Educating Producers: Cover Your Acres Winter Conference.

The Cover Your Acres Winter Conference is a joint effort of K-State Research and Extension and the Northwest Kansas Crop Residue Alliance. The Crop Residue Alliance is a group of producers who believe in the continued education on topics related to the mechanics of no-till, the value of residue and emerging technologies and crop production systems. The goal of the conference is to provide an educational event to address challenges on these topics producers are facing, provide unbiased information to producers on these challenges and adoption of no-till and solutions to challenges of no-till. This producer-driven conference has been held since 2002. Nearly 500 producers and agronomic professionals annually attend this two-day conference. A total of 24 speaking sessions are offered each day of the conference, running in concurrent sessions. Continuing education credits are also offered for certified crop advisors and commercial applicators. In 2013, over forty-five sponsors provided financial support to this conference. A display area is available to all sponsors. There are break times during the conference for producers to visit the exhibition area. Sponsorships help keep the conference affordable to producers, with a cost of $35 for early registration in 2013. Finally, evaluations are done each year to grasp the impact of the conference. There are evaluations for both producers and sponsors, so we can better understand the needs of both groups. In 2011, an evaluation was conducted to grasp the changes in no-till adoption since the inception of the conference. It showed that more producers had adopted no-till into at least part of their production system. It also showed that they were experiencing new challenges as a result of no-till adoption. These included differences in weed control, planting equipment, and fertilizer applications. These topic areas have since been a priority in the subsequent conferences.