Soil Health Tech Tools Watch Party: Comet-Farm

Soil Health Tech Tools Watch Party: Comet-Farm

Wednesdays, August 12 and 26, 2020

5:30-7:00pm MDT

Our second watch party of the year, focused on Comet-Farm, is scheduled for Wednesday, August 12. RSVP to receive a confirmation email containing information about joining us via Zoom. At the end of this email you’ll find information on the free Comet-Farm tool and where to register for it before the party.  

In the two weeks following the watch party, we’ll send out tasks every few days for you to try on your own operations, and we’ll organize a listserv where you can ask questions and share ideas with other participants. On Wednesday, August 26, we’ll come back together online to discuss insights and challenges!

More Information

The Comet-Farm tool is a free web application designed to enable farmers and ranchers to estimate carbon sequestration and greenhouse gas emissions related to annual crop production, livestock, and on-farm energy use. The tool was developed by Colorado State University in collaboration with the USDA and NRCS to help producers evaluate the benefits of implementing conservation practices that can reduce greenhouse gas emissions and increase carbon sequestration. Comet-Farm uses detailed spatially-explicit data on climate and soil conditions for specific locations and allows users to enter detailed information for their fields and livestock operations. The tool can be found at https://comet-farm.com/Home. 

At our watch party on August 12, you will learn to:

• Navigate the Comet-Farm tool web application and input farm data.

• Determine the approximate greenhouse gas emissions of your current ranch management practices.
• Run different management scenarios to understand the tradeoffs in greenhouse gas emissions between different farm and ranching management scenarios.

• Read Comet-Farm reports following data input and use the information to make informed decisions on farm and ranch management practices to mitigate GHG emissions.

The Comet-Farm tool is free to use and is available online with a laptop or desktop computer. 

Website: https://comet-farm.com/Home

Before the webinar, please:

• Visit the Comet-Farm website and register to create your account. Guidance on this process can be found in this tutorial.
• Compile information about your management practices including:
  • The number of animals and unique herds you keep
  • The type of housing/shelter you keep your animals
  • Annual feed ration information (type of feed, calendar of feed, proportion of each food stuff in feed)
  • Manure management 
• Download zoom at https://us02web.zoom.us/. Several tutorials are available for using Zoom (here are two at YouTube and Zoom).

Email Jenna Davis at jdavis at quiviracoalition dot org with any questions