The educational materials listed on this page are about Soil Management.
Soil management encompasses a number of strategies used by farmers and ranchers to protect soil resources, one of their most valuable assets. By practicing soil conservation, including appropriate soil preparation methods, they reduce soil erosion and increase soil stabilization. These soil conservation methods allow for healthy soil formation, soil fertility and favorable soil composition, including soil permeability and soil porosity, which lead to increased soil health. Soil organic matter is a critical component of soil health. Cover crops can help maintain or increase soil organic matter. By using a variety of soil management practices, soil organic matter will increase while soil erosion will decrease, keeping soil nutrients on the farm. Farmers typically use a soil analysis, or soil sampling procedure, to determine what inputs are needed. Key practices include composting, soil chemistry, nutrient mineralization, soil quality/health, organic matter, cover crops, green manures, soil analysis, soil microbiology, soil physics.
Showing 1-10 of 112 results
2025–2026 Report from the Field
In Recognition of Farmers and Ranchers SARE has been around for nearly 40 years, and the impacts that our grant and outreach programs have had on the sustainability of U.S. agriculture are because of one simple thing: Farmers and ranchers are at the center of everything we do. SARE is afunding sourcefor producers.It’s designed forproducers, […]
Farming Strategies for Adapting to Extreme Weather
SARE partnered with PBS KVIE to produce an episode of RFD-TV's America's Heartland that highlights how farmers and ranchers across the United States are using sustainable and regenerative practices to adapt to increasingly challenging and unpredictable weather conditions. Adapting to Flooding and Drought on Hurricane Flats Farm in South Royalton, Vermont Ashley Loehr and Antoine […]
SARE's What is Sustainable Agriculture? Now Available in Spanish
SARE’s What is Sustainable Agriculture? bulletin and companion animated series are now available in Spanish! ¿Qué es la Agricultura Sostenible? features short, translated primers of proven sustainable practices that can be used to complement more detailed training materials. The companion animation series highlights some common practices farmers and ranchers use to improve profitability, quality of […]
Farmers and Ranchers Report Research Impacts
“This project provided a 'first look' at how legume cover crops might function in our crop rotations," says Texas A&M AgriLife Extension agronomist Reagan Nolan, discussing his search for cover crop mixes that can help meet the challenges of farming in western Texas. Nolan wanted to explore whether legume cover crops could be incorporated into […]
2023–2024 Report from the Field
SARE grants havehelped our viabilityas a business anddemonstrated thatsmall businessescan make a positiveimpact on theenvironment when wedevelop relationshipswith each other forthe benefit of all. Jeanine SeabrookGlass Rooster Cannery Letter from the Director I have always appreciated the value of long-term research as well as the long-term impact of both applied and basic research. The core […]
New SARE Bulletin: Best Practices for the Sustainable Urban Farm
For decades, urban farms and community gardens have helped meet demand for fresh and local produce. Urban farming creatively utilizes limited space, conserves land and transforms vacant lots or buildings into productive greenspaces. Farming in cities can be a rewarding way for communities to grow healthy food while receiving a wide range of other interrelated environmental, […]
Best Practices for the Sustainable Urban Farm
For decades, urban farms and community gardens have helped meet the demand for fresh, local produce. Urban farms are diverse and adaptable, ranging from small farms on repurposed vacant lots to multilevel vertical farms and rooftop gardens. Often, they combine ecological farming practices with some form of infrastructure. Urban growers make clever use of their […]
New SARE Bulletin: What is Sustainable Agriculture?
SARE’s newly revised What is Sustainable Agriculture? publication provides a primer to practices that can help farmers and ranchers improve the sustainability of any complex, integrated production and marketing system.
New Book: Farming With Soil Life: A Handbook for Supporting Soil Invertebrates and Soil Health on Farms
Smart farmers know that healthy soil hosts a flourishing and diverse ecosystem of bacteria, fungi and invertebrates. But the complex relationships between soil life, productivity and resilience are not well understood. Now available from the Xerces Society and SARE, Farming with Soil Life: A Handbook for Supporting Soil Invertebrates and Soil Health on Farms is […]
What is Sustainable Agriculture?
This award-winning report provides a sampler of best practices in sustainable agriculture—from marketing and community vitality to cover crops and grazing—as well as eight profiles of producers, educators and researchers who have successfully implemented them.