farmOS Monthly Call, 11 March 2026

farmOS Monthly Call, 11 March 2026

Ongoing notes may be kept in the comments. For general information about these monthly calls see farmos.org/community/monthly-call.

Wednesday, March 11, 2026 6:00 PM
farmos.org/community/monthly-call/join - Call Link

Agenda

This month’s call will focus on the farmOS Conservation Planner module, and related market analysis performed by Our Sci and Point Blue

See: Conservation Planner: Community Feedback Session (at next FarmOS Community Call!)

  1. Demo of farmOS Conservation Planner module [Mike: 10 min]
  2. Market analysis report out [Dan and Greg: 25 min]
  3. Q&A
  4. Create new wiki topic for next month from template.

Attendees

  • Michael Stenta
  • Greg Austic
  • Dan TerAvest
  • Lance Edgar
  • Mathew Hansen (Pasa)
  • Symbioquine (AKA Morgan)
  • Lyle
  • Rachel O
  • Juliet N
  • Jennifer Byrne
  • David
  • Nick Weinstock - BOTL Farm
  • Steve @ Tech Matters
  • Ankita
  • Melissa Julia
  • James

Save Jitsi chat transcript by pasting this command in the browser console:

"## Chat Transcript\n\n```txt" + Array.from(document.querySelector("#chatconversation").querySelectorAll("div.usermessage")).map(um => um.innerText).join("\n\n") + "\n```"

Chat Transcript

Attention: this call may be recorded. 

13:59

me says:
Agenda: 
https://farmos.discourse.group/t/farmos-monthly-call-11-march-2026/2471
 

13:59

Greg says:
Here's the agenda for folks also (hopefully similar): 
https://miro.com/app/board/uXjVG04Sqqc=/?moveToWidget=3458764663224301301&cot=14
 

14:04

Juliet N says:
Apologies if you already covered this - Is there a workflow to engage landowners that have their own farmOS instance? 

14:23

Steve@techmatters.org says:
Very cool.  I've never had to prepare one of these; do people like Jennifer Byrne (hi!) think this helps them and their farmers? 

❤️

14:24

Dan TerAvest says:
Greg, your not sharing your screen 

14:24

Greg says:
https://miro.com/app/board/uXjVG04Sqqc=/
 

14:25

me says:
Juliet: No, this is currently a farmOS instance for the RCD itself. A potential next step is to allow farmers to log into this themselves, and also to connect external farmOS instances if they have them. 

14:25

Dan TerAvest says:
This table was generated as a combination of the survey responses and a Claude-based search for competing software tools 

14:29

Juliet says:
Mike: the dictionaries for land uses, practices, practice information, scenarios… are those from published public docs? Or are you able to leverage nrcs contacts for annual updates? 

14:32

Steve@techmatters.org says:
$49/user/month; prepay a year for $500 

14:32

Rachel O says:
does the map function include external layers that could be overlayed on the maps - streams, contours, soils, parcels, etc?  And can you also digitize the planned practices on the map? 

14:32

me says:
All of the lists were provided by the RCDs we worked with. Some work closely with NRCS, some don't. 

14:32

Juliet says:
So this can support state specific conservation programs not just federal? 

14:34

me says:
Rachel: farmOS maps can display additional layers yes. Here is a module that allows adding them via URL: 
https://www.drupal.org/project/farm_map_custom_layers
 

👍

14:34

me says:
And we have NRCS Soil Survey layer for soil types already. 

14:34

me says:
Juliet: Yes potentially 

14:34

Symbioquine [AKA Morgan] says:
Planners = \"NRCS Conservation planners\" + 
\"Farm Planner\"? 

14:34

Jennifer Byrne, Vermont NRCD says:
Greg - one little comment on the flow chart. Where it says NRCS field staff \"do research\" and districts \"talk to farmers\" i don't think nrcs staff would agree with that catagorization. 

👍

14:43

Greg says:
😃  what do you think is more correct?  I put this together yesterday realizing that no one would know any of it so definitely can update! 

14:43

Jennifer Byrne, Vermont NRCD says:
they also talk directly to farmers and many times are the ones doing the full planning without any district involvement at all. Districts definitely do take on some of their workload by doing planning. Difference is districts do planning for more than just federal programs and nrcs soil conservationists do planning and contracting just for nrcs programs. those nrcs planners are in direct contact w farmers. 

14:45

me says:
I'll try to answer the questions I heard here... 😃 

❤️

14:45

me says:
Yes, it is possible to map the specific geometry of individual pratices. 

❤️

14:46

me says:
farmOS has the ability to export geometries as KML. 

14:46

me says:
Adding an option to convert to shapefile would just be a matter of a feature request and someone funding it. 

14:46

me says:
Regarding the land uses... these came directly from the 5 RCDs that we worked with to design this. There was a lot of discussion among them about how closely they align to NRCS land uses or not. 

14:47

Juliet says:
Mike, can you link the issues / feature requests in githib so we can see whats in the pipeline? 

14:48

me says:
Mapping directly to CD would be a good next step IMO. 

14:48

Greg says:
also important to remember that this is super flexible and modular... so you can have different things than another person 

14:48

Greg says:
so CA can be different than MI 

14:48

me says:
https://github.com/farmier/farm_rcd/issues
 

14:48

Jennifer Byrne, Vermont NRCD says:
Re: your intake form...we've been trying to develop a farmer interview that asks all the questions necessary to complete a CSP application and also lead to a comprehensive conservation plan. It would be great if those q's could be stored in this software. here's our attempt: 
https://docs.google.com/document/d/121lnN2rAUOMUClvCkOjP-OXFdA7DQtDpRz0uJdgz5nc/edit?tab=t.0#heading=h.dkop1x4qq3fx
 

14:49

Greg says:
perfect Jennifer!  That's the kind of content that makes this all much easier to move forward with! 

14:50

Jennifer Byrne, Vermont NRCD says:
in case it's helpful, this is our farmer self assessment that we use for our farm team participants: 
https://www.whiterivernrcd.org/view-our-farmer-self-assessment
 

14:53

Jennifer Byrne, Vermont NRCD says:
I just heard today NRCS is paying a defense contractor to replace CD & protracts with an even newer tool.... 

14:54

Jennifer Byrne, Vermont NRCD says:
Become a defense contractor? lol 

14:55

Jennifer Byrne, Vermont NRCD says:
no please dont 

14:55

Greg says:
https://miro.com/app/board/uXjVG04Sqqc=/?share_link_id=168909482177
 

14:56

Jennifer Byrne, Vermont NRCD says:
I think the associations are a good route to go 

14:57

Jennifer Byrne, Vermont NRCD says:
I would say NACD but they might get scared. the states associations are more nimble 

14:57

Jennifer Byrne, Vermont NRCD says:
Thank you so much! Please keep us in the loop 

👍

15:00

Jennifer Byrne, Vermont NRCD says:
Love you GOATs! 

15:01