Farm science.

yosemitesam1

https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2017-02/ps-wav022217.php

Forecasts of having to double crop production by 2050 very likely to be miles out. Much more likely to be in the range of 25-60% which IMO is fairly easily achievable without increasing the overeliance on fert and chemicals

yosemitesam1

http://bigstory.ap.org/article/general-mills-boosts-eco-friendly-grain-kernza

Work being done to commercialize kernza, a perennial relation of wheat

pedigree 6

Nearly forgot about this thread.:o

Calcium is a basketball.

For the ones worried about lime making your land wetter.
What's magnesium levels like. Maybe you don't need magnesium in your lime.

So calcium is a basketball and magnesium is a golf ball.

Very easy watch these guys. A little bit of Boron.

yosemitesam1

http://www.agriland.ie/farming-news/opinion-building-soil-fertility-sustainably/

A bit of sense being talked on agriland for once!

Attached a paper from the UK, intensive grassland management across 180 sites resulted in over 20t less carbon being held per ha. Over 60t of carbon dioxide per ha across a few million acres is an awful lot of carbon, this will surely come to effect us here...

pedigree 6

The problem I have with these studies concentrating on soil carbon storage and saying that conventional farming is worse for the planet and climate change because soil carbon levels are lower are completely ignoring the fact that high input high output farming is putting many times more carbon on the move going out the farm gate. You can't really have a balanced discussion and ignore that fact.
I've never once seen it mentioned only really here by me.
Why is that because farmers don't really understand what Carbon is.

The carbon that agriculture (and plants) mostly utilise is carbon dioxide. This is then converted by plants into oxygen and carbon by the plant itself. The cow eats the plant (carbon) and the cow converts it into milk and beef and humans eat the milk and beef and we know the rest.

These studies are very important though and we should be trying to find out as much as we can about what is going is on down under our feet.
What happened with me on one field over the winter has opened my eyes to the possibilities as to what can be done.
These studies say that applied nitrogen is bad for carbon storage in the soil.
But they don't give a reason for this or offer an explanation! Ugh!
The reason applied nitrogen cuts back on the amount of stored carbon in the soil is that nitrogen fixing (from the atmosphere) bacteria won't work when there is available applied nitrogen (they don't seem to mind there own produced nitrogen though).
Now how do these nitrogen fixing bacteria get going?
From my research (on the net) they seem to want a pH of 7 and NEED Boron as well as food which is P and K and some more minerals perhaps.

http://www.plantphysiol.org/content/94/4/1554.full.pdf

Why do they need Boron?
I think they need it as perhaps like grit for a hen. As a gizzard really to break down the nutrients inside their bellies and the pH of the Boron itself probably has a big impact itself as to why they evolved to use it.

Then the studies again getting back to applied to nitrogen reducing carbon in the soil. Right so i'm saying the applied nitrogen stops the Cyanobacteria from getting going. The grass mycelium (part animal part plant) then eats this Cyanobacteria and multiply in numbers and increase the amount of carbon in the soil. So that's how applied nitrogen reduces the amount of carbon in the soil.

But does applied nitrogen reduce mycelium numbers?
I don't think so. It stops their food source but if the food source is there before the nitrogen is applied I think they'll be fine. I think they'll grow and eat that food source even in the presence of nitrogen. But you do have to have no nitrogen applied in the soil for the cyanobacteria to grow first and be the food source of the mycelium.:rolleyes:

yosemitesam1

pedigree 6 wrote: »

The problem I have with these studies concentrating on soil carbon storage and saying that conventional farming is worse for the planet and climate change because soil carbon levels are lower are completely ignoring the fact that high input high output farming is putting many times more carbon on the move going out the farm gate. You can't really have a balanced discussion and ignore that fact.
I've never once seen it mentioned only really here by me.
Why is that because farmers don't really understand what Carbon is.

The carbon that agriculture (and plants) mostly utilise is carbon dioxide. This is then converted by plants into oxygen and carbon by the plant itself. The cow eats the plant (carbon) and the cow converts it into milk and beef and humans eat the milk and beef and we know the rest.

These studies are very important though and we should be trying to find out as much as we can about what is going is on down under our feet.

