Sampling Strategy
The ROW Soil Health Sampling Strategy collects paired samples, intended to assess the long-term affects on soil health from different land use practices. For each pair of samples, either the ROW management is held constant and the land management of the contributing drainage area is varied, or the ROW management is varied, and the land management of the contributing drainage area is held constant. For example, in a paired sample, the two samples might both be collected in a natural/unmanaged ROW, but the contributing drainage area to one sample is in row crop, while the contributing drainage area to the other sample is in prairie.
The ROW for each sample was considered either unmanaged (left to go natural, and may contain some native species), domestic (the property owner actively mows and may spray the ROW), and in once case was wetland. The soil types of all samples are the same, so that the results can also be compared across pairs. The paired samples are collected for the following (contributing drainage area listed first, ROW management listed second):
- Grazed Unmanaged vs. Grazed Domestic
- Row Crop Wetland vs. Row Crop Unmanaged
- Row Crop Domestic vs. Row Crop Unmanaged
- Residential Domestic vs. Residential Unmanaged
- Woods Unmanaged vs. Woods Domestic
- Prairie Unmanaged (no prairie managed)
Samples will be collected and analyzed on a 3 to 5-year rotating basis.