Welcome. Thank you for joining us for BEC act Davis, Thursday morning, October the eighth, 2020. Hope everyone is doing well and we're glad to be able to join us this morning. We're pleased to be joined this morning by Mr. David Kindig with the Department of Conservation and Recreation. David is the head of the agricultural nutrient management section there and he coordinates all of those trainings within that department. So we're pleased to be joined by David in the topic of discussion this morning, this nutrient management plans, the changes that you need to know about. One of the focuses that we've asked David to speak on is some of the proposed an upcoming legislation for the year 2025 and how that may impact agricultural producers and folks that are utilizing nutrient management plans and those that may need nutrient management plans, et that occurs. So without further ado, David, we appreciate you joining us this morning and thank you for being here to provide these update. Oh, yeah. I appreciate the invitation. Okay. So as Robbie said, probably most people know me, but my name is they can take on to training and certification coordinator for the nutrient management program in Virginia. I conduct AG training schools, continuing education meetings, and develop, administer, and analyze Nietzsche management exam. I'm technical support to certify new tree major planners covering plan implementation and our program implementation, I'm sorry, an agronomic aspects of crop production recommendations associated with nutrient management plan development. So some of the things I'm going to talk about today on the bill that has 20-25 said is a date where plans may be we become mandatory. And then we'll go and talk a little bit about regulations and the nutrient management program itself, writing plans, talk about verification a little bit and the importance of that. And we have a new program in place that we can actually pay planners directly from our central office. And I'll share with you a little bit how that can be used to help farmers get their plan's written. So house bill 1422. This is language that as of December 31st, 2025, if we haven't made it meet our reduction goals, the option is neutral, magic plan will become mandatory. So I'm just going to go down through this a little bit. Instead of kind of summarize it. I pulled this off a website and some of the formatting is a little funky, but I think we'll be able to make it work. So December 31st. Is one the decision has to be made. And we're going down through here. One question is, does it addresses crop land located in the Chesapeake Bay watershed where fertilizer, manure, sewage, sludge, and other compound containing nitrogen or phosphorus or applied. Chesapeake Bay proper plan does not include land on which bovines are pastured. So I got to watch out for those bovines crossing the road. Okay. So that that kind of addresses that at the moment. Let me okay. Set snuggle weren't any operator 50 or more acres Chesapeake Bay crop lands shall maintain an implemented through new to NIH and plan. If this comes to law, that's what they're looking. Not so less than 50 acres. At the moment, this language looks like they would be exempt format. One thing you may be interested in any information collected by the department is not foil ball. So I know that's always a concern with farmers whenever anything comes in play. So are people going to be able to get my information through this legislation? So they do have that addressed in here, so the information is not foibles. Okay? So the other side of the legislation is addressing themes, stream and theme. So the language he says, any personally bones property to be TwitterShare, which has 20 or more bovines. And our pastor Zhao, install and maintain stream exclusion practices sufficient to keep all those bovines from any perennial stream in the watershed. And so they're, they're looking at two things. Are looking at making nutrient management mandatory and getting mandatory stream fencing down. Now, this is my selling point. To get nudes came economic graph. Say the provisions in this chapter as created by the act, shall not become effective unless or on July first 2026, Secretary of Agriculture and Forestry and Secretary and natural resources jointly determined that the Commonwealth commitments to the Chesapeake Bay Program have not been satisfied by either coverage of sufficient force, another bay crop land by nutrient management plans, installation of sufficient number of livestock stream extrusion, exclusion practices, or combination of other agricultural best management conservation practices. So the opportunity, in my mind to take care of this legislation real easily by making sure we meet our goals because language states shall not become effective. So if we meet our goals, this legislation kind of goes away. So there's some moving targets here. And that is we have these two Secretariat skating together and they are making that decision. Okay. So so it's real important we started getting good documentation of our progress just as soon as possible so that as we move forward to 2025, we have a history of documentation that we have not only met our goals, but we are maintaining them. And we have to we're going to come to the table and talk to the secretaries that are making this decision. In my opinion, we have we have to have a good, solid case so that they can be very comfortable in decisions. Okay, so let's see what's on down here. I think I think that's so that's the legislation that's in place. And so how are we going to deal with this? Whatever the outcome is? And I think the other the other thing that needs to be considered is more than likely by July 2026, the people that wrote this legislation will probably not be here. We may be dealing, we may be, we may not be dealing with different secretaries in natural resources and an eigen parse tree. So they may view this legislation a little bit differently. Between now and 2025. There's possibility they could look at the language in this regulation and make some adjustments to it. So there, there are several moving targets here. And how are we going to advise foreigners to position themselves? So what comes in 2026 with this decision is going to have a middle man and impact on their operation. K. So that's my That's my take on how are we going to deal with is to sit back and say, I'm not gonna do anything till I have to. And I know there's some thought out there that that's what's going to be done. There's, there's repercussions to that. On plan writing side, you might say, well, you know, I can get a plan 20-25, they say you need a plan. I can go get a plan. Well, first you haven't contributed to applause the decision by not getting your farm a nutrient management plan for your farm. Second, if it becomes mandatory, then you have to realize that not only your farm needs a plan, but there's gonna be a lot of other farms that need plans if they've decided not to get one either. So you may find that there's not an over abundance of plan writers to take on this extra low. So you might get delayed in getting a plan written. Probably more importantly, is you have to understand