The reason carbon going out the gate isn't usually mentioned is that its all going to be released back to the atmosphere anyway over the next few days to months and any changes to the amount of carbon being held in food form are tiny compared to soil. Think a dairy farmer stocked at 3/ha, roughly 2t of liveweight and 1.5t solids in the course of a year. That's probably only holding less than an extra ,5t/ha of carbon in food form compared withthe farm holding 20t more in the soil.
The only reason teagasc comes out with the line of we've the lowest co2 footprint in europe for milk is because for grass, these losses are excluded and they're included for tillage.

pedigree 6

yosemitesam1 wrote: »

The reason carbon going out the gate isn't usually mentioned is that its all going to be released back to the atmosphere anyway over the next few days to months and any changes to the amount of carbon being held in food form are tiny compared to soil. Think a dairy farmer stocked at 3/ha, roughly 2t of liveweight and 1.5t solids in the course of a year. That's probably only holding less than an extra ,5t/ha of carbon in food form compared withthe farm holding 20t more in the soil.
The only reason teagasc comes out with the line of we've the lowest co2 footprint in europe for milk is because for grass, these losses are excluded and they're included for tillage.

I'm not sure where the figures you have came from and if they can be ever measured properly.
But there's no element that disappears or turns into another.
The thing people are getting worked up over is the burning of fossil fuels and the release of carbon that was stored away and now is being released back into the atmosphere.
'Fossils ' what were these fossils and how are they carbon?
They were ancient forests and boglands for coal and dead marine life deposited at the bottom of the ocean for petrol and diesel.
Everyone of us is carbon based and bury us at the bottom of the ocean and with enough time and pressure we become crude oil too.
We breath in oxygen but exhale carbon dioxide from the carbon that we eat.
But some of the carbon becomes us as we grow and some comes out as number 1 and 2.

Teagasc's interpretation of it is probably that most of us burn less fossil fuels and use less electricity than most other farmers around the world with our grass eat themselves systems of farming.

I'm not clued in on the whole thing. But to me it looks like there's vested interests at play here and really 'smoke and mirrors'.

yosemitesam1

pedigree 6 wrote: »

These studies say that applied nitrogen is bad for carbon storage in the soil.
But they don't give a reason for this or offer an explanation! Ugh!
The reason applied nitrogen cuts back on the amount of stored carbon in the soil is that nitrogen fixing (from the atmosphere) bacteria won't work when there is available applied nitrogen (they don't seem to mind there own produced nitrogen though).
Now how do these nitrogen fixing bacteria get going?
From my research (on the net) they seem to want a pH of 7 and NEED Boron as well as food which is P and K and some more minerals perhaps.

http://www.plantphysiol.org/content/94/4/1554.full.pdf

Why do they need Boron?
I think they need it as perhaps like grit for a hen. As a gizzard really to break down the nutrients inside their bellies and the pH of the Boron itself probably has a big impact itself as to why they evolved to use it.

Then the studies again getting back to applied to nitrogen reducing carbon in the soil. Right so i'm saying the applied nitrogen stops the Cyanobacteria from getting going. The grass mycelium (part animal part plant) then eats this Cyanobacteria and multiply in numbers and increase the amount of carbon in the soil. So that's how applied nitrogen reduces the amount of carbon in the soil.

But does applied nitrogen reduce mycelium numbers?
I don't think so. It stops their food source but if the food source is there before the nitrogen is applied I think they'll be fine. I think they'll grow and eat that food source even in the presence of nitrogen. But you do have to have no nitrogen applied in the soil for the cyanobacteria to grow first and be the food source of the mycelium.:rolleyes:

The biggest changes under intensification are the removal of plant diversity and the use of fertilizer. Both of these have been shown to result in a smaller and less active microbial population so your soil is being killed, this just happens much slower when you're not tilling it every year.
This is directly linked to soil carbon because it's not plant residues that make up the majority of soil carbon but proteins and sugars bound up with soil aggregates. Fungi make the largest contribution to this because of their much greater surface area and the fact that they release glues to bind soil particles (and improve structure).
Soil bulk density increases alongside intensification also as the soils ability to regulate (through microbes) itself is cut off.

