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Forecasting tool helps decide when to spread manure

There is an online tool Wisconsin farmers can use to help decide when to spread manure. 

Andrea Topper with Wisconsin’s Department of Agriculture, Trade, and Consumer Protection tells Brownfield knowing when to spread to avoid having nutrients runoff into ditches and waterways is important for both field fertility and water quality, and the Runoff Risk Advisory Forecast tool can help. “It is a free tool available 24-7. It’s a tool online that farmers can go and check to see is it a good day to be spreading manure? Is there a risk for a runoff event to happen?”

Topper says the Runoff Risk Advisory Forecast is useful year-round, projecting out ten days during the winter months. “It’s taking into consideration the fact that the ground is frozen therefore these manure applications aren’t going to be incorporated. They’re going to be spread on top and they are vulnerable to any weather events that might be coming.”

In the summer, Topper says the tool looks ahead three days from late spring into fall when it’s easier to incorporate manure into the soil.

Topper says the Runoff Risk Advisory Forecast was developed in partnership with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, using their weather models and has been updated several times over the past decade. “Previously, it was looking at five-mile grid radiuses and now it’s looking at a tighter grid of one-and-a-half miles. Previously, it was updated one to two times a day. Now, it’s being updated four times a day.”

Topper says the Runoff Risk Advisory Forecast can be found online, here.  She says some other states have also built similar forecasting tools including Michigan and Ohio.

AUDIO: Andrea Topper from the Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection discusses the Runoff Risk Advisory Forecast tool with Brownfield’s Larry Lee