Rice & Advice 2022, Ep. 01. In this episode, Drs. Jarrod Hardke and Trent Roberts discuss 2022 rice preplant fertility recommendations and how to manage these inputs in the face of higher costs.
Rice & Advice 2022, Ep. 01. In this episode, Drs. Jarrod Hardke and Trent Roberts discuss 2022 rice preplant fertility recommendations and how to manage these inputs in the face of higher costs.
Rice and Advice 2022, Episode 01.
Title: Rice Preplant and Early Season Fertility
Date: March 21, 2022
[Music]: Arkansas Row Crops Radio providing up to date information and timely recommendations on row crop production in Arkansas.
Jarrod Hardke: Welcome to Arkansas Row Crops Radio. I'm Jarrod Hardke, Rice Extension Agronomist for the University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture. Today on Rice and Advice I've got Dr. Trent Roberts on here with me, our Extension Soil Specialist and we're going to dive off into the topic of rice preplant and early season fertility. And I guess to put another little spin on that, really focus certainly on the economic situation we're in for fertilizer. So, how are you today, Trent?
Trent Roberts: Doing good. How are you, Jarrod?
Jarrod: I'm doing great. So, for the sake of time we know what we're after, looking at the economics on this year and how we're going to make any money your own a rice crop. And I think that starts with the first thing we're going to throw on the ground. That is our fertilizer. So, it's already been interesting, and here recently, it's gotten more interesting.
Trent: Well, unfortunately, it's one of those scenarios where I'm getting a lot of calls and a lot of questions, but they're not the kinds I want. Right? Usually when we want attention, we want good attention. Not all these hard questions in these tough topics where making these decisions can have significant impacts not only on yield, but profitability. And the hardest part for me right now is, typically we can project what things are going to be like in a month or two months. And this is just the perfect storm with everything that's going on. You know, globally in terms of supply chain and economics, that I don't think really anyone has any idea what's going to happen in the next six months, let alone years down the road.
Jarrod: Yeah, we've definitely seen just over the past several months, that initial run up to a fade back, but still didn't know where we were going to go. And then more recently, another pretty big run up here lately. As you're saying, you know, here we are again. We don't know where it's going to turn from here, tomorrow. We didn’t know where it was going to turn yesterday. And obviously, we're not getting into the fuel debate at this point, but certainly that's another good example of - don't know which way things are going to turn from day to day. But also going to have an impact on us on the ground in agriculture.
Trent: You know, and I just try to remind everybody that every year we get more and more into a global economy. Right? And regardless of what we can produce or manufacture here in the US, it's still impacted by what's happening everywhere else. And more and more of that's becoming the case, and it just gets so hard to predict the volatility.
Jarrod: Yeah, I've had a lot of those conversations of late, about just how small the world is, and it is a global supply chain for everything we're discussing and dealing with and the price impacts. So even for things that we may produce a lot more of, closer to home, they're still sold on a world market and directly impacted and influenced. Again, it'll continue to change as it goes from here. But we're going to try to dive in a little bit and focus on, at least from a management standpoint - a crop management standpoint, with our fertilizers. Again, primarily focused here on really our preplant or at planting fertilizers, phosphorous, potassium, zinc for today. We'll go ahead and kind of jump right in. Why not start off with, with phosphorous and kind of go into it? Again, just talking rice today. Trent, where can we potentially reduce our phosphorus rates? What kind of approach can we take with our phosphorus management this season?