It's hard for research to give you all the answers in one place because microbiologists and ecologists don't tend to know much about farming and the bigger picture to really realise the importance of what they've measured.
On the other side you tend to get these climate or environmental scientists who don't understand anything about farming, soils etc. But they go out and try to measure flows of carbon. There's so much ****ty science done on this I'm assuming the only reason they get money is the government is setting out to try and prove that everything's OK so the status quo is maintained.

yosemitesam1

pedigree 6 wrote: »

I'm not clued in on the whole thing. But to me it looks like there's vested interests at play here and really 'smoke and mirrors'.

I wouldn't disagree with that, but I think the tide is starting to turn.

pedigree 6

I feel a competition coming up.

Who's able to grow mushrooms in their fields?:):D

Buford T. Justice XIX

A bit more on soil nutrition.

http://e360.yale.edu/features/why-its-time-to-stop-punishing-our-soils-with-fertilizers-and-chemicals

Buford T. Justice XIX

Two links today.

First one on the success of GM potatoes in fighting late blight in Uganda.

https://cipotato.org/press-room/blog/first-field-observation-in-uganda-shows-extreme-resistance-to-late-blight-by-gm-potato/

Second one..

Farming Pathogens: An Evolutionary Biologist on the Links Between Big Ag and Disease



http://inthesetimes.com/rural-america/entry/20218/agroecology-global-agribusiness-monoculture-profit-and-disease-rob-wallace

yosemitesam1

Buford T. Justice V wrote: »

Two links today.

First one on the success of GM potatoes in fighting late blight in Uganda.

https://cipotato.org/press-room/blog/first-field-observation-in-uganda-shows-extreme-resistance-to-late-blight-by-gm-potato/

It will be interesting to see how long those resistance genes last, the more successful its uptake is the faster it will fail...

Buford T. Justice XIX

I just came across this article, Ivermectin as a cure for a type of wart on cattle.

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0034528807000410

yosemitesam1

http://proof.nationalgeographic.com/2015/10/15/digging-deep-reveals-the-intricate-world-of-roots/?utm_source=NatGeocom&utm_medium=Email&utm_content=pom_20151025&utm_campaign=Content&utm_rd=17263608

A few very good pictures of different roots, a lot bigger than anything in this country and that's the reason why the deep black soils of the mid west/Russia formed

pedigree 6

We are all food producers and food consumers here and there's big research and results coming out at the moment about the link between gut microbiome and the brain and wider health. So I think it's no harm that this goes into the Farm Science thread.

University College Cork seem to be well up there on the world front in this research. Some of the researchers were at the open day in Moorepark.

Here's a very articulate TED talk from Ruairi Robertson a PhD student from UCC.

(Be careful what/where you eat now).:D

yosemitesam1

Are teagasc getting paid to promote protected urea?

From the article on agriland

“It stacks up in terms of cost and yield compared to CAN,” Wall said.

Teagasc research has found protected urea and CAN give comparable annual grass dry matter (DM) yields.

In terms of nitrogen recovery, protected urea performs very well. According to Teagasc, protected urea is consistently as efficient in N recovery as CAN – unlike traditional, unprotected urea, where a lot of N loss occurs."

But from the official published research

"There was no significant difference in annual grass yield between urea, CAN and urea +NBPT. Urea had the lowest cost per tonne of DM grass yield produced. However, the urea treatment had lower N offtake than CAN and this difference was more pronounced as the N rate increased. There was no difference in N offtake between urea + NBPT and CAN."

Using protected urea versus normal urea resulted in an extra 5kg of nitrogen/ha contained in the grass. That isn't really going to be of any benefit especially as there was no increase in yield so will probably cost the cow energy (and also increase n loss from urine patches).

pedigree 6

yosemitesam1 wrote: »

Are teagasc getting paid to promote protected urea?

From the article on agriland

“It stacks up in terms of cost and yield compared to CAN,” Wall said.

Teagasc research has found protected urea and CAN give comparable annual grass dry matter (DM) yields.

In terms of nitrogen recovery, protected urea performs very well. According to Teagasc, protected urea is consistently as efficient in N recovery as CAN – unlike traditional, unprotected urea, where a lot of N loss occurs."

