This methodology was developed and first used commercially at Cornell in 2006, incorporating chemical, physical and biological properties to gauge soil health. Since then, this technique for measuring a comprehensive mix of indicators of soil health has been modified to fit locations around the world.

As the soil health lab manager at the Chinook Applied Research Association in Oyen, Alta., Zavala received the green light to modify Cornell’s technique for Alberta conditions, developing the Alberta Soil Health Benchmark.

“I learned from them everything I needed to put together here,” says Zavala.

Grading on the curve

The Comprehensive Assessment of Soil Health technique and the Alberta Soil Health Benchmark analysis provide test results with handy scores that assess soil using a familiar format — a score from 1 to 100. As well, colour codes make it easy to spot where an intervention or practice change might have the biggest effect.

Zavala and her research team developed scores for each measure based on data collected from 2018 to 2023. During that period, 11 of the 12 applied research and forage associations across Alberta collected soil samples for this project.

Using these results, they calculated the mean and standard deviation based on a standard normal distribution for each test result. Then a scoring curve was developed for each indicator. These scoring curves enable the lab to provide test results that show where your soil fits relative to other soil in Alberta. After analyzing the data, Zavala developed separate scoring curves for coarse, medium and fine soil across the province.

As an example, through these tests, the average soil respiration rate in Alberta was found to be 1.22 mg CO₂ per gram of dry-weight soil. If your soil’s test result is 1.22, your score will be 50 out of 100, right in the middle. If your score is above average, you’ll get a score above 50.

Using these curves, each test result has been converted to a score from one to 100, with 100 being the best. Then each test result is colour-coded for convenience. From worst to best, the scores and colours are:

• under 20: red, very low
• 20-40: orange, low
• 40-60: yellow, medium
• 60-80: green, high
• >80: blue, very high

With the colour-coding system, users can quickly see their biggest soil problems and consider potential solutions. Measurements shown in red are constraints, areas where improvement may increase soil health and ultimately yield. Measures in green and blue are areas where growers can sleep easy at night.

A curve for every test

For most soil health indicators, more is better. A higher test result means a healthier soil and a better score. In these cases, curves are generally shaped like the curve in Figure 1.

For some indicators, such as the amount of manganese or iron in the soil, a lower test result is better. As you can see in Figure 2, curves for indicators where smaller results are better are drawn in the opposite direction, so lower test results bring higher scores.

Sometimes the best test result is in the middle. These cases are shown in Figure 3 as an optimum curve. Soil pH is an example of a measurement in this category. Test results that are very high or very low would return a low score. A score in the middle of these extremes would be in the green zone (high, meaning “good”).

The Alberta scoring curves will change over time. As more soil tests are done, the new data will be built into the scoring curves so farmers can have more accurate results.

Meanwhile in Saskatchewan

To the east, a team led by Kate Congreves, a professor in the department of plant science at the University of Saskatchewan, is working on a Saskatchewan Soil Health Assessment Protocol that includes scoring functions similar to those developed for the Alberta Soil Health Benchmark.

There are subtle differences in this protocol. Rather than creating scores based on smaller regions of the province, the Saskatchewan protocol is developing scoring curves by soil type: brown, dark brown and black. Saskatchewan researchers noted that soil class generally influenced most soil characteristics.

For example, the Saskatchewan report mentions soil organic carbon. Generally, a soil organic carbon of three per cent would be a “good” score in Saskatchewan. But in Saskatchewan’s black soil zone, soil organic carbon levels tend to be higher. In the black soil zone, a soil organic carbon of three per cent would rate as “poor,” with a score between 20 and 40 on the scale of one to 100.

And the rest of the country?

In the spring of 2024, the Canadian Standing Senate Committee on Agriculture and Forestry released a report on soil, “Critical Ground: Why Soil is Essential to Canada’s Economic, Environmental, Human, and Social Health.”

This report includes 25 recommendations, the first of which is that soil be designated as a strategic national asset. Many other recommendations centre on encouraging soil stewardship, using tools like tax credits and carbon markets.

There are many ways to evaluate soil. This report recommends that the federal and provincial governments develop a consensus on how to measure, report and verify soil health.

Zavala would like to see comprehensive soil health testing in place across the country.

“If the government doesn’t see the importance of what we have done in Alberta and look in more detail at how beneficial this can be, we aren’t going to understand what’s happening in our soil,” she says.

“We need to see the soil in a different way.”

The post Benchmarking soil health in Alberta appeared first on Grainews.

“The first question I ask when I’m speaking to farmers is, ‘How many of you have done soil testing?’” says Yamily Zavala, soil health lab manager and soil health and crop management specialist at the Chinook Applied Research Association, Oyen, Alta.

Most farmers in the room raise their hands when she asks this, but when Zavala pushes them further, she finds that most have had an analysis of their soil’s chemical properties. These tests usually analyze micro- and macronutrients, pH, organic matter, electrical conductivity (to indicate salinity) and cation exchange capacity (to indicate the soil’s ability to hold nutrients).

This information is necessary to develop a fertility program, but, Zavala says, it’s far from the whole story.

“Soil is not just chemicals. Soil is not just minerals. Soil is holistic. It’s alive.”

The Chinook Applied Research Association’s Soil Health Lab has been testing soil from across Alberta using three categories of soil properties: chemical, physical and biological.

With more than 4,000 soil samples analyzed between 2018 and 2024, the association’s Alberta Soil Health Benchmark Report includes benchmarks and scoring systems that can provide Alberta growers with comprehensive reports on their soil health in an easy-to-use format.

What is “healthy”?

There isn’t one standard, simple definition of “healthy” soil. Most definitions mention the soil environment and how efficiently the soil cycles nutrients. Almost all definitions use “healthy soil” and “quality soil” interchangeably.

The concept of soil health goes beyond measuring the chemicals and nutrients in the soil and includes how the whole soil ecosystem is functioning.

One common indicator of soil health measures the amount of living microbes in soil. This is soil organic matter, the percentage of soil made up of plant and animal material. Soil organic matter is the basic building block of productive soils, holding the soil together and making soil’s biological functions possible.

We know that a higher percentage of soil organic matter is better. But how much is enough? What other components of soil affect soil organic matter?

What can we measure (besides soil organic matter) to get a good picture of trends, and analyze differences?

