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Header photo courtesy of Peggy Ray

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Weather, markets and politics all impacting agriculture Tim Leeds tleeds@havredailynews.com The last few years have seen north-central Montana agriculture hit from all directions, by weather, floods and fires, market fluctuations and international politics.

Despite the turmoil, experts seem to believe the short- and medium-range situation should work out all right for producers and their crops.

A top-level issue being closely watched is how the political negotiations in world trade will impact agricultural markets, and the situation still is extremely fluid.

President Donald Trump, who had broad support from farmers and ranchers in his 2016 election, has imposed tariffs around the world in an effort to protect U.S. manufacturers and markets and to attempt to force trading partners to stop using actions his administration deems harmful.

That included tariffs on steel and aluminum and major tariffs imposed on China to pressure the country to improve its record on forcing companies to hand over technology secrets to cyber theft.

China responded with retaliatory tariffs that have impacted U.S. exports including soybeans.

China went from the largest importer of U.S. soybeans in 2017 to the fifth-largest, and experts say as much as 27 million tons of U.S. soybeans might go unsold this year because of

the trade dispute.

His pulling out of the Trans-Pacific Partnership also can impact agriculture, as traditional U.S. trading partners shift to others still in the partnership.

Another complication is Trump’s push to negotiate a new trade agreement to replace North American Free Trade Agreement, which eliminated tariffs on many products shipped between the United States, Mexico and Canada. Trump has called NAFTA “the worst trade deal ever” and blames it for the loss of jobs in the U.S., and has been working with Canada and Mexico to negotiate a new agreement.

And another complication comes from outside of Trump’s tariffs and trade actions — tariffs imposed by India.

Montana State University economist Anton Bekkerman said prices on pulse crops have dropped dramatically, with pea prices down about 30 percent this year, chickpeas down 40 percent and lentils down 51 percent.

What will happen with all of these trade situations is up in the air. With the U.S. resuming negotiations with China — which has pledged to buy huge amounts of U.S. products including soybeans to reduce the trade imbalance in place — the last week in March; the negotiation of the new North American agreement still underway, with Canada and Mexico calling for a lifting of the tariffs on steel and aluminum as part of the agreement; and an upcoming election in India likely to determine

what will happen with tariffs there.

Weather impacts north-central Montana — and elsewhere As usual, the weather has played a major factor in what happens with agriculture in this part of the world, and the last few years have been topsy-turvy in that regard.

Two summers ago, ag producers were getting close to being desperate for moisture.

That led to another problem — fires.

Several fires occurred in the area that burned thousands of acres of land, including an early July fire in the Little Rockies that burned 11,699 acres and the East Fork Fire that burned 21,896 acres in the Bear Paw Mountains and brought a top-level federal incident management team to the area to help get it under control.

The weather then turned wetter, and while farmers and ranchers were still trying to deal with the effects of the fires, a record-setting snowstorm the first week of October 2017 — which pretty well put out the East Fork Fire — presaged a record-setting winter.

The October storm dumped more than a foot of snow in north-central Montana and knocked out power for up to two weeks in some areas.

Then, about Christmas-time the region settled into a record-setting winter that led Weather Channel to declare Havre had the worst winter in the country.

Individual records for snow and cold were

set, with February setting the record for the most snow received in Havre for the month, Havre just missing breaking the 1981 record of the most snow for the year at 93.4 inches, and Chester beating its previous record snowfall of 85 inches set in 2009, receiving 85.8 inches in 2017-18.

And the record snowfall led to another problem for farmers and ranchers when it started to melt — flooding.

Water covered fields and valleys and flooded and washed out roads.

The massive flooding led to the fourth federal disaster declaration for the area in eight years, all due to flooding.

The weather stayed milder for most of the rest of the year, with decent precipitation although slightly less-than-normal for most of the region.

Temperatures stayed above normal for the start of the winter, and snowfall was light — until February.

Temperatures were hitting the 40s in northcentral Montana the first two days of February, then winter set back in.

Temperatures dropped and snow fell, ending with the month ending as the second-coldest February on record in north-central Montana with an average temperature for the entire month of -5.9 degrees for Havre.