But from the official published research

"There was no significant difference in annual grass yield between urea, CAN and urea +NBPT. Urea had the lowest cost per tonne of DM grass yield produced. However, the urea treatment had lower N offtake than CAN and this difference was more pronounced as the N rate increased. There was no difference in N offtake between urea + NBPT and CAN."

Using protected urea versus normal urea resulted in an extra 5kg of nitrogen/ha contained in the grass. That isn't really going to be of any benefit especially as there was no increase in yield so will probably cost the cow energy (and also increase n loss from urine patches).

You were at the Moorepark open day yosemitesam so you saw the board and heard the talk.
That's where this article came from, from the talk on the day and I'm sure the interview was on that day.
Agriland are just spreading out these pieces from Moorepark for a few weeks into future.

Then this study. You should never take one study to be 100% accurate.
As a farmer you know yourself that no two years weatherwise are the same. Even location of the plot has a big influence, be that from prevailing weather or micro climate or soil type or organic matter in the soil or whatever.

You have to use your own common sense when reading such articles.
For example if I was to spread urea now here with the ground conditions and temperatures and grass cover. In five days 100% of that Nitrogen in the fertilizer would be lost through volatilisation.
I wouldn't do it.
The protected urea just slows down the granule from melting with a coating on the granule.
I still wouldn't spread that here now either yet. Not in the current conditions.

When your spreading urea when you've emptied the spreader the first bit spread should have dissolved into the soil for maximum usage.

yosemitesam1

pedigree 6 wrote: »

You were at the Moorepark open day yosemitesam so you saw the board and heard the talk.
That's where this article came from, from the talk on the day and I'm sure the interview was on that day.
Agriland are just spreading out these pieces from Moorepark for a few weeks into future.

Then this study. You should never take one study to be 100% accurate.
As a farmer you know yourself that no two years weatherwise are the same. Even location of the plot has a big influence, be that from prevailing weather or micro climate or soil type or organic matter in the soil or whatever.

You have to use your own common sense when reading such articles.
For example if I was to spread urea now here with the ground conditions and temperatures and grass cover. In five days 100% of that Nitrogen in the fertilizer would be lost through volatilisation.
I wouldn't do it.
The protected urea just slows down the granule from melting with a coating on the granule.
I still wouldn't spread that here now either yet. Not in the current conditions.

When your spreading urea when you've emptied the spreader the first bit spread should have dissolved into the soil for maximum usage.

They're saying protected urea stacks up in terms of cost and yield versus can, but they ignore that compared to normal urea there will be no difference in yield to the farmer and it is going to cost more.
The study was done across 2 years and the majority of days it was spread on had 0mm precipitation, so really what they should be saying surely is urea is most cost effective and can be used throughout the year as long as there's a bit of moisture about

Buford T. Justice XIX

Here's one to blow veganism out of the water:)

Root intelligence: Plants can think, feel and learn



https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg22429980-400-root-intelligence-plants-can-think-feel-and-learn/?utm_campaign=Echobox&utm_medium=Social&utm_source=Twitter&cmpid=SOC|NSNS|2017-Echobox#link_time=1500046014


You may have to create an account to read this, though.

Waffletraktor

yosemitesam1 wrote: »

They're saying protected urea stacks up in terms of cost and yield versus can, but they ignore that compared to normal urea there will be no difference in yield to the farmer and it is going to cost more.
The study was done across 2 years and the majority of days it was spread on had 0mm precipitation, so really what they should be saying surely is urea is most cost effective and can be used throughout the year as long as there's a bit of moisture about

~I'm sure Teagasc aren't being paid to sponsor it, it just happened that a protected Urea supplier/manufacturer offered them money to do work on it. Totally unbiased of course.~
I do know farms that did work on N use efficiency and can get into late 50's% but that's nearly going to a hydrphonics drip feed system taking tissue sample etcs to monitor uptake and getting in before a shortfall emerges.

ganmo

http://www.farmersjournal.ie/seaweed-found-to-stop-methane-emissions-from-cattle-rumen-293571

I'm going to have to dig deeper into this one but beware there is no freeze dried seaweed for sale in Ireland

pedigree 6

Cats and farm animals and drinking farm milk make farm children more resistant to asthma and allergies.

