BF 112: Reading the Land

Monitoring for Change Pays Off

There is only one guarantee in agriculture or other land-based businesses: “When we improve land health we realize improvements in production, profitability, and social well-being.” So, how do we confirm and/or measure improved land health? We must learn how to read the land as we walk across it, and learn how to conduct various biological monitoring practices, from simple to more complex.

Target Audience

ALL LEVELS: Farmers, farm managers, and other landowners interested in learning how to improve land health through the power of observation, data gathering and interpretation.

Course Objectives

The primary learning objective for this course is to enable you to begin successfully understanding observations and information you can easily gather from a piece of land. This will allow you to establish a baseline of the land’s health and determine if your management decisions are moving toward what you desire for the land in terms of health and productivity.

In this course you will learn how to:

• Make visual observations
• Develop a monitoring transect
• Collect data
• Summarize and analyze the data you collect
• Use these data to change your management to move the land toward what you want

Webinars

A majority of the work is carried out on your own schedule, which can include readings, photographs, videos, graphics and PowerPoints. A key component are assignments in Teachable, our virtual classroom. To pace and coordinate the independent study there are weekly webinars during the course to allow you to learn from presenters and other students and to ask questions in real time. If you miss or wish to review any webinars, they are always recorded and posted for later viewing.

Webinar Schedule

Live instruction for 2023 has concluded. You are welcome to enroll now to complete this course on a self-paced schedule and join our next live session in Fall 2024. All webinars are recorded and posted in your online classroom to watch anytime. Once enrolled in this course, you will retain access to all materials indefinitely and may return to participate in future live offerings of the course as well. Please join us!