Dan Diaz

Lena, IL

Stephenson Soil and Water Conservation District

Dan and his wife Kathy have four children and four grandchildren. They farm 25 acres of his 52 acres in northwestern Illinois. Diaz is a cooperating producer within the Stephenson Soil and Water Conservation District and has served on their board of directors. Diaz farms an annual corn-soybean rotation on a farm with a significant percentage of highly erodible acres. He farms parttime and has a fulltime career as a Director of Engineering at an agricultural feed manufacturing company.  His career has included the way he manages his operation and he often applies his background in engineering and data analysis to the farm.  While his acreage is small, he has used his background to improve his farm and share data with others to show the benefits of cover crops and other conservation practices. Diaz believes in a balanced farm operation, incorporating crop production as well as conservation to create a wildlife and pollinator friendly habitat. While he does not farm full time, the farm is financially sustainable and is truly a production, not a “hobby” operation.   He has participated with his local NRCS office and with national organizations, such as NACD and Datu Research to participate in soil health studies.  He believes that results which can be seen on small acreage can apply nationwide. Diaz has enjoyed being part of the NACD Soil Health Champion network to share those results.

Soil Health Practices

When Diaz took ownership of his land, it had been in a combination of permanent pasture and CRP. He then transitioned it to no-till crop production. The farm had several preexisting erosion issues created by previous tillage and grazing practices that created erosion gullies six to ten feet deep on several areas of the farm.  After initial crop production, the soil conservation repairs began with creating grassed waterways and water control structures, working with the Stephenson County NRCS technical team for design and build criteria.  The first five years of production, Diaz switched from “farming to halves” (a form of share farming – partnering with another farmer on labor/equipment/supplies/land), to renting his land, and finally to owning the entire production process. To really take ownership of his operation and the decision-making, Diaz says he needed to own his land, giving him full control.  Beginning in 2005, after analysis of yields and soil conditions, Diaz started implementing numerous USDA Farm Service Agency Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) practices such as contour buffer strips, grassed waterways, riparian buffers and filter strips. Through his participation in the USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service Conservation Stewardship Program (CSP), Diaz expanded his conservation practices to include cover crops, deep-rooted cover crops, and forestry management practices. Some of these practices were put in place to resolve preexisting erosion problems while others were added to benefit water quality and wildlife habitat.  On his second round of CSP enhancements, he added practices for pollinator establishment, riparian buffer strip enhancement, and standing crop practices.  Yield mapping was also used to make decisions on adding additional CRP practices to “farm the best and conserve the rest.” In 2019 and 2020, pollinator plots and prairie strips were added to the CRP practices.

Diaz says that cover crops have been an excellent addition to his soil health practice portfolio. Before adopting the cover crops, other conservation practices had helped to control erosion on his highly erodible acreage, but the cover crops have greatly improved the soil structure and have begun to improve his yields. Incorporating cover crops has been a learning curve for Diaz. He spent a lot of time and energy figuring out which cover crops to use and what the management was needed to benefit his cash crops.  In addition, several of the more difficult yield areas of the farm were fallowed. Highly aggressive cover crop establishment during the fallow year drove yields on those acres up from far below average, to rivaling the best acres on the farm.  Diaz is now working to include a wheat rotation as well. He is discovering additional custom farming operators who are adding small grain equipment and rotations to their operations locally.  This capability was virtually non-existent 5 years ago and he believes it is being driven by more diversification and the need for cover crop establishment.

Challenges

Diaz has faced some challenges improving the establishment of cover crops and managing cover crops in the crop rotation. Weather is a challenge in both establishment and termination of cover crops. He has transitioned to more aerial seeding application to get a better window for establishment and a longer growing season.  Fallowing difficult acres has helped more dramatically than anticipated.  Termination of the cover crops has also been challenging, especially in several years between 2015 and the present.  It appears that climate change is creating either too cold and wet, or very warm and dry springs.  When it is wet, the cold conditions made it difficult to terminate in a timely manner. Diaz believes commodity prices will also affect cover crop usage since the price producers can get for their crop will need to help fund cover crops.  It appears that the last several years of improving crop prices have impacted the overall adoption of cover crops.  Diaz is also seeing heavy adoption among some of his early mentees with changing crop rotations, grazing practices, and a transition to a balance of the corn monoculture philosophy of the early 2000s.

NACD and Datu Research

From 2015 – 2017, Dan Diaz participated in a soil health study conducted by NACD and Datu Research. The focus of the study was to examine the economic impacts of cover crops and no-till in four case studies in the Upper Mississippi River Basin. For more information on these case studies, please visit the NACD website.

Updated August 2022