Center for Regenerative Agriculture

Welcome to the Introduction to Ecological Outcomes Verification (EOV) Short-Term Monitoring Training being offered by the Center for Regenerative Agriculture at Michigan State University. We are excited to be offering this training to help producers understand how they can apply ecological monitoring to their grazing systems to improve the health of the landscape.

EOV was developed by Ovis 21, Savory Institute professionals, and Michigan State University scientists. EOV is a practical and scalable soil and landscape assessment methodology that tracks outcomes in biodiversity, soil health, and ecosystem function (water cycle, mineral cycle, energy flow and community dynamics). EOV applies to grassland environments, including natural and seeded grasslands, as well as grazed orchards, sylvopastoral systems and mixed livestock-cropping systems and/or forest areas. Pure cropping systems would not be included. 

Outcome Based: EOV provides empirical and tangible outcomes, which in turn inform the farmer with ongoing feedback from which to make better management decisions. EOV measures and trends key indicators of ecosystem function, which in the aggregate indicate positive or negative trends in the overall health of a landscape. In addition to providing an outcome-based verification of the health of the land base, EOV also provides critical data to the farmer as a steward and manager of the land.

Contextually Relevant: EOV is not a one-size-fits-all metric. Each EOV evaluation is contextualized within its given ecoregion. Each ecoregion contains its own biodiversity of flora and fauna and has unique characteristics such as climate, geology, biodiversity and soil types. Farms and ranches within that ecoregion are then benchmarked against that reference area, allowing managers to better understand the potential of their own property within the operating conditions of their unique context.

Farmer First: EOV is not a top-down assessment tool. It is designed to be a non-punitive learning mechanism for continuous land improvement, ongoing peer support for land managers and marketplace differentiation.

EOV is implemented by Savory’s global Network of regional Hubs, who work closely with land managers in their given geographical areas. Savory accredited verifiers and monitors are therefore deeply knowledgeable of the local ecology. Furthermore, they are well versed in local operating conditions and management approaches. Those land managers seeking training, coaching and implementation support in order to improve the ecological outcomes of their land can find such services with their regional Savory Hub. Several leading indicators in the EOV protocol provide rapid, instructive feedback on an annual basis for land managers in their daily management decisions. Every five years the regional Hub Verifier will collect additional data of lagging indicators, such as biodiversity and soil carbon. The understanding of the relationship between leading and lagging indicators is an incredible asset for those managing land.

About the Course

This course requires reading several chapters of a workbook manual and watching a series of short videos, most are about 5 minutes, that will teach you the science behind Ecological Outcomes Verification’s (EOV) Short Term Monitoring (STM) protocol and how to implement it to conduct short-term monitoring on grazing landscapes. Participation also requires a practical component of monitoring your grazing spaces with a regional hub’s Verified Monitor. Each unit corresponds to an element of monitoring and the units are organized in a sequential manner such that each video builds on the information before it. 

All of the material you need is accessible through the menu on the right side of the window. First, we recommend reading the sections of the workbook listed on the EOV 3.0 Workbook page. Then, you will move on to the Course Videos page and watch the videos in order at your own pace. Should you have any questions or concerns, please send a message to Morgan at mathiso9@msu.edu, and we will get back to you with answers and resources.

We are excited you are here to learn more about monitoring the health of your land.

Matt R. Raven
Crista Derry
Morgan MathisonSlee

Request access to EOV training

Funding for our research is provided by the following:

• Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education
• Foundation for Food & Agriculture Research
• Noble Research Institute
• Greenacres Foundation
• The Jones Family Foundation
• ButcherBox
  
  

This material is based upon work that is supported by the National Institute of Food and Agriculture, U.S. Department of Agriculture, under award number 2020-38640-31522 through the North Central Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education program under subaward number LS20-437. USA is an equal opportunity employer and service provider.