That didn’t come close to the record set in 1936 of minus 12.8 in Havre, also the year with the coldest February for towns throughout the region.

to change.”

D e p e n d i n g o n a f i e l d ’s l o c a t i o n , Gatzemeier said soil with 2 percent organic matter is good. When more organic matter is present in the soil, more N will be released as the previous year’s roots decompose — which can lower fertilizer N needs.

If the organic matter is 3 percent or more in the top 6 inches, count on at least 10 to 20 pounds of N per acre being released into the soil from that organic matter. A similar release is expected after a pulse crop is grown for grain. Subtract that amount from the recommended N application rate.

Aerating, using vertical tilling machines that open up soil with serrated disks, has become common in Idaho and Canada as a remedy for acidification. Gatzemeier said many Montana farmers, too, now till on a four-year cycle and find it very helpful.

Farmers can also mix soil from 8 or 10 inches deep, which has a higher pH level, with the low-pH soil from shallow depths, but with caution. If doing so will only make

Photo courtesy of S. Powell Significant crop damage results from soil being too acidic, as shown in this drone image. high amounts of precipitation. Soils coming from granite sources have lower pH than those from chalky or limestone sources.

However, certain farm procedures also contribute to the change in soil acidity.

One is the practice of applying more ammonium-based nitrogen, or N, fertilizer than a crop needs or can use; high N rates are often applied because they frequently produce high yield, protein, and profit.

Chuck Gatzemeier, a CCA in Glacier County, said acidic soil was already an issue in Idaho and parts of Canada’s Prairie Provinces before he began seeing it in Montana around 10 years ago.

“The primary source of soil acidification, in my perspective, has been farmers planting wheat on wheat on wheat, fertilizing for high yields and high protein without soil sampling first to find out how much N is needed,” Gatzemeier said.

Jones explained what happens when too much N is added. Ammonium or urea fertilizer combined with air and water produces nitrate plus acid. When nitrate is not taken up by plants it leaches out of the soil and acid is left behind.

Removal of crop residue adds to acidity in that it takes away calcium, magnesium and potassium, which “buffer” pH drop.

For example, if oat straw is removed with the grain harvest, Gatzemeier said the amount of lime required to counter the acidifying effect is six times greater than if the straw stayed on the field.

Because fertilizer is generally applied to the surface or in the top few inches of soil, acidity concentrates in the top 3-6 inches. Fortunately, farmers can prevent and remedy acidic soil.

Prevention and mitigation To prevent soil from becoming too acidic, Gatzemeier said CCAs advise farmers to have soil samples assessed every year.

“Look at your nitrogen level, especially in the top 6 inches of soil,” he said. “Look at the amount of organic matter in that same sample, and look at the pH level every year. If the pH level is going down (becoming more acidic), what you’re doing needs

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the acidic layer thicker, more lime could be required later to correct it, at substantial cost for delivery and application.

Lime is a common remedy, but it takes a large amount and it must be worked into the soil. Because acidity is a relatively new issue in Montana, there are not many sources of readily available agricultural lime, though spent sugar beet lime is free in Billings and Sidney. Lime is not used to prevent acidification.

Crop rotation is especially useful when crops that require little N such as legumes are included. Perennials have actually been shown to reverse acidification, though slowly, in North Dakota.

As always, the four Rs apply: When fertilizing, always use the Right source at the Right rate, at the Right time, in the Right place. Follow these four guidelines for every crop, every year.

—— For more information on the certified crop adviser program, or to find one near you, visit http://www.certifiedcropadviser. org/.

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Acid Soil: Prevention may be cheaper than cure

By Meryl Rygg McKenna with Certified Crop Advisors There is so much more to dirt than meets the eye. Along with nutrients, texture, organic matter and so on, soil pH is critical to the health of plants.

Ongoing soil tests show fields are becoming more acidic. At least 20 of Montana’s agricultural counties have soils acidic enough to affect crop health, even in areas traditionally known for high-pH — alkaline soils.

A pH value is a measure of acidity on a scale from 0 to 14. Acidic soils have low pH values — less than 7; basic soils have high pH values — greater than 7; and pH 7 is neutral. Each pH unit change represents a 10-fold change in acidity.