Trent: So, phosphorus and rice is a little bit tricky. You know, we've got some recommendations out there for producers to follow, but there's probably more wiggle room in reducing or cutting phosphorus than our other nutrients. And there are a couple of different ways that we can look at this. But what I always want to remind people of first and foremost, is how much the crop is actually going to remove. Right? So I want them to keep that in the back of their mind just because any time we produce a crop and we remove a grain, we're taking a certain amount of nutrients with that. And so, if we think of a 200 bushel rice crop you know, it's typically going to remove between 45 and 60 pounds of P205 per acre. I want people to keep that in the back of their mind because at some point that has to be replaced. Right? And there are times, in the interim for a year or two, we can rely on those soil nutrients to help supply that. But if we continue to pull off high yields, eventually we're going to mine the soil to a level that fertilizer is going to have to be added back and is going to be essential. And if you look at our phosphorus recommendations in particular, they're split up by soil pH, and the rates vary across those different pH’s. And if you look closely, you'll notice that for pH’s less than 6.5, or what we would consider acidic type pH’s, our overall phosphorus recommendations are lower. Right? Regardless of our soil test P. So, what a producer can kind of take that as, is well, in acidic soils, our P is slightly more available so we can rely more on the soil supplying phosphorus capacity. But if we're being honest, right? In a year like this, when supplies are tight, if you have a soil pH less than 6.5, there's an opportunity that you could probably omit phosphorus from your rice program and not see any reduction in your yield potential. But you have to remember, you are removing nutrients that need to be replaced at some point. And so, you know, even if you're able to just put 100 pounds of Triple Super phosphate, right, or 100 pounds of DAP out, you're at least balancing your removal with that fertilizer application. That’s kind of where I would consider that. Now when we shift over to the higher pH soils, right, greater than 6.5, our rates go up because our soil availability goes down. But a similar-type situation, where unless we're a really, really low soil test P, and by that, I mean less than 9 parts per million soil test P, we can probably omit phosphorus on soils that are greater than 5.6 pH, and greater than 9 parts per million soil test phosphorus, and not see any detrimental effects. It's that high pH, very low soil test phosphorus, where we need to be concerned. And phosphorus is one of those, and Jarrod, you know, it's usually not the whole field that shows that. Right?
Jarrod: That’s it.
Trent: The tricky part is you go out there and look and you go, “okay, well, here's a patch here and here's a patch here.” And you go, “well, it's ten acres out of 100. Is it really worth messing with?” And, it gets a little bit tough, but those are kind of some of the guidelines that I would think about as it pertains to phosphorus management.
Jarrod: And you hit on it with how spatial it can be and where it shows up and that's the only, when we talk about pulling way back to near omission, knowing that we're getting behind the eight ball. You know, we can't continue that. But you've talked about it a lot, I know this spring and at various meetings. The importance of, if you have soil test history on fields, knowing where you're trending. If you're maintaining or possibly even increasing, to know truly how good a shape you're in versus one snapshot. Again, to help make that decision how you're going to potentially pull back phosphorus. But even another step from there is grid sampling. You talk about the patches. Grid sampling versus, whole field composite. So, you know, we can talk about a field. Okay, well the pH is below 6.5, and seems okay on P. There's certainly the potential for some spots out there to be really high pH and really low P, that it’s going to be possible, if we pull way back, that they show themselves later on into the season. And yeah, then we've got that argument, do we mess with them or not? But the odds are if they do show up, they're going to be a very small, limited area. And I still, even with a major pullback in phosphorus, don't expect to see much of that ever, based on what we've been seeing. I mean, let's be honest, Trent, in the last ten years how many phosphorus deficiencies have you looked at in rice? I’m talking in commercial fields.
Trent: Very few, yeah.
Jarrod: Yeah.
Trent: And I think that’s a result of good sound fertilizer programs, right? So, in the last 15, 20 years since we've kind of updated our recommendations, we've seen producers are applying adequate amounts of phosphorus now in their rotations. And we just we don't see P deficiency near like we used to.
Jarrod: Yeah. And I think that just kind of adds to your comments about where we can pick those spots. I think you've kind of already answered my next question. Just by process of elimination, what you described. But, just to kind of bring it home and make sure we don't miss pointing it out, where can we not afford to cut phosphorus?
Trent: Yeah. So, with direct seeded delayed flood rice, or traditionally conventional flooded rice, we can't afford to cut pH’s greater than 6.5 and soil test phosphorus concentrations less than 9 parts per million. And the other big one, is furrow irrigated rice. Okay. So, my message to folks this year has been, in a furrow irrigated rice production system, we're already adding a lot of stressors to that rice plant. Right? We're growing it in an upland condition, depending on the weather and our irrigation strategy. There could be drought stress, there could be added disease pressure. But the one thing we do know is that in the portions of the field that do not remain flooded and even portions of the field that alter between kind of a flooded and a non-flooded state, those areas are going to tend to stay more aerobic and phosphorus availability in those soils is going to be much lower than if we were growing continuously flooded rice. And what that means is, that if I have lower P availability in the soil, those plants have to rely much more on fertilizer phosphorus to produce maximal yield. The one thing I'm really focusing on with furrow irrigated rice is those soil test concentrations that you get on your recommendation report or the minimum amounts that we need to consider applying.
