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Eighty South Dakota farmers needed for nationwide soil health project: Enroll today

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BROOKINGS – South Dakota State University Extension is inviting South Dakota farmers to participate in a new soil health survey.

The new nationwide project is called “Probing Our Country’s Soil Health” and is looking for 80 South Dakota farmers to participate. The project leaders are working to understand the status of soil health around the country and use that information to develop a new tool called Soil Health Assessment Protocol and Evaluation (or SHAPE). Once completed, the SHAPE tool can be used by farmers to better understand their soil health test results.

“In South Dakota we are often experiencing extreme weather conditions and are looking for ways to stabilize or even increase yields in these conditions. Improving our understanding of our soil’s health can better help us manage them,” said Jason Clark, SDSU Extension Soil Fertility Specialist, who is helping to lead the project in South Dakota.

SHAPE is an online tool designed to interpret soil health measurements, monitor soil health change and offer management practice alternatives for improving soil health. The goal of the project is to collect 13,000 soil samples across the U.S. from approximately 6,000 fields, sampling different soil, climate and management conditions. The SHAPE tool will be available as a free web-based app for easy soil health scoring.

To make the tool as useful as possible for South Dakota farmers, the goal is to attract a broad representation of South Dakota ag lands — crops, forages and pasture. Participants will be asked to share general information through an online survey for how two or three fields from their operation have been managed during the last 10 years. They will provide this information through a facilitator-led online Zoom meeting that takes about 45 to 60 minutes.

Participants will also need to grant access to their fields for hand-probe soil sampling, typically two or three sampling sites from each field. Sampling will typically occur within three to six months of the survey, and landowners will be notified prior to the date.

Each participant will receive a personalized soil health report of their fields (over $450 worth of soil test results), and a hard copy of “Probing Our Country’s Soil Health”, a photo book illustrating soil health across the country and the outcomes to this project.

To enroll as a landowner participant, select a time from one of the following facilitator schedule links:

For more information, contact Jason Clark, SDSU Extension Soil Fertility Specialist, at Jason.D.Clark@sdstate.edu, or Hans Klopp, SDSU Extension Soil Health Specialist, at Hans.Klopp@sdstate.edu.

-South Dakota State University Extension

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