Dexter, MO – A group of volunteers with the USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) is the winner of the agency’s Central Region Group Volunteer Award. The Missouri Delta Soil Health Alliance was recognized for its efforts to promote the benefits of soil health management in southeastern Missouri. It was selected by a national panel that reviewed nominations from groups within NRCS’ 12-state Central Region.
Cheryl Hoback, Missouri NRCS State Earth Team Coordinator, said the group was organized in 2014 by landowners and farmers who understand the value of soil health for the sustainability of their operations. She said the group wished to educate other southeastern Missouri farmers. The Alliance works in conjunction with the NRCS staff in Dexter.
The Alliance includes several hundred members, but is led by a core group of: Johnny Hunter, Allen Below, Damon Dowdy, Keith Mayberry, all of Stoddard County; Patrick Seyer, Scott County; Peter Rost Jr., Tommy Riley, Aaron Boldrey, all of New Madrid County. NRCS District Conservationist Michelle Gross, NRCS Area Resource Conservationist Steve Crisel, NRCS Soil Health Specialist Warren Cork, and Janet Johns, Stoddard County Soil and Water Conservation District manager, provide agency support to the group.
Since the Alliance’s creation, these volunteers have hosted four Soil Health Conferences attended by about 200 people at each event. Volunteers coordinate the event annually, including arranging for nationally known soil health experts to speak at each event. The Alliance also hosts a soil health tour annually, showcasing soil health practices such as cover crops, no-tilling and soil moisture monitoring techniques in diversified crop fields. Tours have taken producers to pastures and cotton, rice, corn and soybean fields where soil health practices are being implemented. Local earth team volunteers also open their facilities to others to look at equipment that has been customized for no-till and cover crop planting. They also have given field demonstrations to allow those attending the tour to get hands-on experience.
Because of the outreach that these NRCS “Earth Team” volunteers have provided, farmers and ranchers from southeastern Missouri have been joined at the conferences and tours by landowners and land users from Illinois, Arkansas, Tennessee, Oregon, Ohio, Indiana and Mississippi, Hoback said. She said the volunteers logged more than 150 hours in federal Fiscal Year 2018 and close to 1,000 hours since 2014.
“The Missouri Delta Soil Health Alliance is committed to educating farmers and ranchers in southeastern Missouri and the surrounding states,” said NRCS State Conservationist J.R. Flores. “By providing outreach to landowners and farm operators, and by spreading the good word about soil health, the Alliance is helping improve the health of the soil upon which all life depends.”
NRCS’ “Earth Team” volunteer program offers many opportunities for people who are interested in volunteering to improve the nation’s natural resources. Volunteers assist in each of the more than 100 NRCS offices in Missouri. To learn how to enlist as a volunteer, contact any NRCS office, or click on the “Earth Team Volunteers” link on the Missouri NRCS website: www.mo.nrcs.usda.gov.