Compost is the result of microbial decomposition of organic matter under controlled conditions. It is used to improve soil health, but it is important to note that lower quality composts can negatively impact crops and soils.
Spreading equipment is a key part of compost application, and can vary from operation to operation:
Selecting Compost:
Application timing:
Application Rates:
Typically 3-6 tons of moist compost applied per acre per year
Conservation tillage (CT) is an umbrella term for a method of land preparation that utilizes crop residue as mulch, leaving at least 30% of soil covered with previous crop residue at the time of planting. Types include no-tillage, strip-tillage, ridge-tillage, and mulch-tillage.
Implementing conservation tillage can take a considerable amount of planning and experimentation to create a management system that works for your farm. Materials can include:
Minimum Tillage:
Mulch-Tillage:
Strip-Tillage/Ridge Tillage:
No-Tillage/Direct Seeding:
Cover crops are a variety of grasses, legumes, and forbs planted for seasonal vegetative cover in agricultural operations. They are a primary fertility and soil management tool for soil health and ecosystem improvement.
Cover crops can be planted at multiple times throughout the year, though cover crops in California are often planted following fall harvest and decompose before spring planting. Cover crops can include a single species or a mix of grasses, legumes, and forbs; plant selection depends on your regional and site-specific climate and soil conditions. Materials can include the following:
Common cover crops:
Inoculent (for legumes only):
Planting equipment:
Timing:
Irrigation:
Cost:
Hedgerows are lines or groups of trees, shrubs, perennial forbs and grasses that are planted along roadways, fences, field edges, or other non-cropped areas.
Farm plans are helpful tools to partner with the establishment of hedgerows; key considerations include selecting hedgerow plants compatible with the soil, water, wind, and light conditions on farm or ranch. Aerial maps that can help assess the topography, hydrology, and crop/non-crop production areas are also useful.
Cover crops can be planted at multiple times throughout the year, though cover crops in California are often planted following fall harvest and decompose before spring planting. Cover crops can include a single species or a mix of grasses, legumes, and forbs; plant selection depends on your regional and site-specific climate and soil conditions. Materials can include the following:
Plants that tolerate standing water:
Perennial grasses that tolerate standing water:
Shrubs that do not tolerate standing water:
Perennial grasses that do not tolerate standing water:
Forbs that can handle some soil saturation:
Mulching is applying plant residues, compost, or wood chips to the land’s surface without incorporating it into the soil.
Cover cropping and conservation tillage can dovetail into use of intercrop crop residue as mulch in a low-input system that maximizes soil health and efficient use of resources.
Prescribed grazing is defined as the management of vegetation with grazing and/or browsing animals with the intent to achieve specific ecological, economic, and management objectives. Grazing management systems can vastly vary.
Before implementing prescribed grazing on the land that you steward, it is important to incorporate the following tools:
Note that the following is general criteria applicable to prescribed grazing.
Riparian forest buffers are habitat dominated by woody species established along a creek. Riparian forest buffers are meant to enhance riparian habitat by shading the body of water and protecting it from harmful runoff.
When planting riparian buffers, make sure to choose species that are well-adapted to the soil and climate conditions of your region. The following is a brief list of California native plants commonly planted for riparian buffers . For a longer list and more detailed instruction, see 'Additional Resources' on the following page.
Riparian Plant Species for Contra Costa County:
Site prep & planting:
Timing:
Spacing:
Maintenance:
Whole orchard recycling is the practice in which orchard trees are chipped and incorporated back into the soil at the end of their agronomic life cycle. The wood chips are incorporated back into the soil of the fields where the trees stood, which may be fallowed or continue agronomic production under minimally-tilled perennial crops.
Implementing whole orchard recycling is a process that depends heavily on machinery capable of uprooting mature orchard trees and roots. Materials can include:
The following information represents an abbreviated version of the process of whole orchard recycling:
Nutrient Use:
Windbreaks (and other wind barriers) are plantings of trees or shrubs meant to shelter and protect chosen areas from wind. Windbreaks can also be known as shelterbelts, and share many uses and benefits with hedgerows.
