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    Differences between the most and least variable sites.

    Grazing Animals Organic Matter Inputs Variability
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    There are significant differences between our sites with the most variable soil health scores (our Swingers) and our sites with the least variable scores (our Parked sites).  The most significant difference between the 2 groups is that Swinging sites have 3 times the number of average grazing days as Parked sites. While Swinging and Parked sites have the same numbers of sites with grazing animals, Swinging sites have animals grazing on-site for a much longer period of time.  2/3rds of Swinging sites are pastures, and the majority of Swinging sites use conventional growing methods.  Swinging sites also apply an average of 7.5 T/acre of organic matter inputs, almost 50% more than Parked Sites at 5.6 T/ac.  These findings support our 2023 findings that more grazing animals and organic matter inputs increase variability.
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    Past Practices can explain some variability.

    Compost Crop Groups Grazing Animals Manure Organic Matter Inputs Variability
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    We continue to see a great deal of variability in our lab results when we compare sites with themselves year-to-year.  We divided our sites into 4 crop categories (Commercial Veg/Flower/Fruit; Commodity Row Crops and Dryland Grains; Home Gardens; and Perennial Hay/Alfalfa/Pastures) and examined each category’s variability.  These 4 graphs show that an examination of past practices can often explain some of the exceptionally big jumps in variability which we see in every crop group.
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    Variability is highest in Home Gardens and Pastures

    Grazing Animals Organic Matter Inputs Variability
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    These 4 graphs show that Home Gardens and Perennial Hay/Alfalfa/Pastures have the most variable soil health scores year-to-year.  Each site’s 3-5 years of soil health scores are represented by a column of 3-5 colored data points connected by a vertical black line (a blue square for 2019, red circle for 2020, green triangle for 2021, yellow diamond for 2022 and aqua diamond for 2023). Each square-circle-triangle-diamond-Blackline combo represents the Soil Health Scores for one site for 3-5 years.  Sites with the most variability have the tallest black lines between their lowest and highest scores.
    Last year we showed that large amounts of organic matter inputs and more days of grazing animals increased variability.  This year we have shown that home gardeners apply the highest rates of organic matter to their sites, and we know that grazing animals are usually found in pastures.  It makes sense then that Home Gardens and Perennial Hay/Alfalfa/Pastures would experience the greatest variability in Soil Health Scores.
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    Organic Matter Input use has decreased.

    Compost Manure Organic Matter Inputs Progress
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    Organic Matter Input use has decreased by 13T/acre on average since 2019.  When we examine our successive years of data and divide our sites into their different crop categories, we see that only home gardeners have increased their Organic Matter Inputs in the last 5 years.  All other crop categories have seen a sharp decrease in Organic Matter Inputs.  Commercial Veg/Flower/Fruit growers have seen the biggest decrease.  Our growers identified several possible causes for this decrease. 
    • An exceptionally wet May-June-July in 2023 meant growers had a hard time planting, cultivating and harvesting between storms.  They may not have wanted to or been able to get additional machinery into soggy fields to spread amendments.
    • Fuel and hauling costs for amendments have tripled in recent years, putting amendments out of reach for many growers.  Several have switched to amending with more economical cover crops if they have the water to get them established.
    • Some growers with excessively high phosphorus levels have decided to forego organic matter inputs and use cover crops instead, to avoid increasing their soil phosphorus to dangerous levels.
    • Our very tight labor market meant growers struggled all season to fill vacant positions.  They may not have had enough workers to do things like spread amendments. Additionally, our tight labor market has increased labor costs sharply.  This has affected Commercial Veg-Flower/Fruit growers the most as their crop category is the most labor intensive.  Recent high labor costs may have consumed any profit that formerly paid for purchased amendments. 
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    Most CSSHP growers have used Organic Matter Inputs.

    Compost Grazing Animals Manure Organic Matter Inputs Progress
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    A majority of all our growers have used organic matter inputs (manure, compost, mulches) on their sites in the last 5 years, with home gardeners leading the way.  We only count the organic matter inputs which are acquired off-site in this analysis.  Manure deposited by grazing animals on-site, or clippings from on-site cover crops, are not counted as organic matter inputs here.  Thus, perennial fields with aftermath grazing often appear to have no organic matter inputs, even though they may have many days of grazing animals depositing manure and urine there.
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    Average Tillage Intensity has decreased, part 2.

    Progress Tillage Intensity
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    When we examine the Tillage Intensity of the 191 sites for which we have tillage data and group them into their 5 crop categories, we see that 4 crop groups have made very good progress in reducing their Tillage Intensity, with Commercial Veg/Flower/Fruit sites and Dryland Grains making the most progress.  Perennial Hay/Alfalfa/Pastures have held steady with quite low Tillage Intensity scores.  Home gardens also have low tillage intensity scores, because many of our home gardeners use mostly hand tools, which disturb the soil less and have lower intensity scores.