Sustainable Recovery and Reconstruction Framework (SURRF)(1).pdf
July 30-130-CIG-Kevin Klingberg
1. Farm Management Impacts to Tile
Drainage Water Quality
Kevan Klingberg, Outreach Specialist
University of Wisconsin – Madison
Discovery Farms Program
74th Soil and Water Conservation Society Annual
Conference. July 28-31, 2019. Pittsburgh, PA
2. University of Wisconsin – Madison
Discovery Farms Program
Eric Cooley
Aaron Wunderlin
Kevan Klingberg
Aaron Pape
Discovery Farms Minnesota
Tim Radatz
20+ Participating Farmers
CIG Funded
A Multi-state partnership
Land-management-tile drain-water quality
Monitoring methods
Soil health
TileWaterQuality andSoil HealthOn-Farm Research
5. Discovery FarmsTile Project inWI and MN
Intensively monitored tile sites
surrounded by satellite locations
Provide tools for farmers and advisors to
diagnose and treat fields with high
nutrient loss through tile drains
Understand the link between soil health
and tile drainage
Great Lakes and Mississippi basins
6. TileStudy
4 counties in Minnesota
Dodge, Renville, Stearns &
Norman
4 counties in Wisconsin
Shawano, Brown,
Kewaunee/Lower Door &
Manitowoc
~48 total sites
7. Study Design: 3 MonitoringStyles
Site Type Intensive Sites (8) Intermediate Sites (20) Basic Sites (20)
Flow Monitoring Constant Constant Bi-Weekly
Water Sampling Constant Bi-Weekly Bi-Weekly
Water sampling: suspended sediment, TKN, ammonium, nitrate, total P, dissolved P, chlorine
Evenly split between states. 24 + 24 = 48
11. Soil HealthComponent
• Testing soil health metrics
• Chemical
• Biological
• Physical
• ~300 site samples
• ~250 from N Use Efficiency proj.
• 48 from tile project
• Looking for link between soil health and
• clean water
15. Going Forward: Tile DrainageWaterQuality
Continue monitoring
Engage participating farmers in awareness of individual farming system and
water quality
Evaluate: farm management + weather + site, regional tile flow + water quality
+ soil quality
Explore / define farm management BMPs
Effectiveness of intermediate and basic monitoring to complement intensive
and understand water quality
Discovery farms is a farmer led water quality research and education program. We conduct soil and water research on real, working farms across the state. We then bring the results of that research back out to the farming community through field days, workshops, conferences, and publications.
Discovery farms is a farmer led water quality research and education program. We conduct soil and water research on real, working farms across the state. We then bring the results of that research back out to the farming community through field days, workshops, conferences, and publications.
In 2017, we received an NRCS CIG grant to begin a new project in partnership with discovery farms Minnesota to monitor tile drainage systems. We want to understand how much soil and nutrients is being lost from tile systems and what management practices may have an impact on those losses. We can then provide a farmers and advisors the tools to diagnose fields with high nutrient losses and to make necessary management changes. We are also testing a new monitoring approach where we use lower intensity satellite monitoring sites to supplement the data collected by our typical intensive monitoring equipment. Finally, we are doing a wide variety of soil health testing to see if there is a link between soil health and tile drainage. Does healthy soil lead to clean tile water?
We are monitoring tile systems in 4 counties in each state. In WI, we are in Shawano, Brown, Kewaunee and Lower Door, and Manitowoc. There are 24 sites in each state for a grand total of 48 sites. In this picture, we are installing an Agridrain, a type of water control structure that provides us access to the tile system for our monitoring equipment.
Here is one of our intensive sites. You can see the agridrain in the foreground there with sample lines running into it. These intensive sites contain our continuous flow monitoring system that keeps track of how much water is flowing through the tile, and an isco automated water sampler that collects samples that we analyze for soil and nutrients. These sites collect excellent quality data, but are expensive to install and maintain. Because of that, we are utilizing several satellite locations surrounding each of these intensive sites to try to collect more data in a cost effective manner.
Some of these satellite sites are what we call intermediate locations. These also have an agridrain installed to allow for the installation of a flow monitor. These sites collect 24/7 flow data, but water samples are only collected every 2 weeks.
We also have these basic sites where we are simply taking flow measurements and taking water samples right at the outlet every 2 weeks.
This is a chart showing how often the tiles are flowing when we do our bi-weekly visits. There is variability in how frequently the tile systems flow. 4 of the sites never stopped flowing, and 1 only was flowing twice. And there are a bunch of sites everywhere in between. Over 80% of the tiles flowed at least 50% of the time, but again, there is still quite a bit of variability.
Flow frequency from all bi-weekly site visits in WI.
4 always run
~83% run >50% of visits
1 runs <25% of visits
Bi-weekly grab samples: WI has more variation but median are nearly the same, with the possible exception for nitrate.