LAKE BENTON — Sharing ideas and resources is one way farmers can help build healthier soil, speakers at a recent conference in Lake Benton said.

Andy Linder, one of the keynote speakers at the Highway 14 CLASIC (Crop, Livestock and Soil Innovation Conference) Tour, said many of the people attending the event were already following practices like no-till farming, and were interested in improving.

“Commonly, it’s the networking among farmers that brings the most value,” Linder said. “They’re there to share experiences with each other.”

The conference brought together speakers like Linder, a farmer from Easton, Minnesota, and farmer Ryan Gibbs of Hopkinton, Iowa, as well as a panel of organizations with funding opportunities for improving soil health.

CLASIC events were held in Owatonna, Lamberton and Lake Benton in February.

Linder shared some of his own experiences with no-till farming for audience members at the conference. Linder has been using no-till farming and cover crops for about 10 years. He said first got interested in no-till farming after a friend invited him to an event similar to CLASIC. He went on to sign up for the Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP).

“It kind of all snowballed from there,” Linder said.

Linder said he and his father now use no-till practices and cover crops on about 2,400 acres of land planted with corn and soybeans. They also try to add small grains and canning crops when they can.

In his talk, Linder said using cover crops and no-till farming practices over the past 10 years have helped build up soil structure in their fields. It also helps prevent erosion.

“Erosion is probably my biggest reason why I keep doing it,” Linder said. He said he “just can’t stand” to see soil washing away, or ending up in road ditches in the winter.

Linder also said he enjoyed the challenge of working with cover crops, and sometimes needing to make decisions “on the fly.”

Using no-till methods with soybeans has been easier than with corn, Linder told audience members.

“They’re the most forgiving. No-till corn is a lot more of a challenge, especially when you start throwing the cover ahead of it,” he said.

Looking at the revenue side of no-till farming with soybeans, “That’s where we start to pull ourselves apart from the group,” Linder said. “Because we’re not doing the tillage, we’re not doing the seed treatment, we’re not doing the fungicides. I just got some rye seed and some application, is all I got for that.”

Factors like having less soil erosion, needing to burn less fuel for tillage and field operations, and reduced costs for herbicide can all affect the profitability of no-till crops, Linder said.

Linder said he also enjoyed having more planting flexibility with no-till farming.

“That’s probably been one of my most favorite things about no-tilling, is the planter goes out when it’s fit, and it stops when it’s raining too hard,” he said. “There’s no ‘How far do we work, and when can we get back out?'”

“The interest (in no-till farming) is still growing, but it’s very slow,” Linder said. Sometimes people aren’t interested in moving away from the farming practices they’re already used to, he said. “Really, a mind change is what we need to do.”

“There’s still a lot of opportunities to try it,” Linder said of no-till farming.

Part of the CLASIC event focused on resources to help farmers interested in taking steps to improve their soil health. A panel of speakers gave examples of programs farmers could apply to for funding opportunities. One such initiative was the One Watershed, One Plan program with the state, said Blake Giles. “The state is giving money to watersheds, to give them priority areas and give producers funding to do structural practices and non-structural practices,” he said. He encouraged producers to speak with their local Soil and Water Conservation District.

Jared House, with the Minnesota Board of Water and Soil Resources, said the state had three pots of funding that were going to soil and water conservation districts. The first was $17 million in a competitive grant to 40 SWCDs across the state. That funding would help hire additional staff and provide guidance for producers, he said.

“That funding also went to hire farmer mentors around this area,” House said. “Reach out to your soil and water districts, and they can hook you up with whoever the mentor is for your area.”

House said a second pot of state funding was for soil health delivery. “It was sent out to every SWCD in the state, and that is wholly driven by local soil and water policy. We’re trying to stay, at the state level, out of programming as much as possible because the locals know what needs to happen and have a better understanding of the needs of all of you locally.”

House said Minnesota was also awarded $25 million of Regional Conservation Partnership Program funds form the federal government. The state was also adding $5 million to that amount. “That $25 million is not for administration. It’s not for anything but putting stuff on the ground.”

House cautioned that the federal RCPP funding was on pause. “The hope is that in March, we can get that out to the districts, but it’s a little bit up in the air right now.”

Other possible resources for funding soil health practices included EQIP and the Conservation Stewardship Program, said Kelly Heather of the Natural Resources Conservation Service. Heather also said that federal funding was also affected by the change in administration. “Anything that touched the Inflation Reduction Act is being paused and evaluated at that point in time,” she said. “If you have concerns, if you have questions, please reach out to your NRCS.”

Funds that came through the Farm Bill were still moving forward, she said.

Liam Bork, of Ducks Unlimited, spoke about the Advancing U.S. Pork Sustainability Grant. The grant focused on several practices, including in-field practices. “Those in-field practices are the things we’ve been talking about today,” including cover crops, and reduced tilling, he said. Other practices were geared toward pork production, like manure management and converting lights to LEDs.

Finally, Peter Noding of the Minnesota Soil Health Coalition, said the MNSHC was working on a large mentor program. MNSHC has also helped partner with ADM for a program with $10 per acre private funding for cover crops, Noding said.