UW Organic Ag Field Day looks at vegetable varieties, research

Organic vegetables will be the focus when the University of Wisconsin–Madison holds its fourth annual Organic Agriculture Field Day on Wednesday, July 28, at the West Madison Agricultural Research Station.

Field tours will offer a look at organic vegetable variety development, no-till vegetable production using killed buckwheat mulch and sweet corn density. The program will also include late blight updates, cucumber beetle management, fertility management using cover crops and a demonstration of VeggieCompass farm management software.

The field day offers growers a chance to compare the performance of a wide array of organic vegetable varieties.

UW-Madison is part of an organic variety trial network that also includes researchers and farmers in Oregon, Washington and New York. This partnership allows comparisons across a range of regions, farm sizes and farming systems, explains Erin Silva, organic research coordinator at the UW–Madison College of Agricultural and Life Sciences.

“We will be able to determine, for example, whether a specific variety might offer advantages to a one-acre, CSA-type farm versus a 50-acre farm that grows primarily for the wholesale market,” Silva explains.

Researchers will also talk about the UW–Madison’s own organic variety breeding program.

An indoor session will focus on VeggieCompass, a software-based system that allows a diversified vegetable farm business to track costs and profitability of individual crops and market channels. The system, which was developed by the UW–Madison in partnership with organic producer Jim Munsch, is available online.

Registration will begin at 1 p.m. Demonstrations and tours will run from 1:15-5:30 p.m. The station is located at 8502 Mineral Point Road, just west of the U.S. Highway 12/14 interchange.

Anyone planning to attend should register by contacting Silva at 608-890-1503 or via e-mail at emsilva@wisc.edu. Pre-registration is not required but is much appreciated.