Why does it matter?

Acidic soil affects crop health in multi-

Photo courtesy of R. Engel Rick Engel takes soil samples from a field showing signs of aluminum toxicity, one of the results of acidic soil. ple ways, said Clain Jones, chair of the Rocky Mountain Certified Crop Adviser program and extension soil fertility specialist with Montana State University. As soil pH drops, plants go hungry because nutrients are less available than in neutralpH soil. For example, at low pH, phosphorus sticks more to clay or iron particles, while nitrogen, potassium, sulfur, calcium, and magnesium are easily leached away and lost. Nitrogen fixation by legumes is severely limited at pH levels lower than 6.

At low pH, aluminum and manganese become more available, leading to toxic levels that produce yellow, brown or even pink foliage and poor growth, especially once pH falls below 5. Too much aluminum

creates plants with club- or broom-shaped roots. Farmers also see an increase in some fungal diseases such as Rhizoctonia and Cephalosporium stripe.

As pH levels go down, the effectiveness of herbicides and pesticides changes, as

well as how long they stay in the soil, possibly resulting in crop damage.

What makes soil more acidic?

Some soils have naturally low pH levels, such as forest soils and those that receive

www.havredailynews.com The weather has turned milder and has led to some flooding although generally mild for this part of north-central Montana.

Big Sandy Creek had topped its banks a bit the last week of March, but was expected to start dropping. Flooding had occurred on People’s Creek near Dodson and the Milk River was flooding near Glasgow, but not expected to top its banks from Havre to Harlem.

The National Weather Service Climate Prediction Center forecasts most of north-central Montana to be at about-normal temperatures and precipitation for the next three months.

While crop weather might be all right in north-central Montana, flooding is inundating farmers and ranchers from the Dakotas to Iowa, with impacts there yet to be assessed.

Impacts on markets Bekkerman said the impacts of flooding on production and prices is yet to be seen.

“There’s been a small reaction in prices to flooding in the central plains and midwest, mostly on the corn and soybean side, but there also seems to be a strong wait-and-see attitude in the markets to get any type of information that could reflect farmers’ ability to plant these crops in the next month or two,” he said.

He said if the flooding causes delays or abandonment of planting in the midwest, it would probably cause corn prices to go up, which could affect other markets as well.

“While this could be good news for grain producers, these corn prices increases would most likely result in a drop in feeder cattle markets,” Bekkerman said.

FARM & RANCH But if corn planting is close to what is predicted, which is higher than last year, it cold lead to an above-average production due to a predicted El Niño year leading to cooler, wetter wetter in the midwest over the summer.

“In this case, higher production numbers and resulting lower corn prices could actually boost feeder cattle prices,” Bekkerman said.

Globally, wheat planting could increase slightly this year, which could affect prices, but spring wheat markets are staying fairly consistent so whether that would significantly lower prices is unclear, Bekkerman said.

He said that in Montana low pulse crop prices and fairly stagnant durum markets will likely lead to an increase in hard red spring wheat planting.

Bekkerman said he is also hearing of an increased interest in planting canola.

“This is related both to the fact that producers are looking for crops other than pulses to place into their rotations as well as simply to incorporate oil seeds into their wheat–pulse rotation for disease management purposes,” he said.

Trade agreements uncertain What will come out of the trade agreements being negotiated — and their impact on agriculture — is completely unclear.

With China saying it will increase imports from the U.S. including soybeans as part of the negotiations, it could have a major impact on U.S. agriculture.

Experts said before the U.S.-China negotiations the last week of March that they expect some limited agreement to be reached soon, but how much it would address the main con-

flicts between the countries on trade is unclear.

Bekkerman said the Chinese tariffs are a concern on grains but it is difficult to draw a direct connection on prices. China is not a major importer of U.S. grains, he said.

“However, the ongoing negotiations could be having more indirect impacts by adding overall uncertainty to agricultural commodity markets, in which prices often move closely together,” Bekkerman said. “It’s also unclear whether or to what extent the prolonged negotiations may be directing efforts/energy away from potential negotiations with other important partners, such as Japan.”

