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University of Wisconsin-Platteville

Platteville Pioneer Farm logoThe University of Wisconsin-Platteville Agroecosystem Research Program, under the leadership of Dr. Dennis Busch, is conducting research to evaluate the impact of dairy farming practices on environmental outcomes.

The DSWR project is being conducted in eight replicated catchments at the the UW-Platteville Pioneer Farm. In each of the catchments, one of two treatments has been randomly assigned. The treatments include soil health management systems (SHMS) and commonly used field practices. The commonly used practice treatments are defined by conventional tillage, injected liquid dairy manure and commercial nutrients applied as required. In contrast, the SHMS treatment is a holistic approach that combines reduced soil disturbance by practicing no-till crop production, utilizing manure-based fertilizer products and establishing cover crops.

These combined soil health management activities aim to improve soil carbon sequestration, reduce greenhouse gas emissions (GHG), increase soil biodiversity and maintain living roots in the soil. Moreover, each catchment is hydrologically isolated and instrumented with surface-water runoff gauges and undisturbed soil core lysimeters (by measuring water movement in the soil), to support the integration of water quality outcomes associated with the cropping management systems.

Birdseye view of UW Platteville catchments

DSWR project site, University of Wisconsin-Platteville

Research Activities include soil health sampling and water quality sampling such as:

Soil health sampling

  • Bulk density
  • Soil carbon sampling
  • Deep soil core sampling
  • Soil biology sampling (soil reactive carbon and soil enzymatic activity)

Water quality sampling

  • Measuring flow-based surface runoff
  • Intact core lysimeter to monitor vadose zone water quality
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Instruments in the field in Platteville, WI

"The work conducted at the UW-Platteville Pioneer Farm will contribute to a six-year, nationwide research effort focused on implementation and evaluation of novel manure products for crop production. The results of this effort will be shared broadly with stakeholders and will help inform ecosystem service markets, incentives, and investments in dairy sustainability.”
- Dennis Busch, Principal Investigator

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“The dairy industry is of great importance for Wisconsin and the Driftless Area in particular. We are fortunate to have a facility at UW-Platteville like Pioneer Farm where we can conduct field-scale research of agricultural management practices. It is my hope that our research will be influential in reducing the environmental impact of dairy”
- Matthew Harper, Research Technician

Platteville farm
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The UW-Platteville Team

Dennis Busch
Dennis Busch, Ph.D.
Principal Investigator

Provides overall leadership for project research, outreach and educational activities. Determines pollutant loads to surface and groundwater resources related to crop production activities.

Kishad Mahmud
Kishan Mahmud
Agroecosystem Research Scientist

Measures GHG emissions, estimating soil carbon and soil health (biological) parameters from different cropping systems

Tristan Martins
Tristan Martins
Instrumental Technologist

Installs lysimeters, manages operations of field equipment, data sensor installments, surface runoff monitoring, sample retrieval and handling.

Matthew Harper
Matthew Harper
Research Technician

Manages field data collection, sample retrieval and handling as well as data analysis.

Publications and Presentations

Publications coming soon.

UW-Platteville Content and Funding

The content and information on this webpage were produced and provided solely by the University of Wisconsin-Platteville research team.

DSWR activities at UW-Platteville are partially funded by Emmi Roth.