Three components of soil health

The theory behind the Alberta Soil Health Benchmark is that healthy soil has three general components. These are the chemical and fertility properties, the physical properties and the soil’s biological properties, such as soil organic matter.

The physical properties describe the inherent character of the soil. Indicators include soil texture, compaction, water infiltration, bulk density (an indicator of soil compaction) and soil wet aggregate stability.

Growers can change some of these physical properties over time through management changes. Other physical characteristics are permanent. Physical properties can constrain soil health and crop yield.

Improving the soil’s physical properties can also improve some of the chemical indicators, the soil organic matter, and other biological indicators. Zavala describes this as “building a really nice house for the biology.”

The third part of the Alberta Soil Health Benchmark evaluation is the biological component.

Zavala sees all three of these components as important and necessary for soil health, but she sees biology as “at the top.” Organic matter in the soil is what allows the soil to function as an ecosystem. The living organisms in the soil are dynamic, changing all the time.

When all three of these components are robust, Zavala says, “that’s what I call the healthy soil.”

Together, all three types of measures provide a snapshot of the health of the soil. With repeated, consistent tests, changes in these measurements will indicate where farm management is improving or depleting soil health.

Measuring biological health

Soil organic matter is a key indicator for measuring soil’s biological health. Soil organic matter is measured by drying the soil, weighing it and then heating it to a temperature that will burn off the organic matter. The remaining soil is re-weighed; the difference in weight is the organic matter. The measure is provided as a percentage of the total soil mass.

The soil organic matter includes many living organisms. Some of the smallest are bacteria and fungi. These produce their own secondary metabolites and digestive enzymes, they absorb pieces of plant residue, and they release nutrients that plants can use.

Among farmers and agronomists, nitrogen-fixing bacteria such as rhizobium are probably the most popular creatures in this category. Nitrogen-fixing bacteria convert atmospheric nitrogen to ammonia, a form of nitrogen that can be converted into plant-available nitrogen.

Protozoans in the soil are generally larger than bacteria and fungi and can move themselves through the thin film of water in the soil. They’re single-celled, but typically bigger than bacteria and fungi. They often consume bacteria, and sometimes fungi. This group of microbes (living organisms too small to see without a microscope) includes flagellates, amoeba and ciliates.

Nematodes are the largest microbes in our soil. They have multiple cells and can consume bacteria, fungi and protozoa. Most nematodes are beneficial to soil health, but some are agricultural pests that take nutrients from plants, such as cereal cyst nematodes. A diverse group of nematodes in the soil is thought to indicate a healthier soil.

Measuring soil organic matter measures the amount of life in the soil. Other tests examine what that life is actually doing under there.

Soil respiration is a measurement that captures a snapshot of the organisms’ metabolic activity. Soil respiration is measured by air-drying soil, rewetting it, putting it in an airtight container, and then measuring the amount of CO₂ produced by the rewetted soil. Results are provided as mg of CO₂ per gram of dry-weight soil.

When the microbes are more active, they release more CO₂. Some ways growers can increase soil respiration include adding more organic material to the soil, adding manure or cover crops, or diversifying crops. Too much tillage can lower the soil respiration rate.

Active carbon measures the share of soil organic matter that can serve as an immediate food source for living organisms — decomposed matter that plants can consume quickly. A high active carbon test result means the microbes have enough food and are producing matter useful to plants.

Active carbon is measured by adding purple potassium permanganate to the soil. Active carbon causes the purple solution to lose its colour. The amount of active carbon in the soil correlates to the amount of colour change. Active carbon is a useful early indicator of changes to soil health. This test will show the effects of a management change sooner than changes to soil organic matter measurements.

The post Measuring the components of healthy soil in Alberta appeared first on Grainews.

Tenuta is a tenured soil ecology professor at the University of Manitoba, currently serving as the senior industrial chair in 4R nutrient management. He’s a research scientist, the kind of academic you might expect to find working in a lab, dressed in a white coat. But Tenuta is out of the lab every chance he gets, making sure his research is focused on farmers’ real-world problems and making sure new research results are accessible to the industry.

This is not a typical career for someone who grew up in the Toronto suburb of Brampton. How did Tenuta get from a botany student in downtown Toronto to a Brandon crop show soil pit? And why does he care about western Canadian farmers?

It started at home

Tenuta’s parents immigrated to Canada from rural southern Italy in the 1950s. Growing their own vegetables and fruit and even slaughtering goats, chicken and rabbits was the normal way of life.

“Self-sufficiency was a big component of surviving, historically, for the people there. When they came to Canada,” he says, “they brought a bit of a time capsule with them.”

This included growing their own food.

“If we weren’t growing it, we were buying it directly from a farmer, like chickens or rabbits or goats.” The Tenuta family had a dedicated insulated cellar in the basement to store wine, cold cuts and other preserves — the cantina, in Italian. A fig tree grew outside in a greenhouse, and there were plants throughout the house.

Tenuta was taken with botany. “As soon as I learned about photosynthesis, I said ‘Oh, that’s the coolest!’ I was disappointed I wasn’t born a plant when I heard that they make their own energy.”

And then there was the grass.

“My dad would go every year and get poultry manure from a farmer, and spread it on the lawn,” Tenuta says. “My dad knew that chicken manure was the best fertilizer.”

Later, Tenuta would learn that this is because chicken manure contains nitrogen and phosphorus. At the time, he was more concerned about how the manure would smell after rain.

“I’d be pretty embarrassed walking home from school. I could smell the house from half a mile away.”

With this background, nutrient management is an obvious fit for Tenuta. Even if he did start his academic career in downtown Toronto.

Getting out of the city

As an undergraduate in Toronto, Tenuta spent a lot of time outside the city. “I loved plants, so every weekend I’d go off and take my guidebooks and identify plants.”

Soon, many of his university projects were focused on the ground the plants grow in. Like many students, Tenuta was influenced by a professor who saw his potential. For Tenuta, this was ecologist Dr. Tom Hutchinson. Hutchinson spotted Tenuta’s interest in plants and encouraged his soil-based projects. Tenuta showed more drive than many undergraduate students, driving from Toronto to Guelph to read the latest research journals. (Research relied much more on location in those pre-internet days of the early 1980s.)

As he was finishing his first degree, Tenuta got a summer research job in Churchill, Man., studying goose poop and nitrogen mineralization. The experience left him hooked on learning about soil health.