what goes into a nutrient management plan. I'm advocating starting get if you don't have a plan now, get a plan. There's a lot of options to writing nutrient management plans will cover that when we jump into the regs. But very important to have yield history, an application records. With yield history and application records that gives the planner, I'll some other options to be writing the contents of the plane. Without a history of application and yield records. The planner is going to be limited to using the values process to write nutrient management plans. And in some cases, farmers that are better managers probably doing better on yields than values is going to assign to the fields. So that could be an issue. Let's see what else we have here when the secretaries. And so I think that I think that's I think that's the main parts about about this legislation. I don't have a crystal ball that tells me what the outcome of this might be. I think we still have a lot of options on the table. I gotta say the people that on that are going to be making this decision in 2025, in July of 2026, probably aren't going to be the same people that have written this. So we don't know what that, what that thinking might be at that time. So, so if the farmers had plans, no matter what the decision is, if it does become mandatory and a farmer has a plan in place, he has good yield records, he has good application records. It's probably going to have little effect on he's operation. For the farmers are weighted to last-minute. They're going to be, they're going to be limited in their options for getting the content of the plan written closely to what they're already doing. So so let me jump, let me jump into looking at a plan on this language is what it is. I would say I would take it seriously and I would approach anybody. I'm explaining to this. Let's just assume and after to Joy 12026 or there's going to be action taking taken that's gone to put these requirements as mandatory. And so if you prepare for that, we meet our goals. You know, your farmers have been positioned to to deal with it much better. So let me go to let's start talking about the nutrient management plan. I'm sure most of you are familiar with nutrient management plans and the language that goes into writing a plan. A Virginia nutrient Magic Plan is recognized as a recognized tool that efficiently manages nutrients for crop production. So it's a good tool for the farmer to have any toolbox. It sets a standard. And as we go through the next few years, there's, as I keep mentioning, there's a lot of flexibility that the planner has. If the farmer has a yield records, an application records to write the plan. So the other thing, and we're talking about credibility of having a nutrient management plan. Pizza recognize tool for efficient management of nutrients. And they are written by certified planners. And so the certification process is just not a rubber stamp. Method. Planners have to meet education and experience requirements and they have to pass both parts of the nutrient management exam. So again, that adds credibility to the to the program because we do have qualified people doing the work. And let me take this over here. Okay? So we have this defined than our regs, the education and experience requirement and passing both parts of the exam. So every planner that is Virginia Certified has met these qualifications and that's how they earn their certification. Another thing, once they are certified, every two years, certification is renewed. And in that two-year period, day every fired, either make plans and accumulate CAN did continuing education credits, or if they do not rate plans, they have to accumulate more credits. So once they're certified, they're not just get their certificate and that's the end of it. They're required as many other certification programs are foreground of us to participate in continuing education credit. So the other thing I want to point out as we're in the rags Is the purpose. Okay? And so sometimes people just say, oh, I gotta get a plan. But there's a lot of depth involved in our program. And one of the things is we had to identify the purpose for nutrient management and nutrient management planning. And I think this is something that people overlook. And they just throw it in the category URL. This is just, this is just to save the bay as just the Save the Bay and the spot. And they kind of, they kind of pupal it off a little bit. But as you see here and the purpose and we take this seriously, I bring, I point this out to planners when we go through our training. Nietzschean Magic Plan is prepared to indicate how primary nutrients are to be managed on farm fields and other land for crop production. Okay. So you see that that's underline or write in nutrient management plan for crop production. If you follow the prac, the procedures in writing a plan, we will get the environmental benefits. So I want to among people to understand the emphasis should be put on crop production and then continue and in ways to protect groundwater and surface water from excessive nutrient enrichment. Okay, so we have all that lined out and our regs and we're going to touch on a few things. So you get an idea about the flexibility that comes with having good records. Plans contain operating procedures based on expected crop yield, existing nutrient levels in the soil, organic residuals, optimum timing and placement of nutrients and environmental resource protection and agronomic practices such as liming until aging crop production. So a plan addresses things very thoroughly. And that's what gives it its credibility. So let me bring up another illustration here. So we run into two things that are maybe miss or reasons people don't think they want to plant native plan. And I found that, found this illustration. Yield equals the sum of all the variables. And so one of the things I always hear about for people that want to poo-pooed nutrient management is that you won't let me put enough nitrogen on my core or you won't let me go for the yield that I think I can get. Okay, so well, well dressed that I'll show you what in their eggs, but I just want to put everything in perspective. So the farmers over here and they're really worried about nitrogen may be phosphorous, were not Latin and put in a phosphorous down. But when you look at all of the factors here that go into yield, okay, so is the farmer stepping back and looking at all of these other factors, okay. Or is he just look at these two factors right here? So I just want to emphasize. All of these factors go, we enter to getting a good yield. And I think sometimes we get too much focused on one or two factors. And we start overlooking a lot of other factors. One of my pet peeves is the sea. And I'm sure you all experience at t2. I have farmers that say, well, I'm a Nikon, decide how much point I'm going to plant till April and I see what corn prices are doing. Well, guess what? By ape role, the varieties left in the warehouse are probably not as high yielding varieties as was in the warehouse last November. That makes sense. And so the farmer may be putting sell it at a disadvantage by not