Farmer-Led Research
Research reports are written by Practical Farmers staff to ensure consistency and quality, and are available to view or download for free.
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How does a person determine whether a stream ecosystem on their land is healthy, and how can you recognize the impacts your farming practices have on a stream’s natural processes? Those were questions I had a couple of …
Nineteen ninety-seven was my first year to grow certified organic corn. To be certified, you have to have records to prove no chemical use for three years. We compared the returns from the organic corn and a field …
Bt-enhanced corn is among the latest products of biotechnology to come to market. Vegetable and some row-crop farmers have used the Bt bacteria (Bacillus thuringiensis) for decades to control the caterpillars of moths. The introduction of the “Bt” …
Deep placement of potassium and phosphorus fertilizer is a practice that PFI members have researched for several years. ISU soil scientist Antonio Mallarino has also been working on the topic (see The Practical Farmer, Fall, 1997), and reports …
Beauveria bassiana (say “bo-vária”) is a widely distributed fungus that kills insects including the European corn borer. Three PFI cooperators have worked for two years with our team to research the use of this fungus for biological control …
Two PFI cooperators in western Iowa posed research questions that apply to the crop nutrient needs on their organic farms, specifically. Jim and Lynn Boes (Atlantic) and Ken Rosmann (Harlan) have nearby sources of poultry manure. They wanted …
One of the common questions organic growers ask is whether cattle manure is equivalent to poultry manure in both corn yield produced and the cost of hauling and application. To try to answer this question Ken Rosmann, organic …
Row spacing has been controversial ever since equipment and crops no longer had to accommodate the width of a draft animal. Dave and Lisa Lubben, Monticello, normally drill soybeans and row-plant corn. In 1997 they compared drilled soybeans …
There are always some trials that are not easily categorized. In 1997, that included an oats trial by Jeff and Gayle Olson, Mt. Pleasant, that compared corn and soybeans as preceding crops for oats. In this case the …
With ISU entomologist John Obrycki and graduate student Laura Weiser, I have been investigating ways to manage the alfalfa weevil and the potato leafhopper by optimizing biotic mortality. What is biotic mortality, and why is it important? Even …
The Neely-Kinyon tofu soybean trials reflect the growing interest in specialty markets and identitypreserved production. Two of the fastest growing specialty markets, with two of the highest premiums in specialty production, are the organic and the pesticide-free approaches. …
In the early 1990s a dozen PFI cooperators tried their hand at strip intercropping, the practice of planting narrow strips of different crops side by side. Some impressive corn yields were recorded, but various problems made it difficult …