“I was in the middle of nowhere with test tubes, soil and goose poop samples. It was wonderful.”

It was when he began studying at the University of Guelph that he really had a chance to “dig in” to soil science. Guelph was also where he realized how much he had to learn. Not just the chemistry, biology and physics of soil science, but also Ontario agriculture.

“I would spend weekends at farm shows,” he says. Tenuta’s brother, Albert Tenuta, is a plant pathologist in Ontario. When Tenuta landed in Guelph, Albert was already working at the Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs. When Albert and his colleagues put on conferences or workshops, Tenuta says, “I would just show up and learn.”

This willingness to delve into a new environment, to listen, and to ask questions, is the trait that’s served Tenuta well throughout his career, and it’s what makes his work useful for farmers and the agriculture industry.

Becoming an agronomist

Instead of talking about the day he graduated with a masters’ degree from the University of Guelph, or the day he finished his PhD thesis at Western University, Tenuta is proud of the day he became an unofficial agronomist — a professional who could offer farmers practical, useful advice.

That day came when a professor he greatly admired, the late soil scientist Dr. Eric Beauchamp at the University of Guelph, was working on a problem for a local farmer. Beauchamp brought Tenuta in to help find a solution. “He said, ‘We’re agronomists. Let’s think about this.’”

This was the first time anyone referred to Tenuta as an agronomist, someone who could bring useful skills to a real-life farm problem.

“It was a little thing, but it was really massive in terms of helping me create some confidence.”

One opportunity led to another, and soon Tenuta found himself with a PhD learning how nitrogen and amendments can control potato pathogens. Then immediately afterwards he was off to the University of California, Davis for a post-doctoral fellowship. He was studying nematodes as indicators of soil health and learning about California agriculture.

Near the end of his contract, the University of Manitoba happened to have an opening in their soil science department, so he flew to Winnipeg for an interview.

“I had all intentions to go back to California. I was loving it there.” There was funding to extend his research contract, and the weather was definitely better just west of Sacramento.

But Tenuta liked his trip to Winnipeg. He liked the people he would be working with (“there didn’t seem to be any infighting”), and, given the importance of agriculture to Manitoba’s economy, he saw that research work on soil health in Manitoba had the potential to be especially useful.

Back to square one

When he moved to Winnipeg in 2002, Tenuta had strong academic and research credentials, but, once again, very little knowledge of the local agriculture industry. He needed to learn about prairie crop production, including the details of farm machinery and the business aspects of grain farming.

Tenuta was lucky to land in an office down the hall from well-known soil scientist Don Flaten. “He was my sounding board.”

Flaten was welcoming and encouraging; Tenuta was never afraid to go to Flaten’s office with questions like, “What’s a mid-row bander?”

As well as talking to Flaten, Tenuta also sought out the people he wanted to help: farmers.

Prairie farmers are lucky to have access to several academic research scientists who take time to understand how their research connects to real-world production practices. When researchers understand the pressures farmers face and how farmers balance multiple factors to make decisions, they are better equipped to design research projects that solve farmers’ problems and communicate solutions so they can be used in the field.

“Sometimes there’s an expectation that you’re a researcher, you’re a professor, you know it all already,” Tenuta says. We’ve all seen someone in a position of authority who’s afraid to admit they don’t know something. But Tenuta would never try that. “Especially not in a room full of farmers!”

Throughout his career Tenuta has made time to learn directly from farmers, as well as searching out information everywhere from podcasts to print magazines.

His form of learning is a two-way street. “I love it when people ask questions, because that challenges me, and it’s me scratching my head. And that also leads to new questions to ask. If somebody’s asking something, that means there’s a knowledge gap. And that means there’s a need.”

Tenuta tries to focus his research where it will be useful. Farmers coming forward with similar questions, or bringing requests through commodity associations, helps Tenuta identify research needs. When farmers push producer-run commodity groups to invest farmers’ money in specific areas, it’s easier for researchers like Tenuta to attract matching provincial and federal government funding to work on the problem.

When government staff realize “somebody cares about this research,” Tenuta says, “they’re willing to sponsor a portion of it.”

Dual roles

When they’re successful, scientists like Tenuta are balancing two extremely different roles: as communicators providing practical information to the agriculture industry, and as academics in the world of teaching, lab work and research publications.

“We’re servicing a sector, an economic sector — agriculture and industry. And at the same time, we’re in an institution of higher learning and we’re fostering knowledge creation and training students.”

Choosing the right research projects is key to making this work.

“We’re always trying to find something that’s fundamentally interesting and new in terms of knowledge.” That’s the academic side — university researchers are expected to break new ground.

But to also be a good communicator, and useful to the industry, the work must be relevant. “There’s the commodity and farmer route.

“It’s kind of like having feet in two different areas and bridging them.”

Tenuta believes the foundation for success in both these roles is to keep learning.

When Tenuta goes to his campus office he tells his kids and wife, “I’m going to school.” They make fun of him, he says. His 15- and 12-year-old children are still at the age when the idea of one day leaving school seems exciting.

But not for Tenuta.

“I’m still in school. I’ve never left school.”

The post Researcher focuses on farmers’ real-world problems appeared first on Grainews.

“The first question I ask when I’m speaking to farmers is, ‘How many of you have done soil testing?’” says Yamily Zavala, PhD, soil health lab manager and soil health and crop management specialist at the Chinook Applied Research Association, Oyen, Alta.

Most farmers in the room raise their hands when she asks this, but when Zavala pushes them further, she finds that most of the growers have actually had an analysis of the chemical properties of their soil. These tests usually analyze micro and macronutrients, pH, organic matter, electrical conductivity (to indicate salinity), and cation exchange capacity (to indicate the soil’s ability to hold nutrients).

This information is necessary to develop a fertility program, but, Zavala says, it’s far from the whole story. “Soil is not just chemicals. Soil is not just minerals. Soil is holistic. It’s alive.”

The Chinook Applied Research Association’s Soil Health Lab has been testing soil from across Alberta using three categories of soil properties: chemical properties, as well as physical and biological properties. With more than 4,000 soil samples analyzed between 2018 and 2024, the includes benchmarks and scoring systems that can provide Alberta growers with comprehensive reports on their soil health in an easy-to-use format.

What is “healthy”?