considering some of this T factors back in November. And I understand there's all kinds of issues having to pay forward and everything like that. And that's fine. That's fine. We have to realize all farmers are working at different management levels for different reasons. Okay, but I'm just saying if if they're losing yield because they're not able to attain the top, top yielding varieties. You're not going to make that up by dumping more nitrogen out there. Okay? So just, just to emphasize, there's a lot going in to get, getting high yield crops as you all well know. And I think if you've experienced visiting at meetings where they bring in, I'll farmers that are getting these extremely high yields. When you listen to those parks, everybody's looking for that silver bullet. Let's add one thing they're doing that they're getting the high yields that I can do. And I think if you listen to their whole presentation, you're going to find they're looking at all these factors and addressing every single one they can address to get that high yield. Okay? So I'm going to get off the soap box now. Alright, let me see where we go and now, okay, so in our regulations, Let me show you a couple things that might help people better understand why they need to work on getting good, getting good crop records and things like that. So in our rags, we're looking at the section. It says expected crop yield Shelby determined from any one of the following methods on a given field. So when planters are writing nutrient management plans, these are the three criteria they have to use to come up with yield. Yield is the beginning point of writing the plan. Because once we know the yield than we'd look at soil tests and the crop, and we start determining nutrient needs. So let's go down to number 3 first. Okay? This is, this is the preferred method of beginning to write a plan. And it states variable past crop yields are utilized to determine the expected crop yield k. So if we have good crop yield records, we can use that to determine the crop yield for the plant. Now this is the important part. The calculation of the expected crop yield shall be an average of the three highest yielding years taken from the last five years in particular crop was grown in that specific field. So you see right here, this is why for farmers that have not had plans or have not been keeping good yield records. This is why it's very important to start getting that data as soon as possible. Okay, and let me show you a quick illustration here. At Case and my training school, we go through an exercise and I use this to demonstrate using values Virginia agronomic land use system to come up with yield versus farmer records. Okay? So we're going to look at the farmer records part here just to give an illustration of how this works. So these are actual yields. I got one of my specialist. I said, hey, give me some corn yields on a, on a field that you've written plans on for quite a while. So these are actual yields and you can see have 91612800110 and what 80, quite a bit of variability, you might say, that looks like that might be from the coastal plain. And you might be exactly right. So if you did, if you took the average, the average comes out to a 114 bushels. If you use the best three out of five, the average comes to 133. So you can see the difference between just using the average and using the best three out of five. That's three out of five years. The farmer already gets an advantage in planning his yield because we've dropped the two lowest yields out of that calculation, K, So best three out of five. This is how that works to keep the farmer ahead of his plan. I mean, as far as planning to get improve ease yields. So yeah, we have this 161 in here is at probably a reasonable number to write a plan or close to it while looking at all the other yield's probably not assure everybody likes to fertilize for 161. But it looks like 110120 or 128110 are going to be the years that are going to be most representative of the potential yield. Okay? So in this example, so we don't have this, we'd all have these yield records. So in this example, when we use values, what you do is you identify the soil in the field. And we look up that soil productivity, and that's what the farmer has to use. So in this case, I picked a Gilpin soil, it happened to come out to 130. So right now the example looks like, well Dave, there's really not much difference. And this is just for training exercise. When you can, when you're writing the actual plan. How far we want to use a yield records. If they don't have the three out of five and you don't have good records than to plan or has to look into Seoul productivity group, expected crop yields consistent with the information and the standards and criteria book. And so the Virginia Tech Professors years ago when we were building our new major program, went through and grouped all the soils by soil productivity group based on actual yields. And so values for the most part, is still very applicable. Weighed Thompson checks values are regularly. And for the most part, values works well. For the farmers that are doing better management job. They need to do crop yields. And so, oh my gosh, I'm going to keep moving here. Okay, so that's, that's one of the issues to have good crop yields. While the planner to get a more rustic, realistic yield when they're writing nutrient management plans. So now let's look at something else. So maybe you're dealing with soils that are light texture or have some other issues. And so we deal with that in environmentally sensitive sites. And so when the planner looks at all the soils in the field, some of those soils are going to be deemed environmentally sensitive. Ad they are deemed environmental sense the if the area is or as close to a sink hole, OK. Salt with hot patent leads means post both less than 41 inches. The if there's tile drains, soils with high potential for subsurface lateral flow. Most of those souls are over on the eastern shore where you have Sandy profiles. Souls identified prone to flooding and lands with slopes greater than 15%. Okay, so why are we looking at this? Again to defend using nutrient management procedures, to write plans, some untrained. People may look at this and needs that these soils are terrible. You shouldn't even be Farm in these soils. Close to 41 inches, close to bedrock, souls will have leaking potential. You know, just as soon as you put your nitrogen on those soils is going to go right through the profile and you're going to be contaminating groundwater. So and that's true. That's what these characteristics are present. Okay. So we've identified as environmentally sensitive. So that's one part. The other part is how are we going to deal with that? Okay. And so just happened to have that in the regs. Okay. So we've indentified, we have environmentally sensitive sites. We know the potential for nitrogen loss is high. So what are we going to deal? Leishmania, planners shall recommend split application of inorganic nitrogen fertilizers as starter broadcasts for side dressing or top dressing, row crops and small grains consistent with procedures and standards and criteria. Kay, so