Boundless Science Season 2: Nurturing Nutrients Through Fertilizer Management

Join Dr. Emma Matcham, a UF/IFAS State Extension Specialist in Nutrient Cycling through the Department of Agronomy and Caitlynne Youmans, a Master’s student at the University of Florida in the Department of Agricultural Education and Communications as they chat about fertilizer research as it relates to Florida agriculture. Dr. Matcham shares her experience researching precision technology as it relates to agronomic crops. As an expert in her field, Dr. Matcham shares with Streaming Science her very personal connection to researching fertilizer best management practices to keep crops happy and healthy, and Florida waterways clear of fertilizer run off. The future is bright in terms of Nutrient Cycling and fertilizer management. Listen in to learn more about Dr. Emma Matcham and some of the science she champions everyday. #boundlessscience #season2 #BoundlessScienceseason2

Check out more information about Dr. Matcham, the UF Agronomy Department, and fertilizer management research below: 

https://www.facebook.com/UFAgr 

https://agronomy.ifas.ufl.edu/people/emma-matcham/ 

https://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/publication/AG472 

https://youtu.be/yCi7WBmB3rQ?si=qsHiXUuKK_Wx-yHC 

 Keywords: Nutrient cycling, nutrient management, fertilizer, fertilizer management, best management practices, agronomy, agroecology, Extension, State Extension Specialist, BMP

Transcript

Caitlynne: [00:00:00] Welcome back to the podcast series, boundless science brought to you by streaming science, a student driven program that works to connect you with scientists. To learn how science impacts all of us and our everyday lives and interests. I'm Caitlynne Youmans, a master's student in the Department of Agricultural Education and Communication at the University of Florida, and I am your host for today's episode.

In the following interview, I spoke with Dr. Emma Matcham. Dr. Matcham is an assistant professor and state extension specialist at agronomy department. Listen in on the following conversation to learn about Dr. Matcham's research journey and how she strives to positively impact farmers and the environment we live in.

Thank you so much Dr. Emma Matcham for being with me here today. Would you like to go ahead and introduce yourself for [00:01:00] us? 

Dr. Matcham: Yeah, thanks so much for the invitation. 

Uh, I'm an assistant professor and extension state specialist in the agronomy department at uf, and my program areas focus on nutrient cycling for mostly agronomic crops, so silage corn, peanut soybean, forage crops, uh, all sorts of things.

Caitlynne: Very nice. 

So you said that you are an Extension State Specialist. Do you want to tell us what Extension is and what are Extension State Specialists? 

Dr. Matcham: Yeah, so Extension is taking the knowledge generated from research, so research is that creation of new knowledge, and disseminating it to the end users of that knowledge.

Historically, land grant universities had Extension programs across most of their departments, including Engineering Extension that would go talk to folks in manufacturing contexts, or Chemistry Extension and Food Safety. We still have some of those programs in Extension. But these days, a lot of our extension programming is more focused on the agricultural sector.

In Florida, my role as a state specialist is [00:02:00] a mixture of supporting farmers and community members directly and then also serving as a resource for our county agents and faculty. Our county faculty are most farmers first point of contact with Extension, and then if they have questions that their county folks can't answer, or they need more specialized resources, their county faculty will connect them with the appropriate state specialist.

I do have farmers reaching out to me directly as well, but the vast majority of the contacts I get from community members are coming through a county office first. And then in addition to that, we do a lot of inter risk trainings to help build the skills of our county faculty, especially as, you know, our knowledge base and our research grows.

We make sure that our county faculty are informed about that new knowledge so they can be a resource there directly in their communities. 

Caitlynne: Farmers, extension agents reach out to you for help. Is that the only thing you do, is just client management? 

Dr. Matcham: We also do a lot of like public facing events. Uh, so instead of people [00:03:00] reaching out to us with questions, we'll do educational activities for the community.

Uh, some folks do that through the 4 H program, which is focusing on children. I mostly work with adult audiences, and I'll do field days and hands on demonstrations, especially during late summer. 

Caitlynne: And what does a day look like in your job?

Dr. Matcham: As an assistant professor, I actually have an appointment split.

This is really common for faculty at land grant universities, and 70 percent of my duties are research related. And 30 percent are extension related. On that research side, that includes advising graduate students. I have a few students who work for me in my lab and do research projects as part of their degrees.

It's writing papers, it's teaching. Analyzing data, it's really the research side of my job. And then that 30 percent extension represents one to two days a week where I'm either at an extension event, preparing for an extension event, or writing extension materials. So blog posts, uh, EDIS [00:04:00] publications, things like that.

