PRINCETON, Ky. — Each year the program at the Corn, Soybean and Tobacco Field Day at the University of Kentucky (UK) Research Farm consists of individual production training sites at educational research plots.

A mini-corn seminar will be given at a corn plot. A mini-soybean seminar will be given at a soybean test site – and so forth. A fourth educational station for 2014 will be dedicated to producer water quality and nutrient management planning.

The field day is set to begin July 31 at 7:30 a.m. The purpose is to keep working grain and tobacco farmers in western Kentucky informed about current issues, procedures and timely research. The training will be provided by specialists from the UK College of Agriculture, Food and Environment and by representatives of commodity groups from within the state.

Sponsorship will be provided by the Kentucky Corn Growers Assoc. (KCGA), the Kentucky Soybean Assoc. (KSA), Drexel Chemical Co. and the Burley Stabilization Corp.

For this event attendees will split into four smaller tour groups and each tour will visit one of four educational stations for a presentation. The four stations will be crop management, integrated pest management, a tobacco station and the aforementioned agricultural water quality station.

Because the tours will be repeated on a rotational basis, producers have the opportunity to experience all if they wish.

The Kentucky Agricultural Water Quality Act of 1994 is state law that requires all agricultural operations with 10 or more contiguous acres to maintain a water quality plan. The role of UK water quality extension specialist Amanda Gumbert at the event will be to give advice on how to properly prepare a water quality plan for farms.

She will also talk about a second written plan farmers may need. Gumbert said, "If you are applying nutrients to your farm in the form of manure or commercial fertilizer, you will need a nutrient management plan to go along with your water quality plan."

She suggested a local soil conservation service could be a farmer’s first point of contact for developing or updating their water plans.

Adam Andrews, program director of the KCGA, will be another educator at the water quality station. He and Brent Burchett of the KSA will co-present an update of activities their organizations are involved in with water quality regulators, and to encourage farmers to get involved in the process.

Andrews explained producers need to be proactive when cooperating with regulators. "A regulation that overestimates the farmer’s contribution to pollution as excessive is a bad regulation," he said.

Josh McGrath, UK extension soils specialist, will also speak on water quality issues at the field day. McGrath, who recently left the University of Maryland to join the UK staff, will discuss outcomes of the widely discussed recent Chesapeake Bay water quality scenario.

To learn more, call Colette Laurent at 270-365-7541, ext. 264.