Virtual Field Day Access Instructions:
To participate in the live virtual field day, shortly before 1:00 pm CT on February 9, click this URL: https://iastate.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJUpduihpj8iE9ZHcjpsenc2DWQILG41wg0D

Or, join from a dial-in phone line:
Dial: 1.312.626.6799     
Meeting ID: 914 1198 4892

The field day will be recorded and archived on the ILF website so that it can be watched at any time. The archive will be available at https://www.iowalearningfarms.org/virtual-field-day-archive.

Iowa Learning Farms, in partnership with the Iowa Nutrient Research Center, and Conservation Learning Group (CLG), is hosting a free virtual field day on February 9 at 1 p.m. CT. Join us for a live discussion with Billy Beck, assistant professor and extension forestry specialist at Iowa State University and Andrew Rupiper, graduate research assistant in Natural Resources Ecology and Management at Iowa State University.

The virtual field day will explore a unique research project, located at the Ann Smeltzer Trust Iowa Learning Farm in Webster County, looking at a free in-steam conservation practice tying together water quality, wood and wildlife. Funded by the Iowa Nutrient Research Center, the team is working to quantify hydrologic impacts of beaver dams in the stream system and their effect on nutrients and sediment to determine the influence, positive or negative, these ecosystem engineers have within their watershed.

“Many of the stream channels in Iowa aren’t able to assist with nutrient and sediment reductions and may be sources instead due to the straightening of streams, removal of riparian vegetation, removed in-channel wood and added artificial drainage to the landscape,” noted Beck. “While contentious, beaver dams are a free-instream conservation practice that could help improve water quality and reduce nutrient and sediment loads within the watershed.”