that's not so bad. Probably most farmers are already making split applications. So we have identified, we have environment sensing site, and this is how the planner can identify. Okay? So sometimes there's issues and concerns about things like that. If you understand the rags and the planners should thoroughly understand that when we encountered environmentally sensitive sites, this is acceptable way to deal with it. So as if you're challenged on farming fields like that, you can say, hey, I have a nutrient management plan and my plan addresses dealing with those issues. So the other thing we have which may be a little bit unique to Virginia is we have a section in our regs on time. So when we're dealing with timing, we're dealing with nitrogen management at this point. To reduce the potential for nutrient leaching and runoff, certified planners show recommend an application of nitrogen materials to only sites where there's an actively growing crop in place at the time of application, or where a timely planted crop would be established within 30 days of the plan nutrient application. Okay, so that's usually a dress fall planted crops so you can put the nitrogen on before you paint your crop and it's going to come up. Okay, so we're dealing with nitrogen laws here. And this is pretty easy to understand how we're going to put the nitrogens on as close to the time as needed, which is what side dress does. Or we're going to apply it to a crop that's already growing. So the potential for loss is going to be minimized because we can, it's going to be taken up by the plants pretty quickly. Kay? So boy, it's almost 930. I wanted to talk just a tiny bit about the science here so that farmers and you all maybe just don't think about this side dress, pin, corn. Okay, so are environmentally sensitive sites for side dressing corn. Let's say we have a high yield potential up above a hundred and thirty hundred, forty hundred fifty six the bushels maybe. So we're looking at putting a lot of nitrogen down. So we're gonna put that nitrogen down. And you noticed we haven't talked about reducing the nitrogen application rates because we're on soils that have a high leaching potential. Very important for our nutrient management plan to be applied to those fields. Because we're splitting the nitrogen and were managed net to minimize that loss. The other thing that's going on, we go to the hydrologic cycle, which is just the rainfall events over a year's time. We're putting our highest rate of nitrogen all in late spring, early summer. And so let's think about what's going on during that period of time. We have high evaporation because it's hot or get a rainfall or they have a high potential for that rainfall to evaporate. And we had growing plants and so we have high transpiration rate. So why is that important? When you look at the water and how it's being affected by that time a year. As we get rain fall events and we have this high rate of nitrogen applied to the soils. The possibility of water movement down through the soil profile is low. And so between the evaporation and the plants taking up water, it's pretty much sucking all the water up. It's coming down that time a year. Very unlikely we're going to have saturated soils. And so again, following nutrient major recommendations to potential for nitrogen loss to ground wood or at that time is very low. So we're in a good position to manage nitrogen. So we go later into the season and let's just say we had poor yield because of drought or whatever. Okay, so we have, we have that nitrogen still on the soil. We haven't had a lot of opportunity for potential lost yet. And so now, the next way to address minimizing that loss. And I know everybody's thinking it would they were gone plant cover crops. Absolutely, right? And so as you look at managing nitrogen, there is a lot of flexibility in the plan, a lot of options. And so when you have a plan, you can defend how you're managing your nitrogen when you're following a nutrient management plan? Pretty rigorously. Okay, so he covered that. Alright, phosphorus. So remaking phosphorus, their front blade and nitrogen because nitrogen has a potential to leech through the soil pretty easily. Phosphorus, as you all know. Is held by the soil and held in place. So when we're looking at our rags for looking at how are we going to manage phosphorus. Phosphorus application rates shall be made to minimize adverse water quality impacts consistent with subdivisions. And so we're going to look at that right now. Okay? Phosphorus applications from inorganic nutrient sources. In inorganic nutrient sources adjust derogatory way of saying fertilizer for the most part, shall not exceed crop nutrient needs over the crop rotation based on a soil test. So we're gonna take a soil test and we're going to apply a phosphorus based on that soil test. Okay. That's pretty simple. No challenge there, but we know the the planner is monitor right. Proud for recommendations for phosphorus. So that's fine if you're putting fertilizer down and you have phosphorous recommendation. If you have a 0 phosphorous recommendation, you just write a 0 grey font fertilizer to go down. That works fine until you started applying and doors and doors have phosphorus atom can extract it out. So we need a way for the planner to deal with high phosphorus testing soils that still need to accept manure from the animal operation or writing to planful. Okay. So we have that in the rates and this section right here whenever possible, phosphorus applications from organic nutrient sources should not exceed crop nutrient needs over the SOL tests, over the duration, duration of the crop rotation. Okay, so that gives us a little flexibility. As you see here, it should not exceed crop nutrient needs based on a soul tests over the duration of the rotation. So you can actually over apply nitrogen to one crop as long as it doesn't exceed the nutrient needs of all the crops and the rotation. Again, it allows for easy management of the manure and making use of the nitrogen contained in them indoor k. So if we can do that with a soil test, that's fine. If we're at 0 phosphorous ni by our soul test, we need another option. Okay, so if that's not possible, phosphorus application rates and control practices contained in the plan are consistent with phosphorus management provisions contained in the standards and criteria. And so those provisions are our environmental threshold and the p index. So when we are making applications of phosphorus, if we're using a soil test, the application rate goes to 0 at 20% phosphorus saturation of the soil. So why is that important? As phosphorus, phosphorus saturation or the soil increases, we have found that the potential for the phosphorus to come back into solution and be lost increases. Okay, that just makes sense. If you have ice tea and you like sweet iced tea, Some people might put one scoop in it and that's okay. If you really like sweet iced tea, you might put lots of Scoop Senate. So you probably way over applied your sugar and your ice the, that's why you like them. So in the case of phosphorus, we have to be able to offer planners and option when they're