A2O-Uncaster Farming, Saturday, October 19,1985
New mobile laboratory to aid farmers with
BY SUZANNE KEENE
KLEINFELTERSVILLE -
Lebanon County farmers got a
sneak preview this week of a new
mobile nutrient laboratory that
will be available to them and other
farmers in. the Chesapeake Bay
watershed this spring.
Developed jointly by Penn State
University and the Pennsylvania
Department of Environmental
Resources with funds from the
Chesapeake Bay program, the
mobile laboratory will help far
mers determine how much manure
and commercial fertilizer they
should be applying to their fields.
The farmers got a look at the lab
during an Extension-sponsored
manure management field day
held at Harold and Donald
Bollinger’s dairy and poultry farm
in Klemfeltersville.
The mobile nutrient laboratory,
which will travel to farms in the
Chesapeake Bay watershed this
spring, is fully equipped for soil
testing and manure analysis,
explained Russell Wagner, a
nutrient management specialist
with the Bureau of Soil and Water
Conservation
Soil testing and manure analysis
are not new to farmers, they have
been using them for years, but
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never before has the laboratorj
come to the farmer.
"What we’re doing is making it
mobile and putting it all under one
roof,” Wagner said.
With the mobile unit, a farmer
will be able to to get the results of
his soil sample and manure
analysis the same day he takes
them.
The mobile laboratory is also
equipped with an Apple II com
puter that will process the data
from the soil and manure tests into
a recommendation for manure
application. Bureau of Soil and
Water Conservation employees,
who will man the mobile unit, will
plug information provided by the
tests in the computer and have
answers for the farmers in just a
few hours. ,
Armed with this information,
farmers can apply manure and
commercial fertilizer to their
fields in the correct amounts.
Similar tests done through the
laboratory at Penn State
University have helped Harold and
Donald Bollinger, who hosted the
field day at their Willow Maple
Farm. Through tests, the
Bollingers learned that they could
cut back on commercial fertilizer,
a move which saved them $35 an
acre on 75 acres of corn
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'He saved over $2,000 because
he knew what he had in his
manure,” Wagner explained.
Applying manure in the proper
amount has other benefits as well.
Test plots on the Bollinger’s farm
have indicated that when too much
manure is applied, yields are
decreased.
“There is a point where putting
too much on hurts the farmer’s
yield,” Wagner explained.
So if the additional manure is
actually hurting crop yields, the
farmer is wasting precious time
applying it.
The Bollingers added that an
excess of manure in the soil raises
the level of nitrates in the water, a
condition which lowers milk
production and hurts herd health.
Currently, the Bollingers are
filtering nitrates and sulfates from
the water for their cows. Since
installing the filtering system,
Donald Bollinger said, they have
noticed a marked improvement in
milk production and herd health.
The Bollingers have 44 cows
milking and 30 head of young
stock. They also have 70,000
broilers.
Wagner and the other nutrient
specialists who will man the
mobile unit, hope other farmers
will see similar benefits from soil
and manure testing and make it a
regular part of their routine.
‘What we want to do is to take it
(the mobile laboratory) out to
somebody who isn’t doing this to
show them how much they can
save,” Wagner said. It’s an
educational tool. "
The mobile laboratory is free to
farmers in the six-county area
encompassed by the Chesapeake
Bay watershed Adams, Chester,
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Because the unit must service
such a large area, Wagner said the
county Extension and Con
servation Districts will take care
of the scheduling.
‘We can’t service everyone,” he
said, but they will try to reach as
many people as possible.
The 40 farmers attending the
manure management field day on
Tuesday also got a look at the
Bollinger’s lagoon manure system,
which they installed four years
ago. The Bollinger’s system in
cludes a storage pit under the
Russell Wagner, a nutrient management specialist with the
Bureau of Soil and Water Conservation, demonstrates the
use of the Apple II computer in the mobile nutrient tab.
Wagner and other nutrient specialists, will be manning the
lab when it makes its rounds to area farms in the spring.
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manure
dairy barn and an earthen bank
storage pond with a concrete floor
The storage pit under the dairy
barn is pumped into the lagoon
once a month, while the lagoon
itself is pumped out twice a year
When applying the manure, the
Bollingers inject it directly into the
soil.
With this system, Donald says,
they save time and money through
lower fuel and fertilizer costs. And
by injecting the manure, he said,
they have less runoff and almost no
odor.
The Bollingers financed the
manure system on a cost/share
basis with the ASCS.
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