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SARE/NACAA Fellows Visit the Cornhusker State

Posted on by Andy Zieminski

Farmers standing around a field talking with cows in the back.

Nebraska’s landscape is one of distant horizons, rolling plains, sandy hills, and acre after acre of agriculture. In a state where ninety-three percent of the state’s land is in production agriculture, cattle ranches span thousands of acres, and local food systems are on the rise, learning opportunities abounded for a group of educators like the Sustainable Agriculture Fellows. The Sustainable Agriculture Fellows program is a two-year training opportunity in sustainable agriculture for Extension workers. Supported by SARE and the National Association of County Agricultural Agents (NACAA), the program enhances