Success StoryBlue Water Farms: Edge-of-Field Water Quality Monitoring in Kentucky Soils



Blue Water Farms: Edge-of-Field Water Quality Monitoring in Kentucky Soils

Author: Brad Lee

Planning Unit: Plant and Soil Sciences

Major Program: Water and Soil Quality and Conservation

Outcome: Intermediate Outcome

Twenty-nine edge-of-field water quality monitoring stations have been developed to measure continuous nutrient and sediment runoff within row-crop agricultural fields across western Kentucky through a partnership of nine landowners, the Kentucky Soybean Promotion Board, the Kentucky Agricultural Development Board, the USDA NRCS, Kentucky Geological Survey and the College of Agriculture Food and Environment at the University of Kentucky.  As of December 2022, we had completed the baseline cropping system monitoring (corn and soybean rotation) for 22 stations.   We summarized an example soil erosion event and presented this to the Kentucky soybean producers across the state via the Kentucky Soybean Board publication, Kentucky Soybean Sentinel.  We also summarized the nutrient losses across this baseline period and presented this information to the Kentucky Soybean Promotion Board at their research meeting on March 21.






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