There isn’t one standard, simple definition of “healthy” soil. Most definitions mention the soil environment and how efficiently the soil cycles nutrients. Almost all definitions use “healthy soil” and “quality soil” interchangeably.

The concept of soil health goes beyond measuring the chemicals and nutrients in the soil and includes how the whole soil ecosystem is functioning.

One common indicator of soil health measures the amount of living microbes in soil. This is soil organic matter, the percentage of soil made up of plant and animal material. Soil organic matter is the basic building block of productive soils, holding the soil together and making soil’s biological functions possible.

We know that a higher percentage of soil organic matter is better. But how much is enough? What other components of soil affect soil organic matter?

Is there an optimum health level for soil? It’s unlikely that soil can be too healthy. Most of us just want to know if our soil health is trending in the right direction, and how the soil we’re managing compares to other soil in the area under different management.

What can we measure (besides soil organic matter) to get a good picture of trends, and analyze differences?

Three components of soil health

The theory behind the Alberta Soil Health Benchmark is that healthy soil has three general components. These are the chemical and fertility properties, the physical properties and the soil’s biological properties, such as soil organic matter.

The physical properties describe the inherent character of the soil. Indicators include soil texture, compaction, water infiltration, bulk density (an indicator of soil compaction) and soil wet aggregate stability.

Growers can change some of these physical properties over time through management changes. Other physical characteristics are permanent. Physical properties can constrain soil health and crop yield.

Improving the soil’s physical properties can also improve some of the chemical indicators, the soil organic matter, and other biological indicators. Zavala describes this as “building a really nice house for the biology.”

The third part of the Alberta Soil Health Benchmark evaluation is the biological component. “The creatures in the soil cycle nutrients,” Zavala says. “This cycle is what makes the soil alive.”

Zavala sees all three of these components as important and necessary for soil health, but sees biology as “at the top.” Organic matter in the soil is what allows the soil to function as an ecosystem. The living organisms in the soil are dynamic, changing all the time.

When all three of these components are robust, Zavala says, “that’s what I call the healthy soil.”

Together, all three of these types of measures provide a snapshot of the health of the soil. With repeated, consistent tests over time, changes in these measurements will indicate where farm management is improving or depleting soil health.

Measuring biological health

Of course, soil organic matter is a key indicator for measuring soil’s biological health. Soil organic matter is measured by drying the soil, weighing it and then heating it to a temperature that will burn off the organic matter. The remaining soil is re-weighed; the difference in weight is the organic matter. The measure is provided as a percentage of the total soil mass.

The soil organic matter includes many living organisms. Some of the smallest are bacteria and fungi. These produce their own secondary metabolites and digestive enzymes, they absorb pieces of plant residue, and they release nutrients that plants can use. Among farmers and agronomists, nitrogen-fixing bacteria such as rhizobium are probably the most popular creatures in this category. Nitrogen-fixing bacteria convert atmospheric nitrogen to ammonia, a form of nitrogen that can be converted into plant-available nitrogen.

Protozoans in the soil are generally larger than bacteria and fungi and can move themselves through the thin film of water in the soil. They’re single-celled, but typically bigger than bacteria and fungi. They often consume bacteria, and sometimes fungi. This group of microbes (living organisms too small to see without a microscope) includes flagellates, amoeba and ciliates.

Nematodes are the largest microbes in our soil. They have multiple cells and can consume bacteria, fungi and protozoa. Most nematodes are beneficial to soil health, but some are agricultural pests that take nutrients from plants, such as cereal cyst nematodes. A diverse group of nematodes in the soil is thought to indicate a healthier soil.

Measuring soil organic matter measures the amount of life in the soil. Other tests examine what that life is actually doing under there.

Soil respiration is a measurement that captures a snapshot of the organisms’ metabolic activity. Soil respiration is measured by air-drying soil, rewetting it, putting it in an air-tight container, and then measuring the amount of CO₂ produced by the rewetted soil. Results are provided as mg of CO₂ per gram of dry-weight soil.

When the microbes are more active, they release more CO₂. Some ways growers can increase soil respiration include adding more organic material to the soil, adding manure or cover crops, or diversifying crops. Too much tillage can lower the soil respiration rate.

Active carbon measures the share of soil organic matter that can serve as an immediate food source for living organisms — decomposed matter that plants can consume quickly. A high active carbon test result means the microbes have enough food and are producing matter useful to plants.

Active carbon is measured by adding purple potassium permanganate to the soil. Active carbon causes the purple solution to lose its colour. The amount of active carbon in the soil correlates to the amount of colour change. Active carbon is a useful early indicator of changes to soil health. This test will show the effects of a management change sooner than changes to soil organic matter measurements.

Adaptation

These tests and methodologies are not new or unique to Alberta. The comprehensive list of tests used by the Alberta Soil Health Benchmark study has been adapted from Cornell University’s Comprehensive Assessment of Soil Health. Cornell developed this method of incorporating chemical, physical and biological properties to gauge soil health. The Comprehensive Assessment of Soil Health was first used commercially at Cornell in 2006. Since then, Cornell has assessed more than 10,000 soil samples. And Cornell’s technique for measuring a comprehensive mix of indicators of soil health has been modified to fit locations around the world.

Conveniently, Zavala earned her PhD at Cornell University, where she learned about the Comprehensive Assessment of Soil Health techniques firsthand.

“I got the baseline,” she says. When Cornell gave her the green light to modify its technique, Zavala adapted the methodology for Alberta conditions. “I learned from them everything I needed to put together here,” Zavala says.

Grading on the curve

As anyone who’s looked at an elementary school report card in the past few years will understand, seeing a long list of unfamiliar indicators on one piece of paper can sometimes leave you more confused than informed. It can be difficult to know whether you need to make changes, and even harder to figure out where to start.

The Comprehensive Assessment of Soil Health technique and the Alberta Soil Health Benchmark analysis provide test results with handy scores that assess soil using a familiar format — a score from 1 to 100. As well, colour codes make it easy to spot where an intervention or practice change might have the biggest effect. In other words, deal with the red ones first.

Over time, soil-testers will see trend changes in their scores, as (hopefully) scores increase from year to year as land management practices evolve. But even in the short term, the scores can tell you how well your client’s soil is doing compared to other soils in Alberta and in their local area.

