A growing number of producers and advisors are turning to aerial imagery to better understand environmental conditions around agricultural operations. A free national webinar at 1:30 p.m. Central on Friday, Dec. 12, 2025, will highlight how drones and remote sensing technologies can be used to assess air and water quality, track management practices, and support on-farm decision-making.
The webinar, A View from Above: Application of Drones and Remote Sensing for Air and Water Quality Measures Around Livestock Farms, will feature three leading researchers whose work demonstrates the rapid expansion of these tools on ranches and in integrated or mixed systems.
Dirk Charlson, statewide digital ag extension educator with Nebraska Extension, will be a featured expert, offering a practical, producer-friendly look at drone image collection and analysis. Charlson will demonstrate how simple workflows can generate useful maps and insights for manure management, land application, and monitoring changes over time — showcasing opportunities directly relevant to Nebraska producers.
Additional speakers include:
- Dr. Nesli Akdeniz, University of Wisconsin, who has pioneered drone-based air quality measurements in pasture systems.
- Dr. Rebecca Muenich, University of Arkansas, who uses remote sensing to evaluate land application practices and landscape-scale nutrient impacts.
Registration for the webinar is required, and participants will receive the webinar link and an option to add it to their calendar upon sign-up. Those unable to attend live can watch the archived recording, which will be available a few days after the event on the LPELC Webinar Archive page.
An application for continuing education credits for Certified Crop Advisers (CCAs) and members of the American Registry of Professional Animal Scientists (ARPAS) will be submitted.
This event is hosted by the Livestock and Poultry Environmental Learning Community (LPELC) and coordinated by Leslie Johnson, animal manure management extension educator with Nebraska Extension, and Amber Patterson, marketing and communications project manager at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.
