Taking a look at water quality data in Northwest MN: Phosphorus & tile drainage

The Red River Farm Network talks with University of Minnesota Extension Northwest Research and Outreach Center specialist Lindsay Pease about tile drainage and phosphorus.

TRANSCRIPT

Red River Farm Network: This is the Soil Fertility Minute brought to you by the Agricultural Fertilizer Research and Education Council. Our guest is University of Minnesota Extension Northwest Research and Outreach Center specialist, doctor Lindsay Pease.

Lindsay Pease: We have been collecting water quality data on our drainage plots in at the Northwest Research and Outreach Center. What we have been seeing is a lot of nitrogen losses, not only in Northwest Minnesota, but all across the state of Minnesota, really tied to that ratio of service runoff to tile discharge.

And because we don’t get a lot of water flow through our tiles, phosphorus loss is really not a concern in the in the tile drains at all. When we see the most water moving through and the most phosphorus loss is definitely during snow melts, then during that time, the tile drainage is not connected to the surface water at all. So really, this is, again, good news for tile drainage because we don’t see a lot of phosphorus losses through the tiles.

RRFN: AFREC is a farmer led program advancing soil fertility research. Find out more at mnSoilFertility.com.