Caitlynne: So what is an EDIS publication for our listeners who might not know? 

Dr. Matcham: Yeah, so EDIS is Florida's repository of extension publications. And they're available online. I don't actually know if county agents have printed copies anymore. They might. Um, we can print them for any interested folks. And they are educational resources that include summaries of research trials, crop management recommendations, um, hurricane safety recommendations, food safety recommendations, and they're written for a general audience.

So if you have a middle school reading level, you should be able to read any of these and understand what they say. They should have a mixture of like technical information and then that background knowledge people need to understand where these recommendations fit within their life. 

Caitlynne: So you do a little bit of communications, a whole lot of extension, you do a lot of research, and with all of that, what is like the best part of your job here at the [00:05:00] University of Florida?

Dr. Matcham: Yeah, so the people make UF the best place to work. I love working with students and county agents. It's my favorite part of the job. And, uh, I have some really great research teams that I also get to partner with on the extension side. So some of the people that I work with on research are the same people I'm working with on extension.

We get to build really deep relationships that way. And it's, I've been here about two years. It's been really fulfilling to be able to get to know my colleagues better and know everybody's strengths and feel like there are, there are folks to support me and my programming. And I get to be a resource for my colleagues as well.

Caitlynne: And I do know that you have, you've shared with me, you have a lot of colleagues across different universities and things, and that's probably because you haven't spent your entire academic career here at the University of Florida. Would you like to share a little bit about your academic career, how you ended up here, and kind of some of the people and resources you, you met along the way?

Dr. Matcham: Yeah, um, so I actually got into Extension when I was an undergrad at Ohio State. [00:06:00] Uh, I had been working at a coffee shop during summer and saw a flyer, they were hiring a research intern, uh, who knew GIS, could drive stick shift, and wasn't allergic to bees, which is kind of a weird combination of job skills, uh, but it was late in the summer, I wasn't really satisfied with the idea of working at this coffee shop for summer, uh, Without anything else going on and I applied and in this job I was able to meet our extension agronomic crop specialist for Ohio and we were working together to collect Insecticide drift data during corn planting to assess how much insecticide leaves fields during planting and measure that risk for honeybee populations.

Uh, and this was a great project, it was really interesting science, but it also helped expose me to the world of extension. Uh, Harold Waters was the extension, uh, agronomic crop specialist at the time, and he spent a few weeks just [00:07:00] introducing me to folks he thought might have support for a master's student in agronomy.

Uh, I didn't notice until about a year later that that's what he was doing. Uh, so really, really grateful for his influence on my career to this day. And then we were working with Reed Johnson in the entomology department. So that's how I got into extension. I was able to stay at Ohio State and work with Laura Lindsey for my master's.

And my research there was looking at variable rate seeding for soybean. 

Caitlynne: Do you want to talk a little bit about what that means?

Dr. Matcham: Yeah, so variable rate is a technology that allows a planter to change how many seeds it drops as it drives through a field based on the planter's location. So this requires a mixture of different, uh, transmission and actual seeding.

like machinery parts on the planter to be able to change rates easily, and then geolocation data and mapping technology. So it's a whole suite of technologies that work together that allow us to [00:08:00] manage our crops at a geographic scale smaller than a whole field. So instead of pulling up to the field, changing the planters, uh, seeding rate using sprockets on the back of the machine, and they're just driving through the field and it doesn't change until you stop again.

Um, this allows it to automatically change rates as it drives through the field. Is that an expensive technology? It's difficult to put a price on because it requires a suite of technologies working together to be effective. Some folks have already adopted the GPS technology required to make it work and the data management framework for making it work.

So for those folks, it's a relatively small marginal cost, um, but for people who have adopted none of the technologies, it can be kind of pricey. 

Caitlynne: Thank you for that. So, um, from that research that you were doing, you said this was your master's research. How did that turn into, um, your doctorate? And further now to where you are.

Dr. Matcham: Um, so while I was at Ohio state, I was able to work on a multi state [00:09:00] project. So Laura Lindsey, my master's advisor was working with 10 other states. including the University of Wisconsin. 

I collaborated on that research project that was looking at survey data from soybean farmers across the north central U. S. and met Sean Conley through our research collaborations during my master's. He and I thought that there were research projects within his program in Wisconsin that would be a good fit for me and my Ph. D. and I knew I would learn a whole lot about Extension specifically. By doing a Ph. D. with Sean. So I moved up to Wisconsin and did my Ph.D. there. 