To make this work, Zavala and her research team developed scores for each measure based on data collected from 2018 to 2023. During that period, 11 of the 12 applied research and forage associations across Alberta collected soil samples for this project. Members from each of these associations were well-trained in soil sampling, to ensure consistent results across the province and across the years.

Using these results, they calculated the mean and standard deviation based on a standard normal distribution for each test result. Then a scoring curve was developed for each indicator. These scoring curves enable the lab to provide test results that show where your client’s soil fits relative to other soil in Alberta. After analyzing the data, Zavala developed separate scoring curves for coarse, medium and fine soil across the province.

Let’s look at an example. Through these tests, the average soil respiration rate in Alberta has been found to be 1.22 mg CO₂ per gram of dry-weight soil. If your soil’s test result is 1.22, your score will be 50 out of 100, right in the middle. If your score is above average, you’ll get a score above 50.

Using these curves, each test result has been converted to a score from one to 100, with 100 being the best. Then each test result is colour coded for convenience. From worst to best, the scores and colours are:

• under 20: red, very low

• 20-40: orange, low

• 40-60: yellow, medium

• 60-80: green, high

• 80: blue, very high

With the colour-coding system, users can quickly see their biggest soil problems and consider potential solutions. Measurements shown in red are constraints, areas where improvement may increase soil health and ultimately yield. Measures in green and blue are areas where growers can sleep easy at night.

A curve for every test

For most soil health indicators, more is better. A higher test result means a healthier soil and a better score. In these cases, curves are generally shaped like the curve in Figure 1.

For some indicators, such as the amount of manganese or iron in the soil, a lower test result is better. As you can see in Figure 2, curves for indicators where smaller results are better are drawn in the opposite direction, so lower test results bring higher scores.

And of course, sometimes the best test result is in the middle — not too high and not too low. These cases are shown in Figure 3 as an optimum curve. Soil pH is an example of a measurement in this category. Test results that are very high or very low would return a low score. A score in the middle of these extremes would be in the green zone (high, meaning “good”).

These curves have been designed using the same methods used by Cornell University. It was necessary to adapt the curves because Cornell’s benchmark data is based on data in the northeast U.S., where soil is very different from the soil in Alberta. This methodology has been adapted for locations around the world, by developing scoring curves based on local data.

The Alberta scoring curves will change over time. As more soil tests are done, the new data will be built into the scoring curves so farmers can have more accurate results.

The way it WAS

As an example of how these curves and colour-coding work, let’s look at results from wet aggregate stability tests in Alberta, known as WAS scores.

Aggregates in soil are the different-sized “crumbs” that form when soil particles bind together. In healthy soil, biological activity helps the aggregates stabilize and stay together. Too much tillage can break down these aggregates, increasing the risk of soil compaction or erosion. Farmers can build soil aggregates by adding animal manure or cover crops with fine roots to the soil and increasing the biological activity.

WAS measures how well soil aggregates hold together when the soil gets wet. In a lab, WAS is measured by simulating rainfall on soil placed on top of a sieve. Unstable aggregates will break apart and fall through the sieve holes. The share of the soil that stays on top of the sieve is the aggregate stability, provided as a percentage. Using the scoring curves, the Alberta Soil Health Benchmark study will convert that WAS percentage to a score from one to 100.

Because soil aggregates tend to be correlated with soil type, the Alberta WAS data has been analyzed separately for coarse, medium and fine soil.

For coarse soil, the average WAS test result was 48 per cent, meaning that when medium-texture soil is tested, almost half (48 per cent) of the sample stays on top of the sieve during a simulated rainfall.

The scoring curve converts that result into a score of 50, right in the middle of the yellow zone. The soil health report would call it “medium,” and this section of the report would be coloured yellow.

If your client’s WAS test result was 60 per cent, with 60 per cent of the soil left on top of the sieve, the benchmark score would be 70, and this section of the report would be coloured green, for “high.” It would take a test result below 19 per cent to have this section of the report coloured in red.

Comparing your client’s soil to a more local benchmark will give a different benchmark score for the same test result.

On average, soils in the Foothills Forage and Grazing Association area, in southwest Alberta, have much higher WAS test results. Here, a WAS test result of 48 per cent for coarse soil would give your client a benchmark score of only 25, in the orange (“low”) zone. These regional scoring curves allow you and your client to compare their soil to other soils in their area, soils that are probably similar to what you’re dealing with.

To get a score of 50 in the Foothills Forage and Grazing Association area, the WAS test result for coarse soil would need to be 65 per cent. Zavala and her colleagues attribute these higher regional WAS scores to land use patterns in the area. There is more pasture there, and less disturbed area.

In case you were wondering, in the northeast U.S., WAS results tend to be lower. A WAS result of 48 per cent would be in the blue, “very high” zone, and give you a local benchmark score of 80.

Sending in samples

Before sending a sample in, remember that any soil test is only as good as the protocol used to collect the soil samples. The Chinook Applied Research Association’s Soil Health Lab Protocol is available on the lab’s website. This protocol includes all the necessary information from field site selection, to tools, to how best to package your samples for mailing.

The current price for a benchmark assessment is $210 per sample for the biological and physical portion of the tests, plus an additional charge for chemical/fertility tests. This additional charge starts at $60 per sample, with prices depending on the exact list of chosen tests, and the chosen lab.

The forms note that this price is “still a good deal,” and that discounts may be available for special projects. This rate is not near the full cost of performing all these tests and sending you a handy list of results. Zavala explains that they aren’t charging the actual cost of the service now out of fear that “people aren’t going to do analysis because it’s going to be too expensive.”

Once the soil reaches the Soil Health Lab, a portion of the sample will be air-dried and sieved for biophysical tests. Another portion will be stored at 4 C for biological tests. For chemical testing, soil samples will be sent to the A&L Lab and the University of Alberta lab.

Once you get the results, you may see more than one indicator in the red zone, or maybe the orange zone. Sometimes, unfortunately, growers looking for areas to improve are spoiled for choice. And, of course, areas where test results are poor will be correlated. For example, a physical soil constraint makes it hard for microbes to thrive.

The colour-coding on a detailed soil health report identifies areas where management changes could have the most effect. But even with this easy-to-interpret result, not all growers will address every area of concern when they first see the results.

The Cornell manual not only suggests methods of addressing some of the indicators of poor soil health these tests identify, it also includes a discussion on the three main categories of factors that go into a soil management plan.

