There is an ever-increasing focus on climate change and corresponding changes to rainfall
patterns. It seems like more extreme rainfall events are observed every year. Wisconsin and
Minnesota Discovery Farms Programs have monitored 127 site years of edge-of-field
surface runoff. During these site years, 2,184 surface runoff events were measured. These
runoff events and the corresponding rainfall data were analyzed to answer the following
questions:
• Are a large portion of nutrient and soil losses driven by extreme rainfall events?
• Can you control the weather (or the impact of it) on your crop fields?