Uh, my research focused on variable rate potassium applications and data mining techniques. So using farmer generated data for research purposes. I finished my PhD there in 2022. 

Caitlynne: That's really interesting because I feel like normally research, the pipeline is the other way around where universities do research for the farmers.

So that's really interesting that you took farmers, their [00:10:00] data research and kind of did the opposite effect of like how it affects universities. 

Dr. Matcham: Yeah. So as our machinery has become more complicated, more mechanized. There are also a lot of pieces of technology collecting information as farmers use their machinery.

And that data is messy, it's complicated, um, but there's so much of it. Uh, so we live in a very data rich world, and my PhD research was, you know, one of, you know, probably thousands of projects looking at how we can, you know, get value out of this data that's being collected anyway. You know, we didn't have to go through extra effort to actually collect the data.

We did have to go through a lot of post processing to make the data useful, but that data already exists out there. 

Caitlynne: That's awesome. And so then you graduated with your PhD and what was your next step? 

Dr. Matcham: I actually came straight here, so I graduated with my PhD and then was able to [00:11:00] start here at the University of Florida.

It's pretty common for folks to finish their qualifying or prelim exams during their PhD and then immediately start applying for jobs. So it's a pretty common pipeline within agronomy at least. I'm very fortunate that I didn't need to do a postdoc or other things in between graduating with my PhD and starting this position, but I was able to start here immediately after graduation.

Caitlynne: And are you doing all of the same type of research, or what does your research, uh, path look like right now for you? 

Dr. Matcham: Yeah, there's some common threads across my research career, and all of my research happens at the intersection of crop production, nutrient management, and spatial data management. I was more focused on seeding rate, and soybean systems, and potassium during graduate school.

And now I'm a little bit more focused on other crops that are more important for Florida. So I'm doing a lot with silage corn, I'm doing a lot with peanut. But I'm still kind of asking some of those same questions of how do we manage nutrients [00:12:00] appropriately. in this specific place. So instead of making blanket recommendations across a whole state or a whole region, I'm really focused on spatial variation in crop nutrient need and optimum crop management.

Caitlynne: And so a big part of that is Precision technology. And so you do a little bit of research around that, which I know is a big keyword right now in agriculture. Everyone loves to talk about precision, precision technology. So I just want to hear from you. How do we research it in your field? And how do we also describe that research to farmers?

Dr. Matcham: Yeah, that's a huge topic. Let's start with breaking down what precision technology is. Um, because there's a huge suite of technologies that are kind of lumped together when we refer to precision agriculture. Um, and that includes things like sensors that are taking real time measurements in fields. GPS systems that tell us exactly where we are.

So a lot of the data that we're collecting [00:13:00] now is all geo referenced. Remote sensing, so using satellites or other imagery tools. Drones, the data management software that actually collects all that information and allows us to process and read and store that data. So there's lots of different technologies.

That all make up precision agriculture, and a lot of times successful implementation of one technology is dependent on successful implementation of another technology. So I used the example of GPSs earlier. It's really difficult to implement variable rate technology without effective guidance systems and GPS technology.

Does that make sense? 

Caitlynne: Yes, so that's the GIS also that you were talking about that you did kind of in your presentation. Uh, masters, right? 

Dr. Matcham: Well, and during, uh, my undergrad as well. Uh, so a GIS, a geographic information system, is one type of software. Uh, so ArcGIS is a common one, ArcMap. Um, or I use QGIS [00:14:00] for a lot of my research.

There's some agriculture specific GIS technologies like SMS. Um, and a GIS is just any, uh, software that allows you to store, visualize, and process spatial data. 

Caitlynne: And so all these technologies work together to create the big umbrella of precision technology. 

Dr. Matcham: Yeah, yep, that's a good way to put it. So first I want to talk about the why of why I think this is such an interesting thing to research.

Um, starting in the 50s and 60s, the U. S. saw this increase in average field size. We were merging fields together, we were managing larger and larger areas of land as a single unit. given our machinery at the time, when we were We're creating bigger fields, we were also increasing the scale of management decisions.

But, fields are still variable. When we have bigger fields, they're encompassing a fair amount of variability in the landscape. They might have more low points and high points, like a, a [00:15:00] rolling field. That creates dry spots and wet spots, where optimum crop management might be a little bit different. They might have more soil types, and a lot of the precision technology that I'm most excited about allows the management scale to be shrunk below the size of the field.

