At the time, it was his greatest challenge. In 1996, Aaron Thompson knew regulations would soon impact him and other farmers in the Delaware and Chesapeake Bay regions of the Northeastern United States. A Pfiesteria outbreak had caused a large fish kill.
Then, the talk started. Thompson knew what was coming. Nutrient management plans. Regulations. A change in how he’d grown accustomed to doing business.
Yet, a new way of farming brought with it opportunities for the Hartly, Delaware, soybean grower.
“At the time, it was a huge challenge trying to adjust to all of the demands [of a nutrient management plan], going through schooling and training to get certified,” Thompson explains. “It’s created better farmers for those of us operating under those conditions. It’s made us learn our soil, understand what we’re doing and why.”
Adopting stewardship practices like conservation tillage and planting cover crops has helped him re-establish the foundation of his farm business, making it more sustainable for the future.
Clearing the hurdles
Thompson, a fourth-generation farmer, now farms the land his great-grandfather settled in 1909. The property has seen its share of diversity over the generations. What began with tomatoes, wheat, dairy cattle, laying hens and row crops has emerged into today’s Thompson Farm, LLC, currently home to corn, soybeans, wheat and organic broiler chickens. The partnership includes himself (Aaron), his father, his mother and his brother.
Located between the Delaware and Chesapeake Bays, Thompson says the area is challenged by encroaching development, inefficient field shape and location, and soil quality. With 75% of his soil labeled variable and poorly drained; water management strategies are a must due to the area’s excessively wet weather. Wildlife can be problematic, too, adding to an already laborious operation task list. Thompson’s acreage is spread across 149 individual fields that border 46 miles of tax ditches, private ditches, woods and hedgerows.
“While we do not need to maintain the tax ditches, we are conscious of nutrients in the waterways,” he says. “Tax ditches account for roughly 30% of that mileage. We maintain the remainder to keep water flowing in wet times.”
He adds that hedgerows and woodland edges are kept trimmed to increase sunlight in the first rows around a field, which helps increase crop yields.
“Establishing a crop stand in the spring can be a challenge as we combat waterlogged soils, compaction and low soil oxygen,” Thompson says.
Counting on covers
A constant learner, Thompson says adopting the use of cover crops over the last two decades has helped him adjust practices and crops to optimize levels of carbon, oxygen and water. Between 25% and 30% of the farm is planted in a cereal grain like barley or wheat for summer harvest. A mixed cover species that includes rye, wheat, spring oats, rape, radish and crimson clover is broadcast on corn acres once harvest is complete.
“The rye helps prevent heavy weed pressure,” he explains. “We have found an optimum ratio of one-third rye to prevent a heavy weed pressure without deterring a good plant stand or an overabundance of slugs.”
The result creates an environment where residual chemicals from the operation’s full-season soybean program are removed.
He relies on various cover crop benefits, such as reduced soil compaction and increased nitrogen fixation, among others.
“A small amount of crimson clover helps to create enough nitrogen to assist in breaking down carbon,” Thompson adds.
Several vertical tillage tools are used across the farm to help accomplish the operation’s goal of 100% stands. His innovative use of equipment assists with more even manure distribution while working to reduce odor and the volatilizing of ammoniated nitrogen.
“The tillage tools that we use are a conservation practice that we believe in a lot,” Thompson says. “The cover crops have been a game changer for increasing soil health. Vertical tillage works in tandem with that [soil health].”
But that’s not all. While cover crops have helped improve soil and plant health, certain species that make up the cover crop also help correct a noted manganese deficiency in the soil.
“As we have been able to increase air intake into our soils, it’s helped drastically with manganese deficiency,” he notes. “Cover crops are also helping our tillage by keeping the ground covered, which encourages water infiltration into the soil.”
Thompson’s goal is to grow cover crops on all his farmland. The seasoned farmer relies on planting multiple species to accommodate all types of growing conditions.
“My goal is to at least have every acre with something growing on it, some type of clover, to hopefully fix a little bit of nitrogen for our corn,” he says.
Creating a legacy
As easy as it might be for some to wave the white flag amid the myriad of challenges Thompson faces, the soybean grower says conservation fits his heart.
“I love taking on some of these soils that are tough to farm,” he says. “I love seeing the consistency, nice green crops growing on every acre, working on drainage issues, improving the areas that are not as productive.”
The generational farmer says he wants to do anything to improve and fix those problem areas on his land. Conservation practices help him do just that.
Thompson’s stewardship efforts are not only working to help him achieve his goals but also to keep his longtime family farm sustainable.
“Conservation is just an integral part of what we’re doing,” he says. “It’s the foundation of it.”
Rather than turn his back on nutrient management plans and new farming regulations in 1996, the Northeastern farmer chose to embrace a new way of doing business. It was a move that has helped create a legacy all his own.
“It became the biggest blessing,” Thompson says of the decades-old event that forced his operation to shift gears.
As the Delaware farmer continues to plan, he hopes to install tile on poorly drained fields in the future. Doing so would further eliminate open drainage ditches, minimizing the possibility of nutrients entering the waterway.
“One idea we would like to see implemented is the installation of water control structures in tax ditches to slow the lowering of the subsurface water table during the summer,” he explains.
The water control structures could also provide a reservoir for irrigation water with 1,800 acres to till in 149 fields, Thompson says a nutrient management plan for each is a must.
“What better solution than to pump the nutrients that might be in the water back onto a field,” he says. “The irrigation water would ensure a higher yield and higher nutrient uptake from the soil.”
Due to the high deer population in his area, crops are extensively damaged. To help address the issue, Thompson is experimenting with planting a variety of grasses and alfalfa in small coves of fields or along wooded areas to encourage deer to feed in those areas rather than in the cropping portion of a field.
As a conservationist, the soybean grower simply wants the best yield possible with the highest amount of nutrient recovery from the inputs he has applied.
Sustainability might be a buzzword across the industry for environmentally friendly farming practices, but for Thompson, it works in tandem with profitability.
“We farm to increase the basics of air, water and carbon through cover crops and vertical tillage,” Thompson says. “Every trip we make across the field has a purpose as we aim to purchase the correct nutrient sources, in the correct amount, at the correct time.”
Aaron Thompson. Always planning. Always learning. Challenge accepted.