working with the animal operations to sensibly be able to apply that manure even though it's not contributing to crop yield. So the environmental threshold allows that to be done. The environmental threshold is a simple practice. We only look at soil test and the physiographic region where the farms located. The phosphorus to environmental threshold approach allows applications to go up to 30% phosphorus saturation. And in most cases on most operations that's adequate to take care of the manure application. And imagine that if we have extremely high testing soils with other factors that may contribute to phosphorus loss, we can use the environmental I mean, the phosphorus index. The phosphorus index cuts off at an upper limit of 65% phosphorus saturation in the soil. So a huge jump from Seoul Test and from environmental threshold that we can justify going to that higher rate because we look at 13 different factors to calculate the outcome of the phosphorus index. We take into account all sources of phosphorus and take into account all methods of transportation from the site. And so at 65% saturation, we go to 0 phosphorous. That's extremely high. Very seldom cannot apply to fields because of the high soul test. But that upper limit again, assures we're managing the nutrients properly. So let me make another point here. You may, you may have farmers that say, well, you know, I'm already doing all that. I'm following my soul tests. I'm not a reply and nitrogen, I don't have any problems allocating my minority fields. Why do I need a nutrient management plan? And this comes back to being able to document this practice is being put in place. So inspection to acknowledge implementation, I've deemed this for this section. You know, the districts go out and they inspect practices that they pay cost share for. So we have two processes. We have a visual verification and a non visual verification. So visual verifications are very obvious. You'd go out and they're inspecting for cover crop practice. You can see the cover crop growing in the field and they have specifications that it has to meet so they can pay for it. So that's very obvious. They go out and you look at a stream processing, you look at a grass waterway installed. Visually you can see yes, this is done and it's meeting practice specs. You go out for nutrient management. There's no visual way you can say Yes, the plans being implemented. So that's a non-visual BMP. For non-visual BMPs, we depend on the documentation of all having a nutrient management plan and having that plan follow. So that's why at first it's very important to have a nutrient management plan and seconds very important to follow it because you can base what you've done on records that the history of records. So we're right in real close to time here. So let me, let me touch on a few other things here that are very important. Of course, everybody knows about the Bay Model and the most get a bad taste in our mouth when you start talking about the Bay model, we have go on to phase six, which is the latest version of the Bay model. And in phase six, we have gained a lot of favor in the bay models. First, agriculture goes building the bait or the phase six model. They had a series of special committees. They reviewed all of the BMPs in the model. From all those reviews, agriculture had every single one of their BMPs increase in the amount of reduction. And we get for installing those BMPs on everything from cover crops and all the cost share practices through nutrient management. So it's positioned agriculture to be able to meet their goals very well. And I can't emphasize that enough. But to meet those goals, we need we need plans, we need planted acres, and we need verification done all those acres. And so there might be some hesitancy of farmers to participate and verification. And I want to understand that's not the case at all. The planners that write the plan are the people that do the verification. And we have we have a four you have to have a form for everything. Planners come out and they interviewed the farmers and for crop production. They all they do. First nine questions on the form k. As questions like, have you calibrated your equipment? Had, did you follow the application rates for nitrogen? Real simple questions. Okay, so the farmers shouldn't be intimidated about participating in the verification. Planners usually do this at the end of the growing season when they come back to review what's, what's been done and what the farmers planning to do for the next growing season. And so is, it's another, it's just a part of the plan or visit at the end of the growing season, getting the rotations for the next year. Spend some time going through and getting this. So they look at the field. So, so maybe they didn't hit some real good. Okay. Maybe they switched to crops and never contacted the planner. So you have yes. Acres, Those are the acres that they follow the plan on. You have no acres pretty obvious. They switch something up, they got the wrong rate, a menorah down. And then they have justifiable deviation, which is kind of a gray area where they may have switched to crop, but they were able to use the same application rate. So we have a little flexibility there to get a few more acres up in the yes column. Okay, so this is very important. Planner can do it. We have what we call third party. And so for the planner to be able to do the verification, third party verification allows the planner to do that. So every wants the wow. Another person, one of our staff will go out with the planners as they're doing verification. And they just sit there and observe. And they prebaked and they deem that the planner has done acceptable job of recording or the farmer's responses. What is pretty simple? The most important thing about verification is that we can answer the question, how do you know the farmer is following the plan? We had a lot of flexibility in that we build our own verification program and the questionnaire. It was reviewed by EPA and accepted. And so now we have a methodology in place approved by EPA that says you're following your plan. We have a tool in place that say, we can answer that question. Yes, to farmers following a plan. So what if they're not one of them? I had I was out visiting with a planner and he did a verification. And a farmer only had 65% verification. We're running between 85 up to 90%. Farmers fall on your plants. Have that documented? Well, that's awful. What are we going to do? Farmers only 65%? What's that mean? Really? Note No, there's no penalty. There's nothing coming back on the farmer. They discovered what the problem was. They had miscalibrated the applicator, and they over applied phosphorus on a lot of fields. And so this looks bad. Well, next year, so they found a problem. They corrected the problem this coming year proudly, farmers probably going to be up at 85 or 90% implementation of these plant. Okay? No, no, no issues, no penalties for the 65%. But what you have to recognize is that's a tremendous testimony of how this process works. And once again, when we're looking at defending what we're doing. And we can show how we progress and gone from