Soil health status is an important part of a soil management plan, but it’s not the only component. Grower goals and farm resources are also important considerations. A grower renting farmland may be more focused on maximizing short-term yields than on optimal long-term health scores. Or, after two years of drought, a grower may want to implement all of the recommended changes to improve soil health, but simply not have the financial resources to make the changes.

Meanwhile in Saskatchewan

To the east, a team led by Kate Congreves, a professor in the department of plant science at the University of Saskatchewan, is working on a Saskatchewan Soil Health Assessment Protocol that includes scoring functions similar to those developed by the Alberta Soil Health Benchmark project.

The project is very similar to the Alberta Soil Health Benchmarking project, but there are subtle differences. For example, rather than creating scores based on smaller regions of the province, the Saskatchewan protocol is developing scoring curves by soil type: brown, dark brown and black. Saskatchewan researchers noted that soil class generally influenced most soil characteristics.

As an example, the Saskatchewan report mentions soil organic carbon. Generally, a soil organic carbon of three per cent would be a “good” score in Saskatchewan. But in Saskatchewan’s black soil zone, soil organic carbon levels tend to be higher. In the black soil zone, a soil organic carbon of three per cent would rate as “poor,” with a score between 20 and 40 on the scale of one to 100.

And the rest of the country?

In the spring of 2024, the Canadian Standing Senate Committee on Agriculture and Forestry released a report on soil.

This report includes 25 recommendations, the first of which is that soil be designated as a strategic national asset. Many other recommendations centre on encouraging soil stewardship, using tools like tax credits and carbon markets.

There are many ways to evaluate soil. Many tools are not as comprehensive as the Alberta Soil Health Benchmark. Many are similar, but slightly different, like the difference in regional scoring between Alberta and Saskatchewan. This report recommends that the federal and provincial governments develop a consensus on how to measure, report and verify soil health.

Zavala would like to see comprehensive soil health testing in place across the country.

“If the government doesn’t see the importance of what we have done in Alberta and look in more detail at how beneficial this can be, we aren’t going to understand what’s happening in our soil. We need to see the soil in a different way.”

What’s going on down there?

Adding biological measures to soil tests has proven to be fascinating for researchers, including Yamily Zavala.

Using a microscope to visually examine the microbes living in the soil takes more time than the physical and chemical soil tests, but it’s also more rewarding. Soil is filled with a vital network of bacteria, fungi, protozoa and nematodes.

These microbes, along with other living things, such as earthworms and insects, are also called the “soil food web.” A healthy soil food web supports several functions, such as decomposing organic matter, helping plants access nutrients, stabilizing the soil structure, detoxifying the soil, and more.

Of all the microbes, Zavala is especially taken with the protozoa. “It’s so much fun to watch them,” she says. Protozoa are the single-celled organisms that consume bacteria. This class includes several types of organisms including flagellates, ciliates and amoeba.

Soil samples destined for biological analysis are stored in the fridge at 4 C. When it’s time to view the samples, the soil is placed in a plate with 24 wells (not completely unlike a tiny ice cube tray), and incubated for a few days in an agar broth, a solid growth medium that Zavala describes as a “nutrient soup.”

One indicator of soil health is the biomass of all living organisms in the soil. Another is the diversity of this underground ecosystem.

For now, there are no quantitative measures of microbe diversity. As a qualitative measure, Zavala classifies the organisms in the samples based on size, and also by colour, and makes careful notes about each sample.

A more diverse group has a wide mix of sizes and shapes, and a range of colours. These organisms tend to range from two to three micrometres to flagellates longer than 18 micrometres. In colour, these organisms tend to be clear, yellow, brown, black and sometimes burgundy.

It’s not an official part of the test, but Zavala’s favourite part of this assessment is watching the living creatures interact. One day she spotted a group of nematode-trapping fungi. These fungi are carnivorous, and release pheromones to sense and draw in their prey. While Zavala was watching, they formed a circle. “The nematode was swimming and passed inside the circle,” Zavala says. Then, the circle of fungi closed in and trapped the nematode while she watched.

In another sample, there were many bacteria inside an amoeba. “The amoeba started growing,” Zavala said. “Then it burst. The bacteria overcame the amoeba and took control.”

To take the CEU quiz for this article, CLICK HERE.

References

Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, Resource management, indicators: Soil organic matter.

Chinook Applied Research Association Soil Health Lab Protocol for Soil Sampling.

Chinook Applied Research, soil health reports.

Cornell Soil Health Lab, Comprehensive Assessment of Soil Health, manual. (This manual includes a detailed explanation of data scoring, as well as detailed descriptions of each measure and suggestions for improving soil quality.)

Saskatchewan Soil Health Assessment Protocol, Phase II, Final Report.

Standing Senate Committee on Agriculture and Forestry. Critical Ground: Why Soil is Essential to Canada’s Economic, Environmental, Human and Social Health.

The post Soil health benchmarking survey in Alberta appeared first on Grainews.

That day, a spark that had been smouldering under a burn pile in a neighbour’s field since the previous summer caught some wind and came to life. In almost no time, five neighbours with tractors arrived to blacken the ground and help prevent the fire from spreading to our farmyard.

We live 40 kilometres from the nearest volunteer fire department. Its members are well trained and knew exactly how to put out the flames in the abandoned yard that was burning to the north. But they couldn’t be there immediately, and they didn’t have the necessary equipment to plow fireguards.

In situations like this, farmers are often called on to take their equipment out to stop prairie grass fires before they do too much damage. It’s dangerous work, and most farmers have no formal training around this.

Steve Wallace is a former president of the Saskatchewan Safety Council, chief of his local rural volunteer fire department and a former City of Regina firefighter. Wallace has seen more than his share of grass fires and he knows how to fight them. I contacted Wallace to get his thoughts on the best way to fight a grass fire.

Use pincer movement

When you’ve got a cultivator and you’re in your tractor, your gut instinct to stop a grass fire might be to head downwind and start digging a fireguard strip. This is going to be dangerous — you’ll be in the smoke — and it’s going to be hard to know how far downwind you should be to be safe.

Fire can move faster than wind. If there’s an 80- to 90-kilometre-per-hour wind, the fire might be moving at 80 to 100 kilometres an hour, and a spark could easily jump a wide fireguard.

