Join Us for the 2025 Dakota Lakes Annual Field Day!

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A group attending a Dakota Lakes field day gathers in a soybean field to learn from longtime farm manager, Dwayne Beck

Field day attendees board the Dakota Lakes people mover

Make plans to attend the 2025 Dakota Lakes Research Farm Annual Field Day — your chance to explore cutting-edge research and connect with experts shaping the future of agriculture on the northern Plains.

Date: Thursday, June 26, 2025

Time: Field day begins at 3 p.m. CT and runs until dark

Location: Dakota Lakes Research Farm, 21310 308th Ave., Pierre, South Dakota 57501

Featured Presentations:

  • Sunish Sehgal – Advances in winter wheat breeding and management

  • Melanie Caffe – Innovations in oat breeding and production practices

  • Christopher Graham – Genetic improvements in field peas and chickpeas

  • Madalyn Shires, SDSU Plant Pathologist – Monitoring and managing plant disease threats across South Dakota

  • Cody Zilverberg & Dwayne Beck – Long-term insights from Dakota Lakes’ cropping systems research

Additional sessions will explore the impact of crop rotations on weed pressure, disease cycles, and soil health.

Plus: Take a guided tour of our new addition, Raptor Roost, where new research activities are underway in this developing area of the farm. This optional tour will be at 1:00 p.m., prior to the Field Day.

Don’t miss this opportunity to engage with researchers, farmers, and fellow agricultural innovators. Hope to see you there!

Dwayne Beck inspects root nodes on a soybean plant at Dakota lakes Research Farm.

Ample Wildlife

Just like people, wildlife needs food, shelter, and water not just to survive but to thrive. The farming practices we follow at Dakota Lakes nurture a robust ecosystem that provide for the needs not only of the deer and pheasants that are popular with local hunters and nature enthusiasts but also a diverse range of species that ideally keeps pests at bay naturally without the need for intensive pesticide intervention.

Healthy Food

Much of the nutrient acquisition in plants is mediated by microbes, so soils that are home to a rich diversity of microbial life are better equipped to provide plants with their required nutrition effectively and efficiently. Recent studies have shown foods, including meat, grown under regenerative farming practices contain higher levels of certain vitamins, minerals, and phytochemicals than those grown under conventional farming practices. While the science behind these studies is complex and sample sizes are small and highly variable, preliminary results suggest that regenerative practices can enhance the nutritional profile of many of the foods we eat.

Clean Water

Carbon is one of the best water filters known to man, and regenerative farming practices like no-till, cover crops, and livestock integration help to maintain or even increase soil carbon levels. Plants serve as natural “carbon pumps,” bringing carbon in from the atmosphere by way of photosynthesis and feeding it to soil microbes in the form of exudates. In addition, plants take up and hold onto nutrients that are mineralized in the soil, so keeping living roots in the ground for as much of the year as possible goes a long way to preventing nutrient runoff into local waterways.

Living Soils

By following diverse cropping rotations, keeping a living root in the ground as much as possible, integrating livestock, maintaining good soil armor, and keeping soil disturbance to a minimum, we are nurturing the soil microbiome and providing favorable conditions for the bacteria, fungi, nematodes, protozoa, insects, earthworms, and other living creatures that call the soil their home. Just a teaspoon of healthy soil can contain billions of microbes and our goal is to promote a natural, balanced environment that allows them to thrive.