He added that Japan is a concern because it is a major trade partner for Montana’s agricultural economy.

“The country has been consistently one of the top importers of U.S. beef and wheat products,” Bekkerman said. “Since the United States pulled out of the Trans-pacific Partnership agreement in 2016, there has been talk of developing a bilateral treaty. These talks have been slow in even starting, but in the meantime, Japan, along with the remaining countries in the original TPP, agreed on the Comprehensive and Progressive TPP agreement: basically the original TPP, but without the United States as a participant.”

That agreement, which took effect in January, provides substantial preferential treatment and lower import tariffs on Canadian and Australian beef and wheat products into Japan, Bekkerman said, adding that as of April 1, some estimates predict that U.S. wheat will be 40–50 cents per bushel more expensive than Canadian wheat, which could have some significant ramifications.

April 2019

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But he said. the impacts on demand for the higher-quality wheats grown in Montana are still uncertain.

The North American agreement also is unclear. Trump has said he is willing to pull out of NAFTA — although as a congressionally approved agreement Congress might have to OK that — if the new agreement is not approved, but Mexico and Canada have said they are not willing to move forward unless the steel and aluminum tariffs are removed.

The agreement first has to be approved by the U.S. and it has received lukewarm support in Congress, and Democrats controlling the House seem to be in no hurry to pass it.

Bekkerman said negotiations with the European Union are also tied up with EU negotiators refusing to discuss agricultural products, which the U.S. insists must be part of the negotiations.

“The theme: The process has stalled and the uncertainty about forward movement is affecting … U.S. markets and has moved buyers in EU, Mexico and Canada to look at potential alternative procurement strategies,” Bekkerman said.

And the elections in India that start this month could have a major impact on pulse crop prices.

“There are opposing demands from Indian consumers who want to open up trade in order to lower pulse crop prices and Indian farmers who want to maintain and potentially increase government help in maintaining favorable crop prices,” Bekkerman said. “It will be both interesting and important to see how these two opposing groups make their influence felt through the election process.”

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Acid Soil: Prevention may be cheaper than cure

By Meryl Rygg McKenna with Certified Crop Advisors There is so much more to dirt than meets the eye. Along with nutrients, texture, organic matter and so on, soil pH is critical to the health of plants.

Ongoing soil tests show fields are becoming more acidic. At least 20 of Montana’s agricultural counties have soils acidic enough to affect crop health, even in areas traditionally known for high-pH — alkaline soils.

A pH value is a measure of acidity on a scale from 0 to 14. Acidic soils have low pH values — less than 7; basic soils have high pH values — greater than 7; and pH 7 is neutral. Each pH unit change represents a 10-fold change in acidity.

Why does it matter?

Acidic soil affects crop health in multi-

Photo courtesy of R. Engel Rick Engel takes soil samples from a field showing signs of aluminum toxicity, one of the results of acidic soil. ple ways, said Clain Jones, chair of the Rocky Mountain Certified Crop Adviser program and extension soil fertility specialist with Montana State University. As soil pH drops, plants go hungry because nutrients are less available than in neutralpH soil. For example, at low pH, phosphorus sticks more to clay or iron particles, while nitrogen, potassium, sulfur, calcium, and magnesium are easily leached away and lost. Nitrogen fixation by legumes is severely limited at pH levels lower than 6.

At low pH, aluminum and manganese become more available, leading to toxic levels that produce yellow, brown or even pink foliage and poor growth, especially once pH falls below 5. Too much aluminum

creates plants with club- or broom-shaped roots. Farmers also see an increase in some fungal diseases such as Rhizoctonia and Cephalosporium stripe.

As pH levels go down, the effectiveness of herbicides and pesticides changes, as

well as how long they stay in the soil, possibly resulting in crop damage.

What makes soil more acidic?

Some soils have naturally low pH levels, such as forest soils and those that receive

www.havredailynews.com The weather has turned milder and has led to some flooding although generally mild for this part of north-central Montana.

Big Sandy Creek had topped its banks a bit the last week of March, but was expected to start dropping. Flooding had occurred on People’s Creek near Dodson and the Milk River was flooding near Glasgow, but not expected to top its banks from Havre to Harlem.

