The Wilke Project - A Grower Driven, Public-Private Venture to Adapt Direct Seeding Systems for Eastern Washington

Diana Roberts

This project is a community and grower driven, public-private cooperative effort to adapt and develop annual cropping, direct seeding systems for the intermediate rainfall area (12 to 17 inches annually) of eastern Washington. Lincoln County, WA, where the Wilke Project is centered, is the second or third largest wheat-producing county in the US.

The project goal is to demonstrate economically viable rotations, including alternative crops to wheat, that enable annual cropping and improved soil conservation. Grower interest in direct seeding is to cut input costs, spread risk with diverse crop rotations, and prevent soil erosion by wind and water.

This annual cropping system immediately eliminates summer fallow acres that traditional systems use one year in three in this region. This direct seed system has the potential to reduce air quality problems associated with summer fallow, soil erosion by wind and water, nitrate leaching into groundwater, degradation of surface water and salmon habitat by soil runoff. We anticipate it will be a long-term project with evolving objectives and methods.

Currently we are testing two crop rotations: 1) A four-year rotation including two cool season cereals, one warm season grass, and one broadleaf crop; 2) A three-year rotation including crops all adapted to the region; two cool season cereals and one cool season broadleaf.

The project is based at the 320-acre WSU Wilke Farm at Davenport, Lincoln County. Both rotations are being grown at the farm in three replications of approximately 10-acre strips. An important premise of the project is to use farm-size equipment for all management operations.

In addition, area growers are replicating each rotation on their farms at three sites across the region. They provide valuable information and insight into the system performance in a variety of microclimates. These on-farm plots are at least 25 acres per crop.

Economics of the rotations are of primary importance. We also obtain economic information from conventional cropping systems from three farms adjoining the Wilke Farm. We track the changes associated with going to direct seeding and annual cropping by collecting data on the Wilke Farm and on-farm sites for soil health and structure, soil moisture, weeds, insects, diseases, etc.

We hold summer tours of the Wilke Farm and on-farm sites. We also publish our findings in Extension publications and present them at winter meetings. Over 150 people attended the first two years of Wilke Field Tours in 1998 and 1999. Of attending farmers in 1999, 75% reported they have tried or intend to try direct seeding on their farms.

Highlight information from the 1998 and 1999 field days includes:

Cooperators and collaborators in the project include:

• Ag Horizons team of WSU Cooperative Extension,
• ACIRDS (Annual Cropping, Intense Rotation, Direct Seed) group of Lincoln and Spokane County producers
• Environmental Protection Agency Region 10; Columbia Plateau Agricultural Initiative (CPAI)
• Lincoln County Conservation District
• McGregor Company
• Monsanto Corporation
• Western Farm Services
• Washington State Department of Fish and Wildlife
• McKay Seed Company (Almira)
• Natural Resource Conservation Service

Each of these groups participates in different ways. The project includes consensus building training for all cooperators in order to ease the decision-making processes involved with a broad group with diverse perspectives.

The Wilke Direct Seeding Project, along with related efforts, has the potential to change the face of Pacific Northwest agriculture, improving economic, environmental, and social sustainability of farming across the entire region.

Diana Roberts
Cooperative Extension Ag Horizons Team
Washington State University
222 N. Havana
Spokane, WA 99202
Tel: (509) 477-2167
robertsd@wsu.edu

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