Jarrod: Yeah, I agree. We've seen it and have a little bit of data. And I think we know we do have a little bit of a road ahead of us from a research standpoint on - we'll see. Got to do a little work. See where we may need to go, from a soil test recommendation more specific to furrow irrigated rice. Again, because of some of those changes, and phosphorus is going to be a big component in that. But I'm with you on sticking with the rates. But there's likely, yeah nothing's guaranteed, but there's a good chance there'll be some adjustment in the future on some of those as we continue to press on furrow irrigated rice. Obviously, we'll let the data lead us on what we need to do, but there's work to be done. We've seen the differences in uptake in those areas of the fields. Again, not surprising based on the lack of a flood condition there versus flooded conditions. With that kind of kind of moving on from phosphorus, let's talk a little bit about potassium or potash. And again, same kind of general conversation about where can we potentially reduce our potash input and what kind of approach are you recommending guys take if they're looking at trying to pull back on potash?
Trent: Yeah. So, for potash, the nice thing about it is much more flexibility in terms of correcting deficiencies and application rates compared to some of our other preplant nutrients like phosphorus or zinc. We don't have any pH considerations when we're talking about potash. It's entirely based on soil test K concentration. And so, if we take that into consideration, our potash application rates are going to range anywhere from 0 to 120 pounds or units of K2O per acre. And let's jump back to that grain removal portion. Rice actually doesn't remove very much potash in the grain, right? So you talk about a 200 bushel rice crop, it's only going to remove about 30 units of K2O per acre.
Jarrod: In the grain?
Trent: In the grain. Yeah, in the grain. The difference is a rice plant actually needs about as much potash as nitrogen. Right? The difference between potassium and nitrogen though is the soil supplies much more potassium to the plant, than nitrogen. And so that's why typically our or potash rates are much lower. What I try to tell people is, if you have a potash rate above 60 units of K2O per acre, so a 90 or a 120-application rate, let’s consider putting out the 60 as a preplant and then coming back post-flood with some of our tools or just monitoring it for nutrient deficiency symptoms. Because that gives us some flexibility in the sense that 60 could get us a long way, right? It could get us to the finish line. But also knowing that we've got in-season tissue tests and we've got ways to determine if that was adequate and make those applications and still achieve maximal yield all the way to the boot stage of rice. So really, the point I'm getting at there is, we can adjust some of those higher rates, like the 90 and the 120 knowing that there's ample opportunity to come back in-season and make corrections or make adjustments if we need to.
Jarrod: On that. So, come back. If I'm going to pull back my rate and go with the lower than recommended rate at planting, and then I'm going to come back in-season to pull some tissue samples to see how I'm doing, what sample am I pulling? And what timing do you want to see me pull those?
Trent: Yeah, so, we've got a little bit of research on this and typically we're not going to want you to take a tissue sample until after a half-inch internode elongation. And we're going to want you to sample the white leaf. So that's going to be the uppermost collared leaf on the rice plant. And typically, we need to get anywhere from 10 to 20 of those from a representative area and submit for tissue analysis for potassium. And we've got an interpretation, critical concentrations. It's similar to what we've talked about in soybean but it's a lot more straightforward. It's not as dynamic, meaning it doesn't change as much throughout the season. But it's one of those tools that could be very useful, and we can start at half inch beginning internode elongation. And if everything looks fine there, then maybe we don't take another test. But you know, maybe it's borderline and we put out a little potash with a mid-season application. Or maybe we check it a few weeks later and we throw a little potash in with a boot application. Right? But a lot of different opportunities to correct potash deficiency in a rice crop.
Jarrod: Yeah. I mean that's one of the nice things about potash and its responsiveness. I mean, we can go out there with an additional application, assuming it looks like we're a little short. I mean, all the way right up close to heading, and still get a response. Again, if it's needed. Still get a really good response from that potash application.