The National Weather Service Climate Prediction Center forecasts most of north-central Montana to be at about-normal temperatures and precipitation for the next three months.

While crop weather might be all right in north-central Montana, flooding is inundating farmers and ranchers from the Dakotas to Iowa, with impacts there yet to be assessed.

Impacts on markets Bekkerman said the impacts of flooding on production and prices is yet to be seen.

“There’s been a small reaction in prices to flooding in the central plains and midwest, mostly on the corn and soybean side, but there also seems to be a strong wait-and-see attitude in the markets to get any type of information that could reflect farmers’ ability to plant these crops in the next month or two,” he said.

He said if the flooding causes delays or abandonment of planting in the midwest, it would probably cause corn prices to go up, which could affect other markets as well.

“While this could be good news for grain producers, these corn prices increases would most likely result in a drop in feeder cattle markets,” Bekkerman said.

FARM & RANCH But if corn planting is close to what is predicted, which is higher than last year, it cold lead to an above-average production due to a predicted El Niño year leading to cooler, wetter wetter in the midwest over the summer.

“In this case, higher production numbers and resulting lower corn prices could actually boost feeder cattle prices,” Bekkerman said.

Globally, wheat planting could increase slightly this year, which could affect prices, but spring wheat markets are staying fairly consistent so whether that would significantly lower prices is unclear, Bekkerman said.

He said that in Montana low pulse crop prices and fairly stagnant durum markets will likely lead to an increase in hard red spring wheat planting.

Bekkerman said he is also hearing of an increased interest in planting canola.

“This is related both to the fact that producers are looking for crops other than pulses to place into their rotations as well as simply to incorporate oil seeds into their wheat–pulse rotation for disease management purposes,” he said.

Trade agreements uncertain What will come out of the trade agreements being negotiated — and their impact on agriculture — is completely unclear.

With China saying it will increase imports from the U.S. including soybeans as part of the negotiations, it could have a major impact on U.S. agriculture.

Experts said before the U.S.-China negotiations the last week of March that they expect some limited agreement to be reached soon, but how much it would address the main con-

flicts between the countries on trade is unclear.

Bekkerman said the Chinese tariffs are a concern on grains but it is difficult to draw a direct connection on prices. China is not a major importer of U.S. grains, he said.

“However, the ongoing negotiations could be having more indirect impacts by adding overall uncertainty to agricultural commodity markets, in which prices often move closely together,” Bekkerman said. “It’s also unclear whether or to what extent the prolonged negotiations may be directing efforts/energy away from potential negotiations with other important partners, such as Japan.”

He added that Japan is a concern because it is a major trade partner for Montana’s agricultural economy.

“The country has been consistently one of the top importers of U.S. beef and wheat products,” Bekkerman said. “Since the United States pulled out of the Trans-pacific Partnership agreement in 2016, there has been talk of developing a bilateral treaty. These talks have been slow in even starting, but in the meantime, Japan, along with the remaining countries in the original TPP, agreed on the Comprehensive and Progressive TPP agreement: basically the original TPP, but without the United States as a participant.”

That agreement, which took effect in January, provides substantial preferential treatment and lower import tariffs on Canadian and Australian beef and wheat products into Japan, Bekkerman said, adding that as of April 1, some estimates predict that U.S. wheat will be 40–50 cents per bushel more expensive than Canadian wheat, which could have some significant ramifications.

April 2019

3

But he said. the impacts on demand for the higher-quality wheats grown in Montana are still uncertain.

The North American agreement also is unclear. Trump has said he is willing to pull out of NAFTA — although as a congressionally approved agreement Congress might have to OK that — if the new agreement is not approved, but Mexico and Canada have said they are not willing to move forward unless the steel and aluminum tariffs are removed.

The agreement first has to be approved by the U.S. and it has received lukewarm support in Congress, and Democrats controlling the House seem to be in no hurry to pass it.

Bekkerman said negotiations with the European Union are also tied up with EU negotiators refusing to discuss agricultural products, which the U.S. insists must be part of the negotiations.