Farm plans are helpful tools to partner with the establishment of windbreaks; key considerations include selecting plants compatible with farm's ecological conditions. Aerial maps that can help assess the topography and hydrology are also useful.
When planting windbreaks, it is important to plant species that are well-adapted to the soil and climate conditions of your farm. The following is a brief list of California native plants commonly planted for windbreaks, shelterbelts, and hedgerows.
Trees:
Shrubs:
Skills: Permitting, conservation on agricultural land, illegal dumping prevention.
Fun Fact: Eagle Scout, former member of the University of California Marching Band, aspiring birder, and a Contra Costa native raised in Southern California.
Ben started working with Contra Costa RCD in January 2017 after receiving two Masters degrees from Indiana University in Natural Resource Management and Environmental Policy following undergraduate studies at UC Berkeley. Ben manages the Voluntary Local Program, the EcoStewards Program, and other conservation programs focused on agricultural lands.
Skills: Water conservation, Irrigation Audits, Data interpretation/analysis, Soil conservation.
Fun Fact: As a toddler Ishai lived on a cut flower farm. His first word was tractor. While working as a gardener, Ishai learned to backcountry ski, because being in the snow is much better than being in the rain.
Ishai has over 20 years’ experience in the landscape field, with 8 of those as an irrigation specialist. He is also a licensed landscape contractor. In 2016, Ishai returned to school as a returning adult student, first earning a Certificate of Achievement in Nursery Management at Diablo Valley College, and then transferring and graduating from UC Berkeley in 2022 with a BS in Conservation and Resource Studies, earning the departmental citation.
After graduating from Cal, Ishai worked as a Scientific Aid in the Groundwater Permitting Unit at the Regional Water Quality Control Board, reviewing groundwater discharge monitoring and reporting data.
Ishai has a deep interest in all things grass, soil and irrigation and has focused his studies on those fields.
Skills: Critical Thinking, Environmental Education, Community Engagement, Qualitative Data Analysis.
Fun Fact: I consider myself a “micro-hiker”, or someone who notices and admires the tiny details and mini ecosystems all around (leaves, bugs, the interesting pattern on a rock, wildlife, fungi, moss, etc.).
With a B.S. in Society and Environment from UC Berkeley and a minor in Food Systems, Nat is a critical thinker; a passionate believer in collective liberation; and dedicated environmental steward. In the Berkeley community, they have been involved in many projects toward food justice and agroecology such as Pour Out Pepsi, the Berkeley Student Food Collective, the UC Gill Tract, and Berkeley Student Farms. From these spaces/efforts, their passion for sustainable food systems grew. They are excited to be part of the Urban Agriculture Team and help actualize sustainability goals that CCRCD and partners are striving toward!
Skills: Environmental stewardship, relationship building, community composter & gardener, aspiring homesteader, native grasslands enthusiast, loves working with animals, grazing systems, tree hugger, watershed restoration steward.
Fun Fact: She grew up in Connecticut and although once partial to the Autumn season, understandably so having grown up surrounded by vibrant colors and foliage, has since made the East Bay her main home for the past 10 years, and has grown to appreciate every season, and the diversity of biomes present throughout California with vibrant colors of its own.
Genna comes to Contra Costa Resource Conservation District (CCRCD) as an early career professional who’s background in environmental sciences and food systems gives her a holistic lens in which to assist land managers across Contra Costa county. She recently completed serving in a Sustainable Agriculture & Water Technician role at Mendocino County Resource Conservation District through a UC-Berkeley AmeriCorps program called GrizzlyCorps, and also worked on rangeland carbon monitoring with Point Blue Conservation Science based in Petaluma, CA and Quivira Coalition based in Santa Fe, NM, where she partnered with farmers & ranchers across the continental Southwest. With CCRCD’s growing Agriculture team, Genna is the point person working on livestock and rangeland conservation projects including the Voluntary Local Program to restore habitats and protect the state threatened California Tiger Salamander and Alameda Whipsnake and federally threatened California Red-Legged Frog, and many additional rangeland management projects.