Trent: Well, you know, Jarrod, if we're being honest, that is the most extreme approach I would take, right? Now, if you don't feel like, let's say you get a recommendation for 120 units of K2O, and you say, “well, I can't cut it in half,” right? Like, “I want to save money, but I don't want to cut it down to 60.” You know, “what’s somewhere in between?” And when we look at those rates, like 120, 90, 60 – typically we can probably take 20 to 30% off of those and save a portion of our input cost and not sacrifice or compromise a lot of yield. Right? So, to me those are the two scenarios that you can do. And it just comes back to your comfortability and whether or not you want to do, potentially, an in-season application, if the tissue test indicates that it's needed.
Jarrod: Yeah, that's still one of my preferred. Not pulling back way too far with potash, but yeah, it's an excellent example. Two different approaches you can take there. It depends on a little bit how extreme you do want to get with trying to save those costs, but knowing that the potential is going to exist, some fields that you may need to come back. And even though I mentioned you can go as late as just prior to heading, I mean, the preference is that you go before that. If you're sampling around after joint movement, around half inch, you've got a couple of weeks or so to get that out still and be fairly, still be nearly a week in advance of heading or anything like that to get it out. So, there's a big window of response we work with if you take the more extreme option of a harder cut early. But the odds are if you just cut back, like you said, 25, 30% probably not going to see anything. You know, if you sample, that would indicate that you're going to need to apply more. I mean, it's just not that likely with the relatively small reduction. So hopefully we can utilize a couple of those strategies. Kind of the same question as before, and again, we've touched on some of it. But where can folks not afford to cut potash this year?
Trent: Well, so when we're looking at potash in particular, to me, that's one of those where tracking the soil test levels becomes important. And, in my opinion, probably a little bit more than phosphorus from the standpoint of - we know that the rice plant needs so much more potassium than phosphorus and we're relying on that soil test K, or that soil potassium, to supply a significant amount of what that plant needs. If we're tracking our soil test levels in those fields and we see a field that over time, the soil test K is declining, what that suggests is that we're preferentially removing more potash than we've been putting back in. And so, we're already mining that soil K. And those scenarios are ones where we probably can't afford to cut, because whatever we've been doing in the past has been a cut. Right?
Jarrod: That’s right.
Trent: Whether it was intended or not, it was not sufficient. But those are the scenarios. And then once again, with the furrow irrigated rice, I'm going to tell people, don't cut just because potassium is so closely tied to disease pressures in rice. And we know that when we're in those non flooded scenarios, we can get a significant increase in disease pressure. We don't want to cut potash in that furrow irrigated rice scenario. And then along the lines of the disease pressure, if you've had a history of stem rots or things like that, that's a pretty good indicator that you're suffering from potash deficiency or a hidden hunger with potassium type scenario. And so, if you have those in the back of your mind, from previous field history, then chances are once again, your potash management in that field has been, you know, subpar or suboptimal. And those are situations where we probably want to avoid cutting potash even further.
Jarrod: You know, just from some observations the past couple of years, talking about even on row rice and we haven't gotten really, you know, soil type or soil texture specific with anything too much yet. But for potash, we had some interesting observations in a couple of furrow irrigated fields that were on largely clay, to maybe silty clay. Clay loam kind of deal, that if the upper end of the field showed what appeared to be very plain potash deficiency, which is, knock you over - to walk out there and see it. It's one of the last things you expect there. But again, the trends remain the same in our plant sampling that the uptake even on clay soils upper end of fields is greatly reduced. So, again on a lot of those soils it doesn’t even come back recommending any potash but it's something we're going to have to watch out for in the future.
Trent: Yeah, it's really tricky. And you know, I'd encourage everyone here listening to go take my soil fertility class because we'll discuss this. But you know, we traditionally think of potash or potassium being taken up by diffusion, as the nutrient uptake mechanism. But when you have flooded soils, then mass flow is also another mechanism that plants can use to take up potash. I wonder, like in a flooded rice crop, how much the plant actually relies on mass flow to help aid in potash uptake. And when we remove that flood, we remove a plant uptake mechanism for that specific nutrient. And maybe, it's having more of an effect than we would have expected. But, right, it's just like we always say, Jarrod, the more we know, the less we know. And so in -
Jarrod: That’s it. Education is the progressive discovery of our own ignorance. That’s a fact.
Trent: Another opportunity.
Jarrod: That’s it. So that kind of at least covers generally where we are on potash at this point. Another one I don't think I've gotten too many questions on this so far this year. We have certainly covered it in some meetings and things. But what about the zinc? What should guys be doing about their zinc fertility this year?
