It’s a long way from Illinois to the Gulf of Mexico—but out of sight cannot mean out of mind when it comes to managing nutrients on your fields. The actions you take have a huge impact on nitrogen and phosphorus levels in water hundreds of miles away. Though agriculture has made significant strides in improving nutrient utilization over the years, it must do even better in the future. Pick Up the Pace Illinois growers are doing many things right, but now it’s time to take even more care to ensure that nutrients remain on your fields to aid productivity rather [...]

Phosphorus (P) is one of the two nutrients to contribute to hypoxia. Nitrogen is the other. New insights into how phosphorus leaches into groundwater can reduce its potential impact on water quality and its impact on the environment. Phosphorus poses an environmental threat when it travels from soils to open bodies of water, including lakes, streams and rivers. Click here to read an Ag professional article on the problem. I think the key takeaway from the article was that too high of a soil test or too much phosphorus in the soil leads to leaching across many different soil [...]