a low rate to a high rate just by identifying the issues and having a farmer dress him as a great testimony to say that what we're doing is working. Okay. So I got a couple minutes yet. Let me touch on one other thing. And that's a direct pay program. And I can make this information available to the agents. They can just contact me and I'll be glad to give it to them. So direct pay is is very similar to the n-m law that a program that's administered through the cost-share program. The difference between an M1 day and direct hey, is that the farmer is not involved in the direct pay program, the plan or takes care of all the paperwork. And so the planner fines client or if he's already working with a client, that's fine. They submit a consent form that the farmer his sign to us. We administer this program, Alice central office enrichment. We receive that consent form. We approve the plan to be written because we have the money. Planter writes the plan, sends the plan to us, we review it and approve it, and a planner gets paid. And so it's a very simple prize. In the fall as far as a farmer goes. They just see the plan are showing up and writing their plan. They're not obligated to do any kind of late work. It's not run through the district. So some advantages. One now, since the planter is getting paid through direct, hey, it allows the district and the farmer to take more of the funds and apply that to putting BMPs on the graph. So they're not having to take money out of the farmer's account to pay for the plan writing. So it allows extra, extra money there to put BMPs on the ground. So I put this document together and I can make it available to any farmer. I put in here a list of questions. So we we have the list pay direct certified planners and I have about 32 in the program so far. The areas they serve, whether they write crop or the right animal plans. So if you have, if you already have as you're working with a planner and you're very satisfied with the service that planners giving. They just can sign up and work through the direct pay. No problem at all. If you're looking for her and you're a little hesitant, what can I do? How do I know if I'm getting right, planner nine. So I've put a list of suggested questions in this document about so you call planter up. They work in the area where your farm is. You might ask and some of these questions decide, hey, is this the right person to come work for me? Because, you know, all planters are different and different personalities that slightly different philosophies. And so if you're going to be serviced well, buy a planner. You and Ad Planner have to be communicating on the same level. Okay, and so that's very important to get the most out of neutral major program, you have to have an excellent relationship with your planner. And so some of these questions might help you sort through them. I would say if you're already working with a planner and they are giving a good service, they can switch over and get paid through the direct pay program. It's seamless. From the fiber perspective. Several that districts are promoting the planter to use direct pay again, because then that allows them to allocate more funds to the farmer to put practices on the ground. Alright, thank you, Dave. We appreciate you joining us this morning and sharing that update. I will just look and we've got a lot of dialogue, several questions in the chat window. So I'm going to scroll back up and see if we can maybe touch on some of those topics. I see we have one of the first comments and first of all, I'd like to thank all of you from, from the local solar water districts that have joined us. Appreciate you being here and providing somebody's questions and comments. I think that's really going to be helpful for good dialogue discussion this morning. So one of the questions and comments that we had, Dave was talking about some of these cause share practices, maybe not being available if this does become implemented into legislation in 20252026. So I don't know that there's much further to be said about that other than that, that is a possibility. Well, yeah, if it becomes mandatory. And this is all conjecture. I mean, you know, typically when things become mandatory, we haven't always offered cost share for it because now the farmers required to do it. So from the, from the cost share side, especially the stream fencing, you know, they've had very good programs where the farmer can get pretty much everything paid for. And so the discussion might come up, well now that is mandatory. And if budgets are getting tight, they might say, you know what they asked, Do it now anyway, now they're going to have to pay for it. So I think there'd be a lot of pushback to that. But that may look at some practices, maybe lead them in place, but they may reduce the payment. So from the district standpoint, as many producers as you can get participating, especially in stream fencing, is going to be certainly be a benefit come 2025 when the secretaries or have to making those decisions. I think you touched on this a little bit day, but we did have a question here about the Bay model credits into question was our credits to the goal based on a number of nutrient management plans for the acres that are in nutrient management planes. Okay, that's very good question. The goal is based on Acres. So we have to show right now, we're looking at having acres in the bay drainage, about 876 thousand acres of planned acres we need in the drainage system. So that that sounds like a pretty big number and it is. But what I'm trying to let people know is we've we've we've had that goal in years past. I mean, we've had that acre numbers in years past. So in 20 let me look at my numbers here real quick. In 2012, we had a 1,000,200 thousand acres plan. In 2013, we had a 1,000,450 thousand acres plan. 2014, we had a million three hundred and forty three acres plan. So having a plan 876 thousand acres is a very doable goal. Now the difference between those press years and where we're at now is that we have to do verification. So if we're at let's say we're at 80% verified acres as far as our our verification program. So that that's acres gone account. So let's say if we had if we submitted a million acres, I'll plans, we would only be able to count 80% of those are 800 thousand. So when we're looking at 876 thousand acres, yes, we're going to have to have probably close to 1 million acres planned to get that 876 thousand. But it's very doable. We're running at 85 to 90% verification, which has astounded everybody. But I think it really shows the commitment of Virginia agriculture to do the right thing. And that's what's come out of this verification program. It really has shown agriculture in a very good light. All right, the next question that we had here was in prescribing nitrogen and phosphorus, would it be a correct understanding that yields under that value system can be used or the Avars three highest yields of the past five years can also be use whichever one is higher, and I believe that is correct. Yes, they can they can use either one. But hopefully, you know, if you're keeping good yield records, the farmer is going a little