Trent: Well, Jared when we were preparing for this podcast, I sat down for a second and I realized we've been so focused on nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium that I have no idea what zinc sulfate is costing people right now.
Jarrod: I don't think it's very different then it's been in the past couple of years now. So yeah, that's going to get me a phone call [laughter], by somebody that is listening to this podcast - who is going to tell me I'm wrong in some way. And I haven't looked at it within the last a little bit, but I don't think it's very different.
Trent: Huh? Well, and that's good, though, right? I mean, we don't need it to go up just because everything else does. But, my approach was zinc is not something that we want to cut just because even though it's a micro nutrient and it's needed in small amounts, it's just as essential as all the other elements. There are some tricky aspects to the zinc recommendation. But, if you're less than, 4.1 parts per million soil test zinc, and you're greater than 6.0 pH, you need 10 pounds of actual zinc per acre to prevent a zinc deficiency and make sure you maximize your yield and productivity. Very similar to phosphorus, zinc deficiency can be spotty. Right? It can show up in pockets in the field based on soil tests zinc changes or textural changes. But like everyone knows, a zinc deficiency is the hardest nutrient deficiency to correct and the most costly. And what I always try to tell people is with no other nutrient, other than zinc, is that ounce of prevention worth who knows what, in make up later. And so, zinc is not something that I want to try to cut. You know, I want to follow that soil test recommendation, whether I'm furrow irrigated or on flood irrigated. And I want to try to use those rates as close as possible. You know, we do get some benefits out of that of zinc seed treatments. But I hate to say it when the soil test says you need 10 pounds, then you need 10 pounds. There are often questions that arise about distribution and being able to cut rates and those types of things. And that's unfortunately a case-by case-basis. What you're able to do on your farm with like a multi-nutrient blended fertilizer is not what someone else can do. And so unfortunately, those are the kind of questions we have to field on a case-by case-basis. But long story short. Zinc is not something I would consider cutting in any of our rice production systems.
Jarrod: Yeah. As you kind of touched on there's certainly going to be some opportunity out there, some soils that are kind of close to that recommendation line. Whether it's recommended or not, that yeah, okay - zinc seed treatment, like you said, in a blend that has some amount of zinc, stuff like that. Is that that going to get you by? Arguably, yes. It's not going to change your soil situation by any means. You know, with those small amounts out there, but that could get you by. But most of our recommendations do fall into a considerable amount, in at least a couple of numbers. I've got handy, yeah, running 25 pounds of zinc sulfate is 30 bucks an acre. Right about where we’ve generalized them being. And Trent, you're talking about prevention, better than trying to cure a problem later. We use the example a lot. In this case, maybe it is $30 an acre to get 10 pounds of actual zinc out there – zinc sulfate. Okay that's $30. Well, you're not likely to have any problems then in that year and you're building the soil test. Well, if you don't put any out and you do have a zinc deficiency, the Band-Aid or the cure is just the liquid version that costs 25 to $30 an acre to spray on and, okay so they're equal there? But no, they're not because the liquid sprayed on doesn't build soil test. And you forgot about the fact that in order for it to really work, we tell you that you have to drain the field first and then you have to put it on. And then most likely, to really get it back going, you need to put on some urea or ammonium sulfate and then bring the water back. So, it's not truly swapping costs. It's potentially a massive increase in cost, if we don't try to get that corrected. So, spending the smart money up front on zinc sulfate is still going to be the way I continue to recommend.
Trent: Yeah, and most of our research, and there's some wiggle room there, shows that typically if you use that 10 pounds of actual zinc application rate, in usually three to four years you build your soil test zinc level up enough that it no longer recommends zinc. And so that’s truly a nutrient that you're banking those credits or you're banking that nutrient to take advantage of later.
Jarrod: Yeah, we have a lot harder time building some of our other nutrients but that one. Yeah.
Trent: I know this is a nutrient focused podcast, but as long as we're on the subject of zinc, I think it would behoove us to bring up - isn't there a new herbicide that's getting registered? Is Rogue going to be available for us to use?
Jarrod: Yes.
Trent: Yep. And so Rogue, right? I mean, I'm not a herbicide guy, but Rogue is the one we put in the water. Post-flood.
Jarrod: That's right.
