No-till and Cover Crop Symposium registration open now

REGIONAL — The 2018 No-Till and Cover Crop Symposium will feature talks by researchers, field crop growers and other experts from the U.S. and Canada.

It will take place from 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Thursday, March 1 at the DoubleTree by Hilton (formerly the Sheraton Hotel and Conference Center), just off I-89 at Exit 14W in South Burlington. It is sponsored by University of Vermont (UVM) Extension’s Champlain Valley Crop, Soil and Pasture Team in Middlebury and the Northwest Crops and Soils Program in St. Albans.

Registration is required by Feb. 23. The fee, which includes lunch, is $85. Graduate students may attend for $50 and are encouraged to sign up to present a poster on their soil health, no-till or cover cropping research at the symposium.

To register, go tohttp://go.uvm.edu/ntcc. To request a disability-related accommodation, contact Karen Gallott at (802) 388-4969 or (800) 956-1125 (toll-free in Vermont) by Feb. 16.

Highlights include talks by Bob Schindelbeck, Cornell University, on soil health, and Blake Vince, a fifth-generation farmer from Merlin, Ontario, on his experiences with no-till and cover crops to improve water quality on his 1,300-acre farm.

Other presenters will include Ryan Patch, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food and Markets; Steve Roy, Redline Tile Drainage, West Chazy, New York; and Eric Young, Miner Institute, Chazy, New York; who will discuss best management practices for tile-drained fields and current tile drainage research projects in the Lake Champlain Basin.

Presenters from UVM Extension include Jake Jacobs on crop insurance and Joshua Faulkner and Kirsten Workman on what farmers are doing to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. A panel of Vermont farmers will describe what did and didn’t work for them with no-till and cover crops.

The symposium includes an exhibitor fair and poster session. For information or if any questions, call (802) 388-4969 or e-mail [email protected].