better than values. But yeah, feet are willing can be used. And I have a lot of planners that right to plans based on values. The farmer has looked at his yields over time and say, you know, what values is run and right along with what I'm doing. And so I'm gonna step on a few toes here. Planners like the use values because they don't have spend time getting yield records. Farmers like using values because they don't have to spend time documenting yield records. As we go forward. We need documentation of yields, an application. Because when we do verification, if you don't have any yield documentation of yield records and application records, we're not gonna be able to count those acres toward meetings, our goals. So. Values is fine if you want to use that to write the plans. But we still need participation by the farmer in accumulating the records. And the record keeping system doesn't have to be complicated. K, it can be very simple. You know, a lot of financial lending institutions have had the record books that they give the farmers to keep track of records. It doesn't have to be computerize anything like that. They can they can have their own system. It just has to be some type of documentation that the planner can look at it and see that the farmer made applications according to the plan. We got a question, David. Will DSCR BY sending the nutrient management plans to the district or will that be the responsibility of the plan writer? Yeah. The thing about sending the plans around. I usually tell the planters when they sign up farmers, that farmers participating in cost share. The planner needs to go by the district and talk to whoever administers that as to what the plans need to look like and how they need to be formatted. And so I'll continue to do that. So at that point, I would, I would let that be the decision between the planner and the farmer. As a farmer says, hey, industry calls for a plan. You have my permission to send that plan to them or whatever the arrangement needs to be. I urge planners to work directly with their farmers for requests for any information they do. And so if the farmer tells the planner, Hey, make me an extra copy and drop it off at the district. Can be done, but it's not automatic. I tell the planner they need to respect their client's data and how it's managed. And they have to work through the farmer to get permission to do that. Most times it's not a problem, so it can be done. I just stress they need to have a little custody chain there. So they're not giving data out that the farmer did not want given out. But that should be able to be arranged. No problem. But it won't be automatic. Felt like say they'll have to work that out between the planner and a farmer, how the farmer, once his plans distributed. We've got two more questions in the chat window, David and I'll open it up for anyone that has questions or compensation. On the first of those is is the direct pay program just for the Bay watershed or is that state lie? Right now the fun all the funding that's allocated TO it is for the Bay watershed with one exception where you can write plans outside the Bay watershed that support the litter transport program. So of course, we're trying with litter transport program, we're trying to move as much litters possible out of the Bay watershed. And so that was justification enough. We can write plans outside the Bay watershed, but only if they're associated with litter transport program. All the other writing has to be within the Bay watershed. And the final question in the chat window, does cropland include nurseries and vegetable arms if they are over 50 acres? That's a good question. I wouldn't I wouldn't I wouldn't have an answer for that. I think we'd have to go back to the authors of this document, decide that in our, in our in my nutrient management regulations. If we look at crop land, crop removal, crop rotation, there's several definitions. Crop means cultivated plants or agricultural produce such as grain silage forges, oil, seeds, vegetables, fruit, nursery stock or turf grass. Crop land means land used for the production of grain, oil, seeds, silage, industrial crops in any other category of crop, not defined as a specialty crowds. So if they, if they will use that definition for crop lands, oil, seeds, silage, industrial crops, and any other crop not defined as a specialty crop. So let me tell you what specialty crop is. And let's see, especially crop means vegetables, tree crops or perennial vine crops, ornamental horticulture crops and similar crops. So if they use that definition for crop land, vegetable tree crops, perennial buying crops, ornamental horticulture crops would not come under cropland. But whether that was the intent of the definition of crop land that they used in the and the reg i don't know. That would let me see if I can because they have definitions associated with it. Ok. Chesapeake Bay crop landings, cropland in the Commonwealth located in the Chesapeake Bay watershed on which fertilizer, manure, sewage sludge, or another compound containing nitrogen or phosphorus is applied. Chesapeake Bay crop land does not include lands on which bovines or pastured. So if you look at that, the only land that's not included as their definition of crop land is pasture where bovines grace. So that would be all inclusive except basically for pastures. So in that case, they may have to look at being included in the mandatory program. We've got two more questions here and in one alum, I'll address here with our announcement of next week's topic on VCA today. But before we get to that, we've got one question here on wood nutrient management plans and stream on exclusion apply to all livestock or just bovine. Well, that's I I could answer that question. In the language. They only say bovines and I know that's come up for discussion. What if you have goats or sheep? They're not exactly bovines. So again, that would have to be a clarification. We'd have to get from from the authors of this document. And I try to push off, but I don't want to try to imply something that shouldn't be implied. So at the moment, they could either, we could either to seek out guides on add and, or just work as best we can of Guinea stream fence now, I could be that could that could possibly be a change in the language. You know, as we have 5-years here, you have different people coming in. They may look at that and say, well, hey, you know what, we've got? We've got homes and sheep and AMUs and everything else out here. We really need to we really need to make sure that stuff fenced out too. So I would not would not hang my hat on bovines, just meaning cattle. Because we have those years to get from one place to 20-25. So the cost share program, how they right to do the stream fencing? I think I'd use that as guidance as far as how to talk to producers about getting the stream fencing dot on their operations? Dave, We had a question. I don't know if you can can comment or answer this. We had a question about for the bovine numbers that they mentioned in that regulation, is that by head or is that by animal unit? Is that specified? Is not specified. They just say bovines. I'm