Conservation focus keeps nutrients, soil on farm

MADISON, Wis. — The focus at Schoepp Farms LLC is to keep soil and nutrients on the land.

“We started no-tilling in 1991 and in 2005 we started to put dairy heifers on cornfields,” said Ron Schoepp, who farms with his family near Wisconsin Lake at Lodi in south-central Wisconsin.

In addition to growing corn, soybeans, winter wheat and alfalfa, the operation includes 110 acres of grass pasture and the family grazes dairy heifers, dry cows and beef cattle.

“Conservation did not start with me,” said Schoepp during a virtual farm tour held at the World Dairy Expo.

“My dad worked this field with a neighbor in the early ‘60s and they each had two-bottom plows,” he said. “The neighbor plowed through the waterway and my dad picked the plow up for every grass waterway.”

Prior to 2005, Schoepp was raising dairy heifers in confinement. Then he learned that 40% to 60% of the nitrogen in cow manure is lost compared if the manure is dropped directly on the ground as the cattle are grazing.

“Now we buy a lot less commercial fertilizer,” he said.

Schoepp uses a no-till drill to plant crops into standing rye.

“The rye is knee-high or more and we have very little soil disturbance and tons of protection for the soil,” the farmer said.

“Planting soybeans in rye is a no-brainer,” he said. “Corn, you have some challenges and you have to add some more nitrogen.”

For his corn, soybean and wheat rotation, Schoepp harvests the corn and then plants rye in the fall.

“I plant the soybeans in the rye, kill the rye, harvest soybeans in the fall and plant wheat,” he said.

Cover crops are also planted at the farm and in 2021 sunflowers were added to seed mixture.

“No one told me how much people love sunflowers,” Schoepp said. “In the 30 years we’ve been doing this stuff, by far the most positive response was buying a 50-pound bag of sunflower seed and throwing it on 18 acres.”

“I got calls from people you’d never believe were interested in soil health,” he said. “Sunflowers will always be in our cover crops.”

The yield monitor in his combine helped Schoepp see the impact of grazing his animals on his row crop fields.

“In the pasture, it’s hard to tell the yield difference, but with the yield monitor, you can see the line where the cattle were compared to where the cattle had not been,” he said.

Research has showed, Schoepp said, that dairy heifers raised on Wisconsin pastures have the same weight gain and are the same age at first calving than heifers raised in confinement.

“Nobody wants to believe that, but heifers raised on managed pastures produce 2,000 pounds more milk in their first lactation,” he said.

“That’s why we raise them on pasture — the cattle live longer, they have better foot health and they have fewer birthing problems.”

It is important, Schoepp said, when grazing cattle to have a plan for inclement weather.

“You have to have a plan to keep them off the land when it’s too muddy,” he said. “If you have your cattle out there and make a muddy mess, you’ll have a disaster.”

The family members built a heavy-use area for their cattle in 2012.

“It has three pens and a feeding alley,” Schoepp said. “If you shouldn’t have a tractor on the field, you shouldn’t have your cattle on that field.”

Before Schoepp built his heavy-use area he put the cattle on sacrifice paddocks.

“The mistake I made was I left the sacrifice pastures in the same place for too many years,” he said.

When grazing his cattle in the winter on cornstalks, Schoepp moves the fence every day, just like when the cattle are grazing in the summer.

“If you let them have the whole field in one day, the cornstalks will all be packed down, frozen to the ground and the cows won’t be able to get them,” he said.

The farmers also use a back fence to prevent the cattle from grazing areas they have already been on.

“If you don’t, you’ll get poor utilization of your crop residue and very poor manure distribution,” Schoepp said. “It takes a little more time, but it is definitely worth it.”

A small change to conserve soil and nutrients can make a huge difference, the farmer said.

“If you’re losing 5 tons of soil per year, you’re stealing from your grandchildren,” Schoepp said.

“It has been estimated that the annual soil loss on our farm is 0.3 tons per year,” he said. “But I argue with that because every year we’re catching soil so I think we’re on the positive side.”

“To do what we’re doing, you have to change your mindset,” the farmer said. “But we can still feed the world.”