Agronomy Winter Roadshow (Scotland) - Soil Health

We have moved our popular Agronomy Roadshows online this year so we can still let farmers in Scotland know about the latest crop research. As well as addressing some of the hot topics affecting their businesses, not just in Scotland but local to their region.

In partnership with Scotlands Rural College (SRUC) and the Farm Advisory Service (FAS), we will provide information and thought-provoking conversations delivered via a range of speakers drawn from research, industry, and farming, to provide expertise from all areas of agriculture. 

This session will look at soil health.

Soils are complex systems that are important in providing and sustaining the landscapes they support. They are built up of three main components – physical, chemical, and biological and these need to function together to create and maintain this vital resource. In the past, the main focus for agricultural soils has been on the chemical (pH, organic matter, and nutrient levels) attributes but this is now changing as the influence of the physical (gas movement and soil structure) and biological (biodiversity and nutrient cycling) aspects of the soil are more understood.

In this soils-focussed session for the FAS / AHDB roadshow, SRUC researchers will define what soil health is, how it is measured using simple indicators, and present recent research findings from assessments of soil health in different agricultural systems along with a tool that advises on advantages and concerns to management changes.

Speakers:

• Joanna Cloy (SRUC)
• Christine Watson (SRUC)
• Paul Hargreaves (SRUC)

Once the initial session is over, attendees are invited to attend a Q&A session hosted by AHDB Knowledge Exchange Manager for Arable, Chris Leslie, that will be running from 11.15am via Microsoft Teams here.  This link will be shared in reminder emails for attendees and also during the lecture.