Soil Health Meetings Scheduled for Sioux Falls and Watertown in December

Sioux Falls and Watertown will be the sites of two upcoming educational forums that will focus on Soil Health. The Soil Health Events referred to as “SD’s Soil Health Challenge: Don’t Get Left in The Dust”, will take place on December 9 at the SDSU Regional Center in Sioux Falls and December 10 at The Codington County 4-H Complex in Watertown.

The events will feature presentations from Jodi DeJong Hughes, from University of Minnesota Extension; Shannon Osborne and Randy Anderson with the USDA Agricultural Research Service (USDA ARS), and Dwayne Beck and Anthony Bly from South Dakota State University (SDSU). Information will cover soil organic matter, weeds, cover crops and wet soils.

Each event will also feature a panel of farmers who will share some tips on what has and what has not worked on their farms.

SDSU Agronomy Field Specialist, Ruth Beck, who is helping to organize the meetings states “we cannot under estimate the value of our soil and the role it will play in our ability to continue to produce an abundance of healthy food. We had a huge response to our “Soil Health Info Day” last winter in Mitchell. This led us to believe that people are really interested in learning more about soil health and so we are expanding the effort this year. It is our hope that people will come to these events and find value in them”.

Both events will begin with a registration at 8:45 a.m. and will run through the day, wrapping up around 3:30 p.m. There is no cost to attend the events which include lunch. However, organizers are asking for an RSVP if you plan to attend. More information can be found at iGrow.org and www.sdnotill.com.

If you plan to attend the Sioux Falls event, call (605) 782-3290. For the Watertown event, call (605) 783-3642 to RSVP. Two additional events are being planned. One in Belle Fourche on Jan. 16, 2014 and Mitchell on Feb. 13, 2014.