So we're splitting fields into smaller, smaller management zones using this precision technology. 

Caitlynne: Absolutely, and so what does that, how does that benefit farmers and how does that benefit your role as an extension agent? 

Dr. Matcham: When we're able to make decisions on smaller and smaller scales, those decisions are related to crop inputs.

We can improve the return on investment for everything we put into a field. That means that for every pound of fertilizer we put out, we are going to see a larger increase in yield. And it also means that more of the fertilizer is going into the plant, and less of it is being lost to the environment. [00:16:00] So improving ROI for every field input, whether that's fertilizer, whether that's seed, whether those are other crop inputs.

Caitlynne: So, do you want to talk a little bit about what fertilizer is, how important it is for us to research it and know these things for the environment? 

Dr. Matcham: Just like humans need a wide variety of nutrients to grow, there are 18 elements that are required for plant growth. And some of those elements are already present in fields and in growing environments, um, like carbon, which comes from the CO2 in the air.

Um, but other elements like calcium and boron, those are coming out of the soil and absorbed through roots. Any of the nutrients that a plant needs to grow end up being stored in plant tissues. And I'm going to use soybean as an example. The nutrients stored in the soybean grain or seeds are end up getting removed from the field at the end of the season, and the nutrients stored in the leaves and the stems, those get left in the field, and the nutrients within them get [00:17:00] recycled for future crops.

So the leaves break down, and the elements within them are available within the soil for future crops to take up. But all of the nutrients that were inside the grain, that's actually left the field. You know, that's, that's on a truck, that's on a train car, that is being fed to pigs in North Carolina, or being exported to Asia.

You know, those elements aren't in our field anymore. And fertilizer is how we help replace those nutrients that are removed at harvest, so that we can grow future crops in the same place. 

Caitlynne: So there's a lot of misconceptions probably out there about like is fertilizer safe? Is it, um, beneficial? Do you want to talk a little bit about those things?

Dr. Matcham: I think a lot of the questions that I get when I'm just interacting with the public, like if I'm, I'm getting my hair cut and I mentioned that I do fertilizer research, I do get a lot of questions about fertilizer safety. But a lot of times the questions I'm getting about fertilizer safety are folks conflating fertilizers with pesticides.

[00:18:00] So not all agricultural inputs are the same. And I also do have a lot of confidence in our pesticide regulatory system in the U S. So that is not my specialization. We're. Not gonna talk more about that today, but I want to make sure that we separate that out. You know, pesticides are a different class of products.

I also am confident that those are safe, but that's a different podcast. Most fertilizer products, especially the ones you can pick up at the garden center, are pretty inert. They're not going to react with a whole lot in our environment. Going to, they can be corrosive. Um, but they're unlikely to be dangerous for humans to touch.

And so from like a human safety contact worry, I have very few worries about fertilizer products. Uh, from an environmental safety problem, in general fertilizers are only a problem because our agricultural landscape is so large. So anything that we do at a watershed scale can have large impacts on our water supply.

We have a lot of agricultural [00:19:00] production in Florida. It's one of my favorite things about working here is that we have lots of agricultural land and it produces a wide diversity of crops. But because there's so much. Any small amount of fertilizer lost from an acre of land in agricultural production is representative of thousands of acres.

So it's that, like, multiplicative effect that becomes an environmental risk. So I want to mention that there are nutrient stewardship frameworks that we use when we're researching fertilizers. One of them is the 4R framework. And this helps us understand which fertilizers are going to be best for specific crops or cropping systems.

and how we should be applying them. So at what rate, at what time, and where the fertilizer should be located within a field. So should it be spread over the top? Should it be under the soil surface? By researching these best management practices or fertilizer management practices, we can help reduce the risk of [00:20:00] fertilizer over application.

and still maintain good plant growth, which is really important. We want to maintain high yields because we want to eat food. We want to have fiber and fuel. But we also want to reduce the risk of overapplication since that causes both environmental risks and reduced farm profits. 

Caitlynne: And that goes, speaks back to the return on investment that you were just talking about.

So now that we understand what fertilizer is and how to manage it and what you do to research it, can we talk a little bit about careers that are related to this big idea of precision technology, fertilizer management, kind of some of the jobs out there that people can get other than just being a scientist or just being a communicator.

