True grit

COLUMBIA BASIN — If coordinators of the second annual Building Soils for Better Crops conference have their way, audience members are left standing on more solid ground.

About 110 people gathered in Big Bend Community College's ATEC Building Thursday morning for the day-long conference, hosted by the Grant Conservation District and Washington State University Grant/Adams County Extension.

The morning session included the fundamentals of soil building, the effects of organic amendments on soil physical properties, soil-borne disease suppression with organic amendments and what comprises compost and what does not.

The afternoon session included soil quality testing, experiences with testing soil quality and comparing costs of soil-building practices.

Conservation district Manager Ron Hull said this year's response was comparable to last year's events.

"I'd always like to see more growers here, but we do have a good corps of growers," he said.

Hull estimated more than half the audience was comprised of growers.

"The speakers are just tremendous," he said. "I think the quality of speakers are even better than last year. The information they have is just up to date and right on the money of what people are looking for."

Hull has a long list of hopes for the conference, including his hopes attendees leave with the ability to apply the technical information to their own operations.

"I hope they gain a better understanding of the importance of the biological health of their soil," he said. "That's as important as the chemical fertilizers and all that, that they understand there's a biological side to the soil that needs to be paid attention to, rather than just always worrying about the chemical side."

Hull hopes conventional growers recognize the need for their programs similar to organic growers' needs, and he hopes the conference raises more questions, so they can "bug" the district with topic ideas for another conference next year.

"It brings some expertise together into one spot, so people can take advantage of it," he said. "Otherwise they have to do a lot of work on their own. This information is out there, but it takes a lot of effort to find it."

District employee Lyle Stoltman said a lot of people he works with are quite interested in compost and always want to learn more. He found a marketing workshop the day prior particularly useful, he said.

"You've got to care for the soil for long-term production and profitability," he said. "It's a long-term investment that will pay off."

WSU Master Gardeners Pat Lamphere and Marta Tredway were in attendance for continuing education credits.

"For backyard gardeners, which is what we address, soil is a big deal here in the Columbia Basin," Lamphere said.

She found a presentation about the use of soil for disease suppression interesting.

"I'm going to do a little practice in my backyard garden," Lamphere added.

"For us, who are not professional growers, we have to pass (information) along to somebody else, I think it's really good," Tredway said.

Quincy-George area dairy farmer Mark Kellstrom said he wanted to learn the difference between raw manure and organic manure.

"We have the best of both worlds — livestock and crop ground — so it really applies to me in a special way," he said. "Also we sell a little bit, too, so it would be kind of nice to tell our customers in an intelligent manner what they're getting."

Kellstrom thinks agriculture has made a full swing, as farmers find out they cannot just mine the soil.

"We've got to put things back in, which is more expensive to use green manures and cow manures," he said. "If we keep robbing the soil, our production is going to go down. I think the use of all the commercial fertilizers is OK to a point, but we've got to get back to the basics of using cow and green manures, which cost more money. But we're going to be forced to do it, not only from the government, but from an economical standpoint too."