“The theme: The process has stalled and the uncertainty about forward movement is affecting … U.S. markets and has moved buyers in EU, Mexico and Canada to look at potential alternative procurement strategies,” Bekkerman said.

And the elections in India that start this month could have a major impact on pulse crop prices.

“There are opposing demands from Indian consumers who want to open up trade in order to lower pulse crop prices and Indian farmers who want to maintain and potentially increase government help in maintaining favorable crop prices,” Bekkerman said. “It will be both interesting and important to see how these two opposing groups make their influence felt through the election process.”

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Weather, markets and politics all impacting agriculture Tim Leeds tleeds@havredailynews.com The last few years have seen north-central Montana agriculture hit from all directions, by weather, floods and fires, market fluctuations and international politics.

Despite the turmoil, experts seem to believe the short- and medium-range situation should work out all right for producers and their crops.

A top-level issue being closely watched is how the political negotiations in world trade will impact agricultural markets, and the situation still is extremely fluid.

President Donald Trump, who had broad support from farmers and ranchers in his 2016 election, has imposed tariffs around the world in an effort to protect U.S. manufacturers and markets and to attempt to force trading partners to stop using actions his administration deems harmful.

That included tariffs on steel and aluminum and major tariffs imposed on China to pressure the country to improve its record on forcing companies to hand over technology secrets to cyber theft.

China responded with retaliatory tariffs that have impacted U.S. exports including soybeans.

China went from the largest importer of U.S. soybeans in 2017 to the fifth-largest, and experts say as much as 27 million tons of U.S. soybeans might go unsold this year because of

the trade dispute.

His pulling out of the Trans-Pacific Partnership also can impact agriculture, as traditional U.S. trading partners shift to others still in the partnership.

Another complication is Trump’s push to negotiate a new trade agreement to replace North American Free Trade Agreement, which eliminated tariffs on many products shipped between the United States, Mexico and Canada. Trump has called NAFTA “the worst trade deal ever” and blames it for the loss of jobs in the U.S., and has been working with Canada and Mexico to negotiate a new agreement.

And another complication comes from outside of Trump’s tariffs and trade actions — tariffs imposed by India.

Montana State University economist Anton Bekkerman said prices on pulse crops have dropped dramatically, with pea prices down about 30 percent this year, chickpeas down 40 percent and lentils down 51 percent.

What will happen with all of these trade situations is up in the air. With the U.S. resuming negotiations with China — which has pledged to buy huge amounts of U.S. products including soybeans to reduce the trade imbalance in place — the last week in March; the negotiation of the new North American agreement still underway, with Canada and Mexico calling for a lifting of the tariffs on steel and aluminum as part of the agreement; and an upcoming election in India likely to determine

what will happen with tariffs there.

Weather impacts north-central Montana — and elsewhere As usual, the weather has played a major factor in what happens with agriculture in this part of the world, and the last few years have been topsy-turvy in that regard.

Two summers ago, ag producers were getting close to being desperate for moisture.

That led to another problem — fires.

Several fires occurred in the area that burned thousands of acres of land, including an early July fire in the Little Rockies that burned 11,699 acres and the East Fork Fire that burned 21,896 acres in the Bear Paw Mountains and brought a top-level federal incident management team to the area to help get it under control.

The weather then turned wetter, and while farmers and ranchers were still trying to deal with the effects of the fires, a record-setting snowstorm the first week of October 2017 — which pretty well put out the East Fork Fire — presaged a record-setting winter.

The October storm dumped more than a foot of snow in north-central Montana and knocked out power for up to two weeks in some areas.

Then, about Christmas-time the region settled into a record-setting winter that led Weather Channel to declare Havre had the worst winter in the country.

Individual records for snow and cold were

set, with February setting the record for the most snow received in Havre for the month, Havre just missing breaking the 1981 record of the most snow for the year at 93.4 inches, and Chester beating its previous record snowfall of 85 inches set in 2009, receiving 85.8 inches in 2017-18.

And the record snowfall led to another problem for farmers and ranchers when it started to melt — flooding.

Water covered fields and valleys and flooded and washed out roads.

The massive flooding led to the fourth federal disaster declaration for the area in eight years, all due to flooding.