thinking. And I may get smack down for this. Since we're using the term bovines, they may not be familiar with the more intricacies of animal units versus head. But it's not, it's not specified in the, in the language. Now they don't they don't define that by animal unit. So I would I would just assume they're talking about number of cattle standing there for bovines. I also saw your comment there about the question was, is there any hope of getting litter transport to counties that do not have poetry forms on end or within the Bay watershed. And that's a great segue for our next week's presentation, or just to make a point on that while we're at the topic next week we're going to be joined by Dr. Mark, writer and Steph melons from DC or in the topic of discussion is going to be poultry litter. We're going to talk a little bit about the aerodynamics of poultry litter usage. But also we're going to have Seth join us and speak a little bit about some of the updates on the poultry litter program through DC are. So if that's a topic of interest and we encourage you all to join us next weekend. It'll be covered. So wouldn't be the first meeting I spoke at Robbie where everybody was just so all struck, they couldn't speak. Well, I think you did a great job covering every thank David and I know it's you know, that's why we wanted to do this. And I'd like to really give credit to, to Mike broadest and Caroline and King George, the agent in those counties. Mike was really deep inspiration behind this topic of discussion. He thought this was something that would really be beneficial. So I know Mike, you're on with us. I thank you for for your recommendation for this session. I think we've had a great turn out and got a lot of great information. So appreciate you being here with us. Everybody that's joined us from the soil and water districts, other extension personnel and agents. Thank you all for being here. As I said, this session has been recorded. So if you have clients that would be benefitted from this, please feel free to share that with them. You can see the link there on your screen about three quarters of the way down for the recorded sessions. Also, if you need help getting nudges, contact one of the agents for the program. We'll be glad to get those links too. Thank you, David. We really appreciate your time this morning. And as always, it's a pleasure to have you all with us. Appreciate the updates. Also, I'd like to take just a brief second again to recognize and thank the group of agents that make this effort possible. As I said, lower maxi ne, staffing, Rommel check might broadest and Trent Jones, I wouldn't be possible without all their work. So thank you to everyone. A Rabi I got Nao De visit a bit in it. More discussion or by, you know, revise animal soul to us to give three years recommendations aged bull. To aid in the speed or the development of a nutrient management plan? You may use a soul fast, older than three years. No, sir. To have assault specifically designed to capture some of that information for nutrient management plan. And rather than the soul to us just given 011 year rotate, a one-year crop recommendation, give three when it's printed out a debt. Okay, now I know who I'm talking to happen. Ok, remember we talked about this Thaler and I followed up with Rory on it some. But just one person I just haven't had time to dedicate back to pursuing it more, but I know I understand fully what you're asking that they could have, but I know one of the issues are and I talk to Rory was getting their software updated to do something like that on down at the soil testing lab. I'll leave it at the moment. We've had a discussion but we haven't gotten any farther with it for your tail or not. Apologize for not being able to dedicate more time to it. But a lot of stuff happened here. Oh yeah, coded happen. But but but not I mean, it would be a wonderful thing. Flip flip texts lab to have a reason to update desk software. Because as Ben, I had a man. So revise and recommendations as things change. A main at 11. Example of that is, you know, with just the little bit of tobacco samples. We don't use ended a far laws oppose or they send back almost a recommendation. I know the analysis Taylor is outdated. Yes, sir. Ok. And, and but, but no nobody remembers Fortran or what what a program is written in to change its mean and its, its whale would do to be change. So if they, if they made the recommendations as plant food, that that would be better. Yeah. But you know, for some of those specific crops, I just use that as a example. Rom, you know, because it was just way it was to address the offers and pot ash that they require about a soil sample. They gave the examples of the the analysis of the firm laws. Yes, sir. And kind of like a a turf Sayyaf, although they can go in and change. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know. I know they might be able to do something like that internally because I know they can APOE nobody knows how to do. Oh, okay. I know all that. And the other thing is finding even if they did no funding to get somebody to do, it's always an issue to Seoul Test Lab. They really struggle sometimes for funding to keep that going. We really need it. But it's not always their decision whether it's the best thing or not. But thanks for con Taylor and reminded me I remember we had to talk and I followed up with Rory on some things and I just wasn't able to push it hard enough to get something to to address your concern. But I'll bring it back up on the radar now. Yes, sir. Thank you for colon. All right. Well, I don't see anything else there, so we'll go ahead and finish up this morning. But again, thank you, David. We appreciate your time this morning. Thank you for your efforts and had been wetness up. I know this is going to be an ongoing topic of discussion over the next several years. So we'll try to make an effort to continue to these sessions like this in offer some additional information for producers and, and plan writers to make sure everybody is well ahead of the game, hopefully, depending on what happens in 20252026. So thank you again for joining us again. Thank you for participants had joined us this morning. A few closing remarks. As I said next week, our topic of discussion is going to be poultry litter won't be joined by Dr. Mark, writer and sef moments from the Department of Conservation and recreational net topic. So it will be next Thursday morning at nine AM. Said Be on the lookout for that advertisement. Again, recordings are posted at the link you see on your screen there. And finally, one last comment I'd like to make if you've been joining us for these sessions, if you could please fill out our evaluation. You've you've seen some of that when we send out our emails with the advertisements and stuff, but it just take a few moments of your time. And if you have questions or recommendations for topics, that would be a great way for us to get those in the vita program for those topics. So again, thank you for everyone's time does more. Hopefully this was a benefit to everyone. And we appreciate Dave, again, you being with us and hope everyone stay safe and stays well.