Healthy Farms, Healthy Soils
A research collaboration between farmers, scientists, and conservationists
Philo Ridge Farm was founded just over a decade ago with a vision of positively shaping Vermont’s agricultural future. One of the early goals of the farm was to create a working example of how farmland can be an environmentally beneficial landscape through the application of thoughtful and integrated farming techniques.
Tracking the value of transitioning Philo Ridge’s farmland from conventional to regenerative farming methods has been an important part of our process since day one. Though the beneficial impacts of our methods may be visible at the farm, to become most effective and useful to other farms, we believe these impacts and changes must also be measured, documented, and analyzed. Our research program and data collection allow us to continue learning about and refining our methods and to quantify and share their value with others.
Using research to support Vermont’s farms
Philo Ridge Farm has adopted soil health management practices including management-intensive rotational grazing (MIRG), supplemental seeding, and pasture nutrient amendment.
As has been widely reported, conventional dairy, hay, and row crop production degrade soil and speed climate change through the release of carbon and methane into the atmosphere. These types of farming systems still make up around 80% of managed agricultural land in the state. The cost-to-productivity ratio of these farms, already tight, continues to shrink, driving farmers to employ short-term cost-saving farming methods that further degrade the land and decrease its ability to sustain long-term production. Steeply declining milk prices have exacerbated already serious financial woes for many farms. Understandably, younger generations now see farming as a losing prospect—the growing number of acres of Vermont farmland left fallow is perhaps the greatest current threat to the future of the state’s agricultural sector.
At Philo Ridge Farm, we practice regenerative farming as a means of addressing these multiple challenges. We are aiming to collect data through research to see if regenerative farming’s interconnected benefits can ultimately lead to greater economic stability and success for farmers, as well as more resilient local food systems that don’t depend on fragile monoculture farming models.
But what are regenerative farming practices? At Philo Ridge Farm, the core pillars of our system are building healthy soils, increasing water retention and purity, enhancing biodiversity and ecosystem resilience, and reducing carbon emissions through carbon sequestration. We practice rotational livestock grazing, use cover crops as part of our crop rotation, apply compost annually, plant native perennials, and continually explore more regenerative practices to foster the health of our land and the surrounding ecosystems. Conservation Innovation Grant Ecological Researcher Nour El-Naboulsi explains, “Healthy and diverse pastures and surrounding natural areas are home to countless varieties of plant, animal, and fungal species, each working together to create a vibrant ecosystem that benefits each other as well as us humans.”
Regenerative agriculture is still being defined as a practice, and its environmental, economic, and social impacts have yet to be well studied and documented. There’s also scant data on the costs and return on investment of transitioning from conventional farming practices to regenerative methods. Data collection and analysis around all of these factors is crucial to understanding and communicating the potential benefits of regenerative farming methods for Vermont’s farms and farmers, and the communities they support.
Tracking the value of transitioning Philo Ridge’s farmland from conventional to regenerative farming methods has been an important part of our process since day one.
The Conservation Innovation Grant
Over the years, we’ve become more adept at conducting research, learning how to coordinate our resources and collaborating with knowledgeable partners to establish best practices, get access to valuable tools, and standardize measurement taking to obtain more consistent, shareable results. In 2020, preliminary data collected through Philo Ridge Farm’s research initiatives enabled our research partners, the University of Vermont and the Vermont Land Trust, to apply for and receive a $2 million Conservation Innovation Grant (CIG) from the USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service to study the outcomes of transitioning Vermont farms from conventional farming practices to regenerative systems for grass-fed livestock.
“The ultimate aim of the CIG study is to provide a comprehensive, data-backed understanding of the effects of regenerative farming practices on Vermont’s farmland and environment.”
Philo Ridge Farm is a partner and participant in the study, named “Managing Pasture for Healthy Farms and Soils Across Vermont,” which is now in its third year of data collection. Working closely with a cohort of 15 farms located in diverse regions across Vermont, the study’s goal is to provide the first rigorous state-wide analysis of the environmental, economic, and social impacts of regenerative farming. Participating farms are adopting soil health management practices including management-intensive rotational grazing (MIRG), supplemental seeding, and pasture nutrient amendment. The grant provides financial support and technical guidance for each farm as it implements these new practices and funds the collection and evaluation of data by the study’s researchers.
“The work we are conducting as part of the CIG project will produce valuable research results with a number of real-world applications. A helpful thing to understand in this sense is that this project is an on-farm trial, meaning the research components take place within the context of real-world, working farms. The benefits of this is that we, as researchers, gain insight not only into the impacts of these practices on farms, but also the complexity of implementation within a number of different, dynamic, and diverse farming systems,” explains CIG Social Science Researcher Mario Machado.
