t yet done to improve soil health on your land? I want to get some more fences in. I want to reduce numbers. The water systems are pretty much done, there’s a few things on my mind. Fences mostly, and there are some grasses I’d still like to try. 6) What advice would you have for someone who is considering changing their grazing system to one that’s better for building soil health? Start small, ask all the questions you can, and don’t jump in whole hog. Don’t decide “hey, I’ve got this quarter, I’m gonna change the whole quarter”. Don’t do that. Just go slow, very slow. Ask questions. Go on tours. Get yourself as versed on the material as you can. I’m lucky, over the years I’ve gone into enough places, I know enough people that I can pick up the phone and call somebody when I have a question. I’m lucky in that respect. But, yeah, start small, start very small, just take twenty acres. It’s gonna take time. Get yourself in the mindset that things are not gonna happen this year. They may not even happen next year. It may be five years down the road before you see something. That’s just the way it is. It’s gonna take some time. It’s not going to be fast. 7) When you walk across your land, what do you look for as indicators of soil health? I see soil health when I see diversity. Whether it’s the little wild iris that I see that I didn’t know existed, or when I stumble across a doe with her brand-new fawn, or when I can go out and see the cows and calves all content. And everybody, whether it’s a little pheasant or a doe or my livestock, can walk up and get a fresh drink of water. 8) Have you made a change that you at first thought would never work? I came home to farm. Most people gave me a year. Said I’d be out of there in a year. That was in 1978. I was even apprehensive that I could make it in this. I made it out of college, but the one thing colleges do is they put rose colored glasses on kids, and you have to take those rose-colored glasses off to see what’s really going on. I had a choice back then of either coming home and trying, or mom was going to sell the farm. Pure and simple, that was it. If I didn’t try, I wouldn’t have known if I could do it. Humans like to be together, they like to be a part of a crowd. When you invest in soil health, you step a foot outside of the box. And when you step to the outside of a group, you’re taking a chance. 9) What does resilience mean to you and what signs are you seeing in your land that it is getting more resilient? Being there tomorrow, being there next year, being there in ten years. I used to do a lot of traveling, and I’d be driving along and all of a sudden see this cloud of dust; well it turns out it was soil blowing, in just a little breeze. My mother and my grandparents on my mother’s side farmed during the dirty thirties so I say there’s a lot of the dirty thirties in me because of what they had to do to survive. And they survived. Maybe not the way I am, maybe not the way their parents made it. But they made it. Resilience means being there tomorrow, being there next year, being there the year after. And every year is different, every day is different. You just gotta keep trying. 10) Between the principles of Rotate, Rest, and Recover; is there any particular one of those that sticks out for you? Rotate. Just keep them moving. I’m not where I should be with my operation, it’s a work in progress. But I would just say rotate because I’m renting a piece of ground right now to the GPA (Game Production Area), and it hasn’t had livestock on it for years– I’m talking many years. And there’s such a deep thatch on that thing that it’s actually snuffing out the grass. 11) How do soil organisms help your livestock and your pocketbook? If you don’t have them in the ground, you won’t have anything out on top. Many, many years ago guys used to fertilize with atrazine. And I believe the little earthworms didn’t like that. I was asking these guys about it and was apparently too stupid to understand. I said, ‘That’s killing the earthworms.’ They’d respond, ‘You don’t need them.’ You don’t need them? God put them in the ground for something! So, if you don’t have the livestock under the ground, you don’t have the livestock on top of the ground. Pure and simple. ____________________________________________________________________ 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