Nutrient Management Plan Development Workshops Announced

Nutrient management plans developed to meet Natural Resource Conservation Service (NRCS) EQUIP program criteria can be developed by Certified Crop Advisors in the State of Ohio as a service to their farm clientele. Nutrient management plans take soil fertility recommendations one step further and start to assess the environmental concerns of field sites to nutrient runoff/loss via nutrient indexes plus assessing erosion and other resources concerns on the farm. Ohio State University Extension is offering workshops on Nutrient Management Plan Development to assist CCA’s in preparing their first plans.

The Workshops use an example farm to go through the process of developing a Nutrient Management Plan. The workshop utilizes two pieces of software that have been developed for putting these plans together plus Word Report Templates developed by Ohio NRCS.  MapWindows  GIS with MMP tools and MMP are the software products used. Both software products are free and can be downloaded from Purdue University athttp://www.purdue.edu/agsoftware/mmp/.

The workshops are day long programs from 9:30am until 3:30pm. It is highly suggested to bring along a laptop with software loaded since this is designed to be a hands on workshop using the program with an examples farm. There is no participant cost for the workshops. A grant has been received by OSU Extension through USEPA GLRI Grant Number 00E01145 to provide these workshops and follow up work. Pre-registration is required. Registration links and more information can be found athttps://agcrops.osu.edu/calendar.