Trent: And so, what I keep trying to tell people is you better make sure your zinc is in order if you're going to use Rogue, because, if you have a zinc deficiency and you've got your Rogue out there - call the rice agronomist, don't call me. [laughter]
Jarrod: Yeah, [laughter] that's right. I mean, you're going to give up that activity and control. You're going to give up some nitrogen we've got to throw back out there. I mean, yeah, the problems are going to multiply in that scenario. That's exactly right. So that’s a good example to bring up. Yeah, head those off before they start, Trent, I appreciate that.
Trent: Oh, yeah. So that's been worrying me ever since we started doing the research on Rogue. It’s not worrying me, but just, man, we need to get out in front of these zinc issues and make sure that we've got those taken care of well before we ever flood those fields.
Jarrod: Exactly. Yeah. We don't want to be putting that into a bad situation where we have to give up on a good herbicide we just got out there and well established. I think that was generally speaking, the majority of what think we kind of intended to cover today. Running through just kind of giving it an overview.
Jarrod: So, hopefully everybody got a little something out of that for different guidance in your scenario. Trent and I are both certainly available for emails, phone calls, text to certainly answer more specific questions. I know we've both been getting a lot of those over the winter about super specific scenarios and trying to tease things out. And we'll certainly try to help you there as best we can. Like always, we're all looking for super specific answers, but that’s why we wanted to try to cover some of the options today. There are still some different options to go with each of these that you're still going to have to make a choice. And again, if we're trying to reduce inputs, we're accepting the fact that we're assuming some risk with reducing rates, trying to reduce our input costs. Trent and I are both very comfortable that we don't have any real fears of anything really going poorly with some of these reductions we're talking about. But there's going to be spots in fields show up, in an occasional field, things like that, that maybe got pulled back or maybe it's related to the timing of the soil samples we’re taking, or something. Who knows, as far as the number we're working off of to make our adjustments. That's why I love soil test history, not just a single snapshot. I can know if something looks odd about that one soil test I may be working off of this year. I can look back at several years past and go, yeah, “maybe this is really more where I am.” I need to hedge my bet a little bit one way or another, so that’s what I hope we can kind of lean on a little bit in the future. So, Trent, any kind of parting comments or anything you'd like to make?
Trent: Well, my only parting comment would be, like Jarrod mentioned, we're always ready and willing to help. For those of you that to try to call me, if I don't answer, please leave a message or text me. Just, you’ve got to remember with me teaching class and other things, I'm not ignoring you, but I also hate telemarketers. [laughter] And so, I live in Fayetteville, and if I see a down state number, it's just as likely to be someone selling me solar panels or auto warranties as it is someone with a nutrient question. So, I'm not ignoring you. Please leave a voicemail or shoot me a text, and I'll get back to you as soon as I can. I just tell people to try to think with a level head, reach out, use the information you can. And hopefully Jarrod and I will be back in a month or two and we'll focus more on nitrogen and talk a little bit more about managing that in the coming crop and just take it one day at a time.
Jarrod: Absolutely. That’s exactly right. And same for me on the leaving a message or a text, I deal with the same thing with all the random calls from a wide range of numbers that I get. If you are looking for some more information just general rice production, a lot of our recommendations and things, please go to uaex.uada.edu/rice. That'll jump you right to the main rice page with a lot of our publications. One of the main ones already out and at county offices, is the 2022 Rice Management Guide. Good to pick that one up, or obviously download it on the website. And again, on that rice page - the handbook, lots of other useful publications and information, and obviously ways to get hold of us about a wide range of topics. But with that and a lot of information and work that we do, certainly supported by the growers through the Arkansas Rice Check Off and administered by the Arkansas Rice Research and Promotion Board and certainly, Trent and I are appreciative of support from the University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture. What we get to wake up and do every day. So, with that we hope to see you out in a rice field somewhere this year. Hopefully for good reasons, but I always say I never get to look at good rice it's always something wrong. I only look at sick rice, Trent.
Trent: Oh yeah.
Jarrod: Yeah. All the time. With that, let us know if we can help. And thanks for joining us for this episode of Rice and Advice on Arkansas Row Crops Radio. Have a Rice day.
[Music]: Arkansas Row Crops Radio is a production of the University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture. For more information, please contact your local county extension agent or visit uaex.uada.edu.