Extension faculty in the Department of Crop and Soil Sciences are leaders in several WSU Extension Program areas including:
Extension Personnel
Douglas Collins, ANR Program Unit
My extension programs and research focus on soil quality and vegetable and fruit production for small farms. My areas of interest are: managing and monitoring soil fertility on diverse organic vegetable farms; organic vegetable cropping systems, including reduced tillage; soil variability across landscapes; and biological indicators of soil quality. I am an active instructor in Ecological Soil Management for beginning and advanced producers. I conducts workshops at area conferences and for Cultivating Success™ classes.
Steve Fransen
Steve Fransen continues to work with perennial warm-season grasses as biofuel and forage utilization. A larger USDA funded study will be completed in 2016 involving intercropping switchgrass cultivars into stands of hybrid poplar at GreenWood Resources at Boardman, OR. We found higher land equivalent ratios (LER) through intercropping than growing trees or grass in monoculture. Recently winter canola is part of his research focus with several studies focused on dual-purpose, forage and seed, use of August planted winter canola under irrigation. So far we’ve found greater economic return when managing winter canola for dual-purpose even through grain yields were lower than monoculture grain production. These studies will continue through 2017.
Drew Lyon
My Extension and Research Program focuses on integrated weed management in dryland small grain production in eastern Washington. Research efforts are directed at the most troublesome weeds in each of the three rainfall zones of eastern Washington.
Clark Neely
My primary focus is overseeing the WSU Small Grains Variety Testing Program throughout eastern Washington. I can answer questions about adapted wheat and barley varieties for the various precipitation zones in the region. My other research and extension efforts seek to better understand how variety selection impacts crop management and crop rotation and ultimately improve economic and environmental sustainability of dryland cropping systems in Washington. I attend and coordinate Extension outreach events to disseminate variety testing and other agronomic recommendation information to clientele.
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