Measuring soil health properties represents a great opportunity to better understand how farm management practices impact key soil functions. Soil health testing builds on our current methods of soil testing to provide additional information to farmers. Rather than focusing solely on soil chemistry, additional biological and physical components of soil are incorporated into a common framework. Building and maintaining high functioning soils require that all three key components (chemistry, biology and physical structure) to be consciously managed and optimized.
Data collected over the past two seasons are showing trends of increasing soil organic matter when fields are cover cropped or receiving manure compared to conventionally tilled fields. No-till practices have shown little effect on soil organic matter. However, more research is needed to better understand these trends, especially their impact on yield.