To avoid this problem, Wallace suggests using a pincer movement, something you might think of as a cone formation. If the fire is coming from the north, for example, plow guards on the southeast and southwest sides of the fire, leaving the fire a wide path. This can keep you out of most of the smoke. As you move south, edge in, leaving the fire a smaller unplowed area to burn. Eventually, Wallace says, “pinch the fire out, or make it to a narrow head.”

This sounds like a slow process, but as Wallace notes, “farmers can make stuff black in a hurry.”

Wallace suggested starting with a cone perhaps 100 metres wide. As you move downwind, you might blacken the ground to narrow the fire’s strip by 20 to 50 metres for each kilometre. “How much you pinch in will depend on what the conditions are like,” Wallace says. Once you narrow the strip, you can control which direction the fire will travel, until you finally get it to stop.

By staying out of the fire’s direct path, you keep yourself safe and can avoid becoming disoriented by thick smoke. “You can get lost in the smoke and you could end up driving directly into the fire,” says Wallace.

As farmers work on this cone formation ahead of the flames, fire department volunteers or farmers with water trucks can work behind the fire, putting out sparks. Wallace says he tells farmers on the scene when his crew is working, “you make it black, and we’ll put out the spot fires.”

[RELATED] Hanson Acres: Fire threatens the farm

Flanking is another way to describe this type of move. “You’re not trying to take the fire head on, because under the right conditions it’s going to kick your butt,” says Wallace.

To pull this off, communication is going to be important. Everyone in the field is going to need a phone or radio to keep in touch with the rest of the crew.

Once the fire’s out, Wallace recommends the firefighting farmers get together with the local fire department to discuss what happened, so everyone is better prepared for the next fire. Drone photos would be especially useful for a debrief. “It’s not a matter of will we have another fire,” Wallace says. “It’s more a matter of when.”

Wallace acknowledges it’s probably impossible to prepare for every situation. On his shelf stacked with two to three feet of manuals about firefighting, Wallace has one whole binder just for grassland fires. “It’s four- or five-hundred pages,” he says.

Control your controlled fire

Wallace also had some advice for containing controlled fires.

Before you light a controlled fire, let the authorities know. If you don’t, someone might see your fire and call the fire department. If a fire truck shows up, they’ll probably bring you a bill.

In Saskatchewan, report your planned fire to the Control Burn Hotline at 1-866-404-4911. In Manitoba, you’ll need a permit. Call the Manitoba Controlled Crop Residue Burning Program at 1-800-265-1233 for more information. Alberta farmers need to talk to their county office.

Wallace says if you’re considering a controlled burn, “I would make sure that you’ve got your cultivator hooked up. Don’t just light it and walk away.”

If you have any doubts, you could consider plowing up a few rounds around the burn spot before you light the fire.

When you’re finished, don’t assume the risk of fire is over just because you can’t see smoke. “A straw fire could stay viable for two or three days,” Wallace says. He added if you have a pit filled with trees or bush, “it could stay hot and burn for a long time.”

Sparks at the bottom of these piles can also overwinter and come to life in the following year.

Finally, check the weather before you decide to burn, so you’re not saying, “It wasn’t windy when I started.”

Keep your home safe

There’s no guarantee that you’ll never lose your house to a grass fire, but there are a few ways to lower your risk. 

Keep your grass mown. Short grass won’t stop a fire, but it will burn more slowly than long grass. 

If it’s really dry, water the grass and trees at the edge of your yard to slow down any potential fires. 

Are you stacking firewood next to your house? Something to remember is wood piles can burn for a long time. 

If it’s a particularly hot, dry year, consider blackening a fireguard around your yard. Just in case.

The post How to contain grass fires appeared first on Grainews.

Every season, farm families weigh the risks and benefits of having their children work on the farm. There is no doubt that farm work is a risky proposition. But there are so many benefits. We want them to grow up with a strong work ethic, and to feel the satisfaction of a finished job. We know they can learn a lot by working with their parents. There are times when we just really need that extra pair of hands.

We are very lucky to have a naturally cautious son, but we also know that things can go wrong, even when a “new” farmer is working near a parent and following the rules.

The U.S. publication Progressive Farmer reported this summer that, in the United States, 33 children are injured every day due to farm-related injury. The three most common causes, they say, are falls, animals and machinery. Some of these injuries are minor; others will impact these kids for a lifetime. One of my son’s friends had to sit out the hockey season after an incident with an ATV on the farm. I took a mental count and realized I know three adults who lost an arm due to a childhood run-in with a grain auger.

And kids who escape these accidents with just an injury are the lucky ones. Progressive Farmer further reported that every three days in the United States a child dies due to an ag-related injury. The main causes in this case are tractors, machinery, ATVs, other vehicles and drowning. I do not even want to imagine the mental toll that this would take.

Last summer the Western Producer reported on a presentation in Iowa by an expert from the National Centre for Rural and Agricultural Health and Safety. Marsha Salzwedel told her audience that, although injury numbers are improving, the number of children killed in farm accidents is staying stubbornly level. This article included fatality numbers for Canada: 250 kids younger than 15 from 1990 to 2009. That’s too many.

Keeping them safe

No two kids are the same. The 13-year-olds I know have wildly different mental ages. They are operating at different levels of maturity, with widely varying skill levels. There are a few who could probably operate a tractor more safely than some adults. But there are a lot who can barely manage to run a vacuum. It’s hard to say “no” when a child or teenager wants to help on the farm, but that’s the only answer if the kid just doesn’t have the attention span to do the job safely. Maybe they’re not quite ready for a grain truck, but perhaps there’s something a little less risky they could do, so they can still be part of the operation, but with a little less risk?

The key to balancing the risks against the benefits is knowing your child and their skills. Of course, accidents can happen to the more careful and skilled child or adult, but as long as we do our best to explain the rules and safety measures, and don’t ask (or allow) a child or teen to do a job they’re just not ready to do, we are on the way to lowering those fatality rates.

The post Wait until they’re ready appeared first on Grainews.

When I took on this job in November of 2011, I planned to stay for six months. I was covering a maternity leave for the previous editor. I wasn’t fully qualified for the position. I’d never been an editor before, and I didn’t have a background in journalism. I was pretty nervous about the whole thing. (I suspect the publishers were too.) But how much damage could I do in just six months?

I was hired for the short-term gig, and when previous editor Lyndsey Smith didn’t come back as planned in the spring of 2012, I realized I was having a good time, so I quietly stayed on, wondering if anybody in the Winnipeg office would notice.

