Green Lands, Blue Waters

Green Lands, Blue Waters

Agroforestry Session, 12:00-2:30 pm, Monday, Oct. 15, 2012

Scribe: Leigh Ann Long

Michelle Schoenberger: The conference goal is to increase acreage of continuous living cover in the Midwest.

We will identify 3-5 big ideas to promote increase adoption of agroforestry – within 1-3 years, especially in the landscape scale

Those Present

Michelle Schoeneberger, U. of Nebraska-Lincoln, National Agroforestry Center

Diomy Zamora, U. Minnesota-Extension

Angie Wright, SW Wisconsin, RC&D

Jeri Neal, Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture

Mark Tomer, USDA-ARS National Laboratory for Agriculture and the Environment

Keegan Kult, Iowa Soybean Association

Rick Cruse, Agronomy, Iowa State University

Dean Current, UMN, forest economist

Leigh Ann Long, Iowa State University (scribe)

Jeri: Agroforesty, a breadth of expertise and interests among members in the working group

Michelle: When you say agroforestry – you assume it is about the trees, but is it about the system.

(From PowerPoint slides):

• It is the intentional mixing of agricultural and forestry elements to help build productive, healthy, and resilient operations and landscapes. And it can incorporate the other GLBW CLCs.
• Windbreaks, alley cropping, silvopasture, riparian buffers, forest farming, and special applications
• Barriers: Lacks institutional support, Current rules effectively eliminate agroforestry practices from consideration for govt. subsidies,and cost-share programs; limited knowledge of agroforestry among agency personnel, often relegated to a number of disconnected, disperse and independent practitioners which limits impact at a landscape level.
• Need to expand from a site level to a system level practice, also need to tie into markets.
• Recent activities….
• North American Temperate Agroforesty is gaining momentum.

(Begin discussion)

Jeri: one of the barriers is that people don’t want to put in trees b/c they get in the way of things that make money. Need to work it into the Farm Bill. A definition needed to be identified so we are all on the same page.

Michelle: in 1999, ‘don’t use the word ‘trees’; fine, then ...long description defining practices without using the word ‘trees’. Getting the personnel on the same page.

Angie: Different terms, but meaning similar things.

…Discussion surrounding the term ‘perenniation’

Djomy: Still educating landowners.

Angie: Visuals are so important.

Michelle: Agreed – our visual software works well.

Brief break to introduce Rick Cruse.

Rick: Land tenancy – long-term nature of trees doesn’t allow for renters to plant.

Jeri: How can we rework rental agreements?

Dean: How to connect absentee landowners interested in conservation with tenants?

Mark: Tenants don’t have cash to get info, but landowners do.

Angie: Small landowners are interested.

Dean: Agroforestry is intensive.

Keegan: Maybe a third party could be involved in the work? Essentially a second renter to manage the agroforestry operation aside from the row crops.

Jeri: Do you target specific places, or people, or major land-uses?

Mark: Labor reductions have compressed operations, but some agroforestry harvest could be done in the winter.

Dean: Some agroforestry can appeal to different niches – willow rotations vs. hazelnut vs. woody florals.

Michelle: NAC is focused on the small landowners (small staff). Also focused on natural disasters and how agroforestry can assist (e.g. riparian buffers mitigating flood control).

Jeri: Culturally the trees are pushed out. Need to educate that trees are appropriate to see in the agricultural landscape – that people should expect to see them on the rural landscape.

Angie: Some people do expect trees – anecdote from SW WI.

Djomy: northern MN, landowner interested in planting trees for research.

Rick: # of tile lines, depth and density, runs counter to putting in trees.

Michelle: # of CRP contracts coming out is also high.

Angie: Trees and tile lines don’t mix.

Michelle: Designing landscapes – as a multipurpose landscape.

Rick: Sweat equity has no value on a 1,000 acre row crop farm.

Michelle: Landscape degradation could be a driver for the large operators.

Dean: Evaluating services, how will that affect policy – policy will move the landowners. Landowners might want to adopt agroforestry, but economics constrain them. Are willing to do it in the riparian zone, not in the productive uplands.

Keegan: A lot of wasted filter strips that aren’t productive in Iowa (from a nitrate removal perspective).

Michelle: We aren’t displacing corn-soy, we are supporting it.

Keegan: Southern Iowa, grazing is hurting,

Mark: Any more interest in agroforestry due to hot summer?

Michelle: two projects – southeastern US with silvopasture, animal welfare increased, plus pine straw income. Also promoting alley cropping.

Djomy: Livestock producers concerned about heat stress and forage quality/quantity. Could use silvopasture to improve marginal pasture land.

Michelle: Demand has outpaced the science on silvopasture/alley cropping.

Dean: How do we concentrate on the watershed area? How can we work with multiple practices that fit the local farming practices?

Mark: Bioreactors, used to denitrify tile drainage – where do the wood chips come from? No other benefits to a bioreactor beyond water quality. 15 year life for bioreactor, how many acres of trees do you need for the wood chips in the bioreactor.

Keegan: and wood chips are the high cost in a bioreactor.

Angie: Can you use TSI (timber stand improvement) to supply the chips?

Michelle: Any kind of wood can be used?

Keegan: Yes, except cedar.

Leigh Ann: Because of the antibiotic properties of cedar.

Michelle: Could windbreaks be put in for wood chips, since you don’t want to block tile.

Mark: Strategic positioning of trees near wind farms, for deflection of wind towards the towers.

Angie: Be conscious of wildlife issues with trees (grassland dependent bird species).

Michelle: the right tree in the right place.

Keegan: When working with producers and CRP, that land is then locked in.

Dean: In trouble with the conservationists – CRP to them means it’s taken out of production for always.

Mark: conservation set-aside is historically removed from harvest due to potential competition for forage from livestock.

Jeri: Suggest a packet of practices to GLBW for variance for the uses of CRP.

Keegan: Bioreactors are EQIP eligible, FSA makes producers take out 0.2 acres from CRP so there is no ‘double-dipping’ – essentially $40, and a lot of paperwork.

Dean: NRCS singled out Elm Creek in MN for special treatment for extra funding, but only gave two weeks for signup.

Angie: (gave another example, in the Driftless Area).

Jeri: We should be ready for with the most-bang-for-your-buck projects.

Angie: These projects were EQIP projects that didn’t rank high enough the first time.

Michelle: Strategic framework has FSA at the table, and will look at program conflicts with agroforestry.

Mark: FSA is an important barrier. When confronted with a short amount of time to make a permanent change in the landscape, landowners will just walk away.

Djomy: Is there a precommunication barrier there?

Michelle: Field people have my admiration – overworked, buried by paper, they don’t get out in the field enough. Disconnects – they are trained in areas of specialties that may be older (terraces, etc.), and are not comfortable with new technologies (eg. Bioreactors), they aren’t as willing to promote them. A lateral thinking shift.

Keegan: Technical staff may have biases and not want to promote certain practices.

Michelle: Need to support Mike Gold’s Technology Training Academy.

Angie: A sort of train the trainer?

Jeri: Hoping that gets funded. SARE gives money for to run two different years of academy training. What happens if it doesn’t get funded?

Michelle: I know it is high priority. Who would be the other entity that could host it if the Center for Agroforestry can’t?

Jeri: Then what is plan B?

Big Ideas:

Having a visual presentation of agroforestry

Thinking about targeting audiences – within watersheds.

Hobbyists

Absentee landowners

Small/beginning landowners

Watershed groups

Livestock Producers

Programs – how can we take advantage of them to push getting CRP variances to do research?

Actions:

Agroforestry Academy; if not funded, then National Agroforestry Center

Jeri: Well, there is a tie-in with the U of Iowa and biomass – and the bioreactor supply issue?

Mark Tomer: Saturated buffer description/explanation.

Dean: Elm Creek (Martin Co., Blue Earth basin) Darwin Roberts, will have saturated buffers, bioreactors, on his property.

Michelle: The collection of case studies, go beyond an agroforestry practice, incorporate the systems.

Dean: Are the 5 practices working for the farmer? We are training toward the practice, not to the system.

Michelle: There is baggage to a practice – thinking about NRCS standards, etc.

Keegan: Is there buy-in from the Cattleman’s Association?

Djomy/Michelle: There is, from a heat stress standpoint. Nebraska, there are lagoons leaking that aren’t supposed to, so they are looking at trees for phytoremediation.

(Break…)

Dean: How do you work with landowners, and find the ones that would do it?

Michelle: FarmLink program. 68% signup.

Angie: Testing messaging – through Aldo Leopold Center in WI. Categorizing landowners, based on production forestry, hunters, etc.

Michelle/Mark: Using GIS for identifying areas, then finding the practices that will fit those areas. Then use layers to overlay where you can get maximum benefits. GIS Guided Suitability Assessment Tool.

Jeri: How could other people access this tool?

Michelle: It uses existing datasets, so could be tweaked for local uses. Ramps in the Appalachians, etc.