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/07/170706072101.htm

pedigree 6

ganmo wrote: »

http://www.farmersjournal.ie/seaweed-found-to-stop-methane-emissions-from-cattle-rumen-293571

I'm going to have to dig deeper into this one but beware there is no freeze dried seaweed for sale in Ireland

It stops methane but can give you cancer.:pac:

Buford T. Justice XIX

Here's an interesting one. Calves injected with HIV produced a broad spectrum response to the virus before the virus could mutate against the antibodies. Scientists are excited because it helps understand the immune response of humans.

https://www.rt.com/viral/397091-cows-neutralizing-antibodies-fight-hiv/

Plus, it's really going to pi** off vegans to boot:D

pedigree 6

Buford T. Justice V wrote: »

Here's an interesting one. Calves injected with HIV produced a broad spectrum response to the virus before the virus could mutate against the antibodies. Scientists are excited because it helps understand the immune response of humans.

https://www.rt.com/viral/397091-cows-neutralizing-antibodies-fight-hiv/

Plus, it's really going to pi** off vegans to boot:D

Yee's all think I'm mad but to further that thought.:pac:

Farm Kids with increased immunity from being exposed to cows (and more I suspect the primary giver of this immunity, cow dung).
Dogs partaking in coprophagia of cow and calf dung.

They are both related and the one and same that is the microbes from the cow's stomachs from that grass eating animal and the fact that that animal has such a stomach system and evolved this gut flora that it has been shown now to be of benefit now to human and dog alike. In that we don't get the same microbes as meat eater's or have the same microbes as our four stomached grass eating domesticated animal but still benefit from the microbes for immunity to allergies and even may help with brain function too as the brain seems to be now inextricably linked to our gut microbes or lack thereof.
But stress has a big impact of gut health as well and can kill the good microbes and allow the bad one's flourish. An example would be that feeling of " butterflies in your stomach" from tension.

Anyway that's all. I've a reputation to upkeep.:D

yosemitesam1

http://onpasture.com/2017/07/24/from-big-to-small-to-big-to-small-our-history-of-cattle-breeding-from-1742-to-today/

A look at the changes through mainly Herefords over the last 300 years. Looking at the pictures its amazing the change a bit of breeding can make

yosemitesam1

http://onpasture.com/2017/07/31/skinny-cows-make-fatter-calves/

This is very interesting, not supplementing growing heifers led to stronger more efficient calves throughout the cows lifetime.
Higher calving rates were achieved by supplementation in the short term but the group not supplemented were much more resilient and stayed in the herd longer.

There's no mention of different strains/genetics so it appears that this is purely down to some sort of epigenetic response.
It might also in part explain how suckler herd fertility declined.

Buford T. Justice XIX

yosemitesam1 wrote: »

http://onpasture.com/2017/07/31/skinny-cows-make-fatter-calves/

This is very interesting, not supplementing growing heifers led to stronger more efficient calves throughout the cows lifetime.
Higher calving rates were achieved by supplementation in the short term but the group not supplemented were much more resilient and stayed in the herd longer.

There's no mention of different strains/genetics so it appears that this is purely down to some sort of epigenetic response.
It might also in part explain how suckler herd fertility declined.

It looks very much like compensatory growth to me with reduced growth in the winter meaning better weight gains on grass?

pedigree 6

yosemitesam1 wrote: »

http://onpasture.com/2017/07/31/skinny-cows-make-fatter-calves/

This is very interesting, not supplementing growing heifers led to stronger more efficient calves throughout the cows lifetime.
Higher calving rates were achieved by supplementation in the short term but the group not supplemented were much more resilient and stayed in the herd longer.

There's no mention of different strains/genetics so it appears that this is purely down to some sort of epigenetic response.
It might also in part explain how suckler herd fertility declined.

My own experience is stuff our dairy replacements with quality grass and meal for the the first year of life. But when they hit grass in Feb or march the next year cut out any supplementation and rely on grass only. Then bull from 20th April onwards. Fit not fat with a good frame would be the mantra I suppose.
Longevity is usually good here.