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Farmer begins shift to climate-smart practices

Carbon sequestration has picked up some momentum as more producers have implemented climate-smart practices.

Eastern Nebraska farmer Quentin Connealy farms along the Missouri River, about an hour north of Omaha. He tells Brownfield he’s making a slow transition to climate solutions on his operation.

“I came from a tillage operation, so we’re about up to 20% no-till right now, which is progress,” he said. “We’re in a funny spot with the Missouri River bottoms. We really fight compaction. We’ve got to fine tune a lot of things and look at a lot of different options to see how we can adapt. It’s not just a turn key deal. We just got to keep studying and see where we can work it into our soils.”

Connealy says he had some hesitations. “You could always take that yield hit. You don’t know if it’s going to help your farm or how bad it could hurt your farm because it’s unknown territory to you usually.”

But he says he’s optimistic about the benefits to natural resources. “It could be a big game changer in the farming industry.”

Connealy says he won’t be eligible for USDA climate incentives until 2025.

He spoke to Brownfield at the Plant Based Products Council’s annual conference in Omaha, Nebraska.