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Innovation at Work: Helping Iowa farmers uncover greater gains, success with sustainability

News — DAYTON, Iowa – Kellie Blair clicks open a spreadsheet and begins to scroll, smiling as she watches color-coded lines of meticulously maintained research data bloom brightly across a large computer screen inside the Blair Farm office.

Despite the chilly, late-winter winds swirling outside, it won’t be long until spring arrives at the farm. Planning is well underway.

“The new season is an exciting time, and we talk a lot about conservation and continual improvement,” Kellie said. “We’re always trying to improve upon yield and profitability, but we know conservation is important. It’s something we believe in.”

Together, Kellie and her husband AJ Blair manage , a modern, diversified family farm near the central Iowa town of Dayton. They are the fourth generation to farm this stretch of Webster County land.

The Blairs both graduated from , where Kellie majored in agronomy and forestry, and AJ studied agricultural business. They’re both century farm kids, too.

AJ spent his childhood at Blair Farm – “I grew up here, I’ve always been here,” he said with a chuckle – while Kellie grew up on her family’s century farm near the small western Iowa town of Pisgah located in the Loess Hills region of the state.

The Blairs are now raising their two children on the farm.

“The history here is meaningful to us,” Kellie said, “and we’re proud to continue it."

A culture of conservation

The Blair family raises a rotation of corn, soybeans, oats, alfalfa and cereal rye, as well as cattle and pigs. The farm has a 450-head cattle feedlot and a 2,400-head wean-to-finish swine barn as part of its livestock operation. The Blairs sell their farm-raised beef directly to consumers and custom finish beef cattle for other farmers. 

Conservation is a farm-wide focus for AJ and Kellie, and they are constantly looking for new practices that align with their approach to sustainability and profitability. 

“Kellie and I both come from farm families that encouraged conservation,” AJ said. “I think you just need to be curious and searching. Keep asking, what else can we do that’s conservation farming but also keeps us in business? It’s a learning process.”

Research partnerships and collaborative projects are key to their success across the board.

AJ estimates Blair Farm has been part of 15-20 large-scale research partnerships with Iowa State and select other partners. These partnerships are often multi-year collaborations that provide unique opportunities for knowledge sharing and allow participants to make smarter, more impactful adjustments from year-to-year.

“One of the biggest challenges in farming is trying to figure out what to measure and how to measure it,” Kellie said. “If we’re going to make a change, we need to first think about the goal, and in the end, we need be able to measure if we were successful." 

“Research partnerships give us the opportunity to collaborate with experts – including the amazing people at Iowa State – to establish measurements, gather data and ultimately make smart business decisions over time,” she said.

Angie Rieck-Hinz, an field agronomist who serves north central Iowa, works with the Blairs and helps them evaluate what’s working well on their farm, what they could do better and how to use the research data being collected to advance their goals.

When Reick-Hinz launched a no-till/strip-till farming discussion group a few years ago, she said the Blairs were among the first to get involved. The group connects farmers who have experience reducing tillage and no-till with farmers who are looking to adopt these practices or have questions about how to improve their existing efforts. During monthly meetings via Zoom, members discuss research, ideas and challenges. 

“My favorite thing about the Blairs is that they are both highly curious people who are constantly exploring, adapting and evolving,” Rieck-Hinz said. “If something doesn’t work, AJ and Kellie regroup as a team and try again. Whatever the mission is, they want to improve and then share what they learn. They’re great collaborators and stewards of Iowa’s soil.”

AJ and Kellie also host field day events at Blair Farm with . Based at Iowa State, Iowa Learning Farms has created a statewide network of farmer partners to serve as local contacts and resources for farmers and landowners in their area. During field day events, local farmers and landowners visit partner farms, where they can learn about more conservation practices their peers have implemented, ask questions, share information, and discuss best management practices for improving water quality and soil health while remaining profitable.

Ground support

The , a public-private partnership led by Iowa State and supported by the Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship, works with Iowa farmers to conduct nitrogen fertilizer trials on private farms across the state. Nitrogen fertilizer is a critical (and costly) input to crop production, and it can be difficult for farmers to determine the optimum application rate, given that it can change dramatically from year to year.

Last year, Blair Farm conducted several of the Iowa Nitrogen Initiative’s 470 on-farm trials. Trial data is used to better understand the interactions among genetics, weather, soil type and management, and how those interactions impact cropping system outcomes. The Iowa Nitrogen Initiative can then provide farmers with information and web-based tools that help to identify optimal nitrogen application rates.

“The Iowa Nitrogen initiative is a great, on-going research partnership for us,” Kellie said. “The data generated makes a real difference and has helped us fine-tune our nitrogen fertilizer usage to maximize yield and profitability.”

Michael Castellano, Iowa State agronomy professor and the William T. Frankenberger Professor in Soil Science, leads the initiative and said the Blairs are an excellent example of Iowa farmers who are working to make a difference not only in their own farm fields, but in the field of agriculture.

“AJ and Kellie are really innovative and always thinking about how they can advance the boundaries of conservation and productivity,” Castellano said.

Water quality

Matt Helmers, professor of agricultural and biosystems engineering and director of the , has worked with AJ and Kellie on research related to water quality in Iowa and the emerging technology of drainage water recycling (DWR).

In 2022, the Blairs excavated a three-acre corner of their corn and soybean fields to create a small reservoir to serve as a DWR system test site. The reservoir collects field drainage and rainfall throughout the year, with the goal of supplying the right amount of water at the right time for crop production. 

“By storing drainage water in the spring to reuse in the summer as supplemental irrigation during dry periods, DWR systems can help increase crop yields and make cropping systems more predictable and stable in the face of weather extremes,” Helmers said.

The reservoir at Blair Farm can irrigate about 106 acres of adjacent farmland, with the water it captures available to use with a pivot-irrigation system during drier parts of the growing season.

“As a farmer, one of the things you can’t control is the weather, so we were curious to look at how a drainage water recycling system could help us store excess water and then have that water available for when our crops really need it,” AJ said.

Kellie and AJ said the opportunity to improve water quality was another reason they decided to invest in a DWR system, which can capture excess nitrogen and phosphorus from farm fields. These nutrients would otherwise flow downstream with drainage water. Storage in a reservoir can also help lower the concentration of nitrogen and phosphorus, allowing the nutrients to be recycled back onto fields with irrigation.

A trusted partner

As they grow their farming practices, AJ and Kellie said they are proud to have Iowa State as an innovative research partner they can count on.

“Iowa State is a trusted partner for us because of the relationship we have with them,” Kellie said. “We know the people and we know the research, and that puts a lot of trust into what they tell us. 

“We’re excited about the future, and we want to keep up with the research. The way to do that is being involved, and we feel like we’re doing OK on the farm because we have good partnerships.” 

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The above is the second feature in Iowa State University's , which explores and illustrates Iowa State's role as a trusted partner. Through research, teaching, service and extension, ISU has a long history of providing proactive and innovative solutions. This work is happening in labs across campus, in Iowa farm fields and in collaboration with business and industry ... .