Then, before I realized what was happening, eight years had passed! And now it’s time for me to move on to a new challenge. (If I don’t move on soon, I’ll have to get my eight-year-old photo updated.)

Editing Grainews has been a great privilege. I’ve had an opportunity to learn about agriculture, about the publishing industry and about farmers.

One of my favourite parts of the job has been interviewing experts. When farmers, scientists or researchers are excited about their jobs, they love to talk about their work. It doesn’t happen every time, but sometimes when you interview a researcher, you can hear the passion in their voice and see the gleam in their eye. When someone is eager to share their knowledge, that excitement comes right through over the phone, and it makes me happy to share the information with Grainews readers.

The other great thing about this job has been hearing from readers. It’s been great getting emails and phone calls from longtime readers who have comments about an article — even when you’re pointing out an error. It’s been nice to read your solutions to our regular Casebook feature. It’s been really interesting to hear your ideas for articles. And I’ve loved seeing the photos you’ve been sending for the Give Us Your Best Shot contest. I’ve also learned that nobody has more fun sending an email than a farmer pointing out an incorrectly labelled photo of a crop in an ag paper!

I will miss these parts of this job very much. I will also miss my co-workers at Glacier FarmMedia and I’ll miss working with the columnists and freelancers who write the material you read in each issue.

I’m not exactly sure what I’m going to do next, especially in the winter, but I am planning to spend more time on our farm. Over the next few months I plan to put in some effort learning about tax and accounting rules so I can do a better job with our farm bookkeeping. I’m going to find a better way to organize our farm data and records. There have been a few discussions about me learning to clean out bin bottoms — we’ll have to see if I have extra time for that.

Before I took this job, I had written three plays, all comedies set on farms in rural Saskatchewan. I have had a few more ideas over the past few years (some good, some not so good), but it’s been hard to find time to write with all of these pages of Grainews to organize. I’ll spend some time on that, and I’ll also keep on writing the Hanson Acres column that runs regularly in Country Guide.

When I took this job in the fall of 2011, our farm was just recovering from a major flood that left us with no crop to harvest. The 2019 season brought such a crazy fall that we weren’t able to harvest all of our 2019 crop. In between 2011 and 2019 we’ve had hail, drought, bouts with disease and some worrying meetings with our accountant. But during that same time period, we’ve also grown some nice lentil crops, sold a few loads of canola at the right time, built a new large storage shed and had our accountant nominate us for an award. Life (and farming) is a mix of ups and downs, so you might as well enjoy the journey.

You’ll be fine

Nobody is irreplaceable, and that is certainly true in this case. Grainews will continue to thrive with a new editor at the helm.

Please welcome Kari Belanger to the position of editor. You’ll see her photo and hear her story in the ‘Editor’s Column’ in our next issue.

Kari brings a lot of experience and enthusiasm to this job. I couldn’t be more confident that you’re all going to love her.

While it was the publisher who hired me on and gave me this opportunity to work on this publication, I owe a big thank you to all of you readers for letting it go on for so long.

What a fun journey this has been!

The post Editor’s Column: All good things come to an end appeared first on Grainews.

Knibbs offered several pointers to use during job interviews. “The best predictor of future behaviour is past behaviour,” she said. When you’re asking questions at a job interview, try having your potential employee tell you about a time when they’ve overcome a challenge in the past. For example, get them to tell you how they handled a situation where they were running a piece of equipment and it made a strange noise.

These days, many potential employees interviewing for a position haven’t had an opportunity to operate farm machinery in the past. In these cases, ask the potential employee what they would do in any situation with an equipment breakdown.

During the interview, Knibbs said, be realistic about the job you’re offering. “If there’s a part of the work that’s not great, name it.” When it’s -40 C, someone still has to feed the cattle. There will be a hot July day when someone needs to clean out a bin.

Once you hire an employee, make sure that person is rewarded for doing that job that “isn’t great.” Remember, not all rewards need to focus on money. Some employees just want to be recognized and thanked for doing a dirty job. Others might be motivated by a little extra time off in return for working on the hot July day.

In every employee/employer situation, communications are key. Knibbs pointed out that, during an interview, it’s important to ask even what you might assume are basic questions, like “What does an 8:00 a.m. start time mean to you?” Your potential employee might assume pulling up in the driveway at 8:00, ready for a pre-work coffee, will meet your expectations. But you might be expecting your new employee to already be in the shop in their overalls, ready to pick up a wrench at 8:00 on the dot. The sooner you can clear this up, the better the experience will be for everyone involved.

The post Hiring labour for your farm appeared first on Grainews.

Short-stature corn is in the works — that is, corn plants with shorter stalks, meaning decreased lodging problems and fewer nutrients needed. But for most Prairie farmers, Bayer’s upcoming new herbicide with a brand new mode of action will be the most interesting part of Bayer’s new development program.

This new product, Bayer says, will be the first new herbicide mode of action that’s come to market in 30 years. For now, says Bob Reiter, head of research and development for Bayer’s Crop Science Division, the product is still in development.

It’s too early for Bayer to give the product a name or commit to a timeline. The company is in “Phase 2” of development with this new MOA, “which means now we’re going into the more intensive human and environmental tests,” Reiter says. There will still be field trials and regulatory approvals to get through. The new product won’t be available until at least the end of this decade.

The post A new mode of action coming from Bayer appeared first on Grainews.

“The three-meal institution is dying,” he said. While he does know that people still buy cookbooks, Charlebois sees no signs that people are cooking.

However, people are paying more attention to what they eat. People are defining themselves as flexitarian (people who are deliberately trying to decrease the red mean they consume), pescatarian (people who don’t eat meat but do eat fish), vegetarians (who don’t eat meat or fish), or vegans (who don’t eat meat, fish, dairy or eggs).

“It’s only going to get more complicated,” Charlebois said.

For now, he said, there are only about 533,000 vegans in Canada. However, when asked in a survey if they’ve tried a plant-based product, such as the meatless burgers available at A&W, 41 per cent of people surveyed said yes. When they were asked if they tried it a second time, 23 per cent said yes. “Not everyone is jumping on the bandwagon,” Charlebois said, “but when you add five or six per cent a year, it grows.”

The post Are you what you eat? appeared first on Grainews.