Dr. Matcham: Yeah, a lot of the career paths that you can think of have an agricultural component to them. So there's engineering, we also have agricultural engineering, there's communication, we have agricultural communication, um, education and agricultural education, [00:21:00] insurance and finance industries have a huge segment.

within the agricultural sector. Um, so if you have a career interest, there is a way for that to intersect with agriculture. A couple that are really present in my work life in agriculture include crop advisors, uh, who work with farmers and help them with their decision making and planning for each crop season.

There are extension agents. It's a great role, especially for people that want to be a bridge between research and other members of our community. Um, there's technology sales, seed sales, fertilizer sales, uh, and then farmers and other people making those land management decisions on the ground. 

Caitlynne: So there's a lot of ways to get involved in what you do.

We've learned so much about your research journey, how you got here, what you're currently doing. I'm curious, what are kind of the next steps in your, in your research journey? Um, are there big picture, little picture things that you're working towards? 

Dr. Matcham: Yeah, uh, so I'm going into my third field season in Florida.

I just finished ordering my [00:22:00] seed, making my plot maps that I have, you know, the, the tools I need to collect data this spring. Some of the projects my team's working on that I'm really excited about. include, we're looking at zinc toxicity in peanut production systems. So zinc toxicity is a challenge because a lot of fields that have received biosolids or manure have a high level of zinc and peanut is a crop grown in these areas that is very sensitive to zinc.

So we're looking at management that can help reduce the impacts of these high levels of zinc on peanut production. We're also working on a glossary, a document that helps us to find some site specific nutrient management words. And this is really helpful since a lot of the vocabulary around nutrient management has a regulatory definition.

that might vary from its colloquial usage. So for example, the term best management practice is used [00:23:00] in agricultural contexts all over the country, but in Florida, the term BMP has a specific regulatory definition for people who live in certain watersheds. So that can be really confusing, especially someone who's new to Florida.

So our glossary is going to help with that. people understand what these words mean in different contexts and help us use language more consistently around nutrient management and precision agriculture. 

Caitlynne: I'm doing a little bit of help on that project with you through Dr. Lauri Baker at the Public Issues and Education Center here on campus and so I'm really excited to work with you and the team. We're going to be doing some focus group things in the future. Um, I honestly, I don't really know what all that encompasses, but I know that, um, I'm really excited to move forward with that with you. 

Dr. Matcham: So focus groups and the social science side of agriculture and, uh, extension communication is new to me this year, but I have it in two different realms of my work.

So the first is that project you just mentioned with the [00:24:00] PIE Center that you've been as well. And then the second is looking at Nutrient management. Decision making tools like digital tools for nutrient management recommendations and how farmers Want those to be communicated to them. So we're doing some focus groups in the US and in Brazil. 

This is with Dr. Kim Morgan who's an economist and we're focusing on whether people would prefer these be static tools web based apps Desktops, like how do people want to be receiving? information related to site specific nutrient management. Uh, so I'm really excited about that project. 

Caitlynne: That's awesome because science communication is growing and it's big and it's important and so I appreciate all the research that you're doing not only with the actual field data but you're also doing more of the like, how can we better get these things that we're doing and that we have been doing to the farmers and the people who really need to know.

Dr. Matcham: Yeah, we can generate all the information that we want, but if it's not actually [00:25:00] influencing change, it's a lot less valuable. So on the focus groups related to nutrient management recommendation communication, we are also doing research on nutrient management generally. including creating some standard practices for using farmer generated data and machinery generated data across two different countries, so Brazil and the U.S. 

So how can we standardize those data sets? How can we make sure that we're using that data in a way that is reflective of what it actually means? Because machinery data can't be error prone. We're working on the science side of that, and it's been nice to be able to bring the social science side in on the front end.

Because that expedites the pace of research and it helps us really focus our data collection on the things that matter for the end users of the knowledge we're creating. 

Caitlynne: You deserve snaps for that. That was a great explanation of how social science and the hard sciences can work together to get the job done.

Get the things done that need to be done. [00:26:00] I appreciate you so much for being here with me today. I really enjoyed myself and learning a lot about precision technology and nutrient management. And you are absolutely an expert in your field. I know at first you were like, I am unsure. I just want you to know and feel confident that you just blew my mind and I learned so much in this 30 minute conversation with you.

Dr. Matcham: Thank you so much for inviting me. This was a really enjoyable experience.

Thank you for listening to the Boundless Science Series on the Streaming Science Podcast. I'm your host, Caitlynne Youmans. If you enjoyed this episode, we encourage you to tune into other episodes in our series and visit our website and social medias in our show notes below for more [00:27:00] information.