The study’s goal is to provide the first rigorous state-wide analysis of the environmental, economic, and social impacts of regenerative farming.
The ultimate aim of the CIG study is to provide a comprehensive, data-backed understanding of the effects of regenerative farming practices on Vermont’s farmland and environment, the effort and expense that go into implementing these methods, and the overall economic and social benefits to farms, farmers, and communities of adopting regenerative practices. “We are exploring a potential approach to agriculture in Northern New England that could provide a viable income to farmers while improving soil health, sequestering carbon, and raising nutritious food. The work has the potential to provide a win-win for farmer livelihoods and the climate problem,” explains University of Vermont’s Ecological Team Lead, Eric Bishop von Wettberg.
Over the last three years, the CIG study’s researchers have been collecting soil samples, soil compaction and water infiltration measurements, data about pasture species diversity and livestock forage quantity and quality, and overall data related to farm management. Soil samples in particular are helping the study track the chemical, physical, and biological changes to each farm’s specific soil type.
CIG researchers from each of the project partners, University of Vermont, Vermont Land Trust, and Philo Ridge Farm, have been busy compiling data from each of the study farms. Farmers have kept busy as well by providing monthly records of the economic expenses associated with implementing CIG practices, providing detailed records of land use management practices for all of the enrolled pastures, and filling out annual social science surveys and sitting down for interviews with CIG researchers to help us understand all of the different costs associated with implementing these practices.
There is a fourth and final year ahead of data collection for the CIG project, which will culminate in a detailed report of our findings, available to the public through the NRCS. The report will include case studies for each participating farm in addition to scientific journal articles and a series of pasture walks. The pasture walks will take place on enrolled CIG farms where community members can learn directly from CIG team members and farmers. “I hope this project can offer useful insights into pasture-based production in Vermont—what it costs, what impacts MIRG can have on soil health, and how farmers are making it work (or not) with their operations. I hope the individual farmer case studies can be used by other farmers to inform decision-making about what approaches to try, and help consumers better understand the how and the why of pasture-based production” explains Vermont Land Trust’s CIG Project Director, Annalise Carington. “I also hope the project can help inform how NRCS can best support grazing-based farms in Vermont.”
Regenerative agriculture is still being defined as a practice, and its environmental, economic, and social impacts have yet to be well studied and documented.
Further research initiatives at Philo Ridge Farm
Philo Ridge Farm Research Coordinator Madeleine Hassett out in the field taking soil samples.
Our work on the CIG project connects us to the impact that regenerative practices are having on farms around the state but also informs the work we do on our farm. “Every farm faces challenges as they transition to more regenerative agricultural practices, and it is really exciting to plan out future research projects and focus on what we want to accomplish in the next few years,” says Philo Ridge Farm Research Coordinator Madeleine Hassett. "Participating in the CIG grant has provided us with an incredible amount of ecological data about our fields and will provide a great baseline for future projects at the farm as well.”
In addition to playing a leading role in the CIG study, in the past two years we also supported multiple small-scale experiments and third-party research proposals. We hosted studies testing cover crop varieties for things like phosphorus uptake, nitrogen fixation, soil fertility, and overall viability, and we studied the efficacy of integrating in situ measurements with remotely sensed data about regenerative practices. We partnered with individual researchers at University of Vermont to investigate the impact of essential oils on pest and parasite diversity and abundance and to create a State of Soil Health compendium for the state. The farm also served as host for research-related events including the CIG Summit and a gathering of the Vermont Grass Farmers.
Beyond the valuable insights provided by the data we’re collecting at the farm, and as part of the CIG study, our research efforts have also repeatedly taught us that agricultural fieldwork takes time, resources, and cooperation—and a lot of walking.
The supportive, collaborative relationships we’ve built, and those now being nurtured by the CIG study between farmers, on-farm researchers, research partners, and other experts, are key to our ongoing success and the future of Vermont’s farms. “As both a researcher and a practitioner, I know that the ultimate referendum on the quality and impact of this kind of work cannot be measured in data/analysis or reports or academic publications. These things are important, of course, but at the end of the day, the biggest successes that come from this project are the relationships we are able to build with farmers and the trust we engender with the farming community,” says Machado.
We’ll continue to share updates about our findings and how these and future efforts are progressing us toward our goal of a more environmentally, economically, and socially sustainable future for Vermont’s farms to keep working lands working.
Curious to learn more about what on-farm research looks like? Stay tuned for an upcoming blog by Philo Ridge Farm Research Coordinator Madeleine Hassett.