The weather stayed milder for most of the rest of the year, with decent precipitation although slightly less-than-normal for most of the region.

Temperatures stayed above normal for the start of the winter, and snowfall was light — until February.

Temperatures were hitting the 40s in northcentral Montana the first two days of February, then winter set back in.

Temperatures dropped and snow fell, ending with the month ending as the second-coldest February on record in north-central Montana with an average temperature for the entire month of -5.9 degrees for Havre.

That didn’t come close to the record set in 1936 of minus 12.8 in Havre, also the year with the coldest February for towns throughout the region.

to change.”

D e p e n d i n g o n a f i e l d ’s l o c a t i o n , Gatzemeier said soil with 2 percent organic matter is good. When more organic matter is present in the soil, more N will be released as the previous year’s roots decompose — which can lower fertilizer N needs.

If the organic matter is 3 percent or more in the top 6 inches, count on at least 10 to 20 pounds of N per acre being released into the soil from that organic matter. A similar release is expected after a pulse crop is grown for grain. Subtract that amount from the recommended N application rate.

Aerating, using vertical tilling machines that open up soil with serrated disks, has become common in Idaho and Canada as a remedy for acidification. Gatzemeier said many Montana farmers, too, now till on a four-year cycle and find it very helpful.

Farmers can also mix soil from 8 or 10 inches deep, which has a higher pH level, with the low-pH soil from shallow depths, but with caution. If doing so will only make

Photo courtesy of S. Powell Significant crop damage results from soil being too acidic, as shown in this drone image. high amounts of precipitation. Soils coming from granite sources have lower pH than those from chalky or limestone sources.

However, certain farm procedures also contribute to the change in soil acidity.

One is the practice of applying more ammonium-based nitrogen, or N, fertilizer than a crop needs or can use; high N rates are often applied because they frequently produce high yield, protein, and profit.

Chuck Gatzemeier, a CCA in Glacier County, said acidic soil was already an issue in Idaho and parts of Canada’s Prairie Provinces before he began seeing it in Montana around 10 years ago.

“The primary source of soil acidification, in my perspective, has been farmers planting wheat on wheat on wheat, fertilizing for high yields and high protein without soil sampling first to find out how much N is needed,” Gatzemeier said.

Jones explained what happens when too much N is added. Ammonium or urea fertilizer combined with air and water produces nitrate plus acid. When nitrate is not taken up by plants it leaches out of the soil and acid is left behind.

Removal of crop residue adds to acidity in that it takes away calcium, magnesium and potassium, which “buffer” pH drop.

For example, if oat straw is removed with the grain harvest, Gatzemeier said the amount of lime required to counter the acidifying effect is six times greater than if the straw stayed on the field.

Because fertilizer is generally applied to the surface or in the top few inches of soil, acidity concentrates in the top 3-6 inches. Fortunately, farmers can prevent and remedy acidic soil.

Prevention and mitigation To prevent soil from becoming too acidic, Gatzemeier said CCAs advise farmers to have soil samples assessed every year.

“Look at your nitrogen level, especially in the top 6 inches of soil,” he said. “Look at the amount of organic matter in that same sample, and look at the pH level every year. If the pH level is going down (becoming more acidic), what you’re doing needs

April 2019

11

the acidic layer thicker, more lime could be required later to correct it, at substantial cost for delivery and application.

Lime is a common remedy, but it takes a large amount and it must be worked into the soil. Because acidity is a relatively new issue in Montana, there are not many sources of readily available agricultural lime, though spent sugar beet lime is free in Billings and Sidney. Lime is not used to prevent acidification.

Crop rotation is especially useful when crops that require little N such as legumes are included. Perennials have actually been shown to reverse acidification, though slowly, in North Dakota.

As always, the four Rs apply: When fertilizing, always use the Right source at the Right rate, at the Right time, in the Right place. Follow these four guidelines for every crop, every year.

—— For more information on the certified crop adviser program, or to find one near you, visit http://www.certifiedcropadviser. org/.

12

Hi-Line

April 2019

FARM & RANCH

www.havredailynews.com

Header photo courtesy of Peggy Ray