Soybean farmers, are you interested in learning about your soil health?
The UW Bean Team is studying the connection between cover crop usage, soil health metrics, and soybean yields.
A great deal of research has been conducted on soil health in soybean systems including some recent work by UW Bean Team member, Lindsay Malone. Our goal is to build off this research by focusing on cover crops and their relationship with soil health. For this project, soil samples that you collect and ship to us will be analyzed using several soil health measures in addition to routine analysis.
These measurements are relatively inexpensive and can be performed on dried soil samples. Any field that will be planted to soybean in 2025 is eligible for this study as we are interested in fields with and without a history of cover crop use. For your efforts, you’ll receive the results from your soil samples, and we’ll discuss the meaning of the results generated from the entire dataset.
Objective
Connect the use of cover crops to common soil health measurements and soybean yield.
What we need from farmers:
- Collect soil samples from up to 4 of your 2025 soybean fields and ship them back to us from your local post office (shipping with be prepaid).
- Fill out a 1-page survey form on the management history of each field.
- Report 2025 soybean yields from sampled fields.
What farmers will receive:
- A sampling kit with detailed instructions and materials to collect soil samples and ship them back to us from your local post office (shipping with be prepaid).
- Confidentiality of your data.
- Extension materials from all the data generated for this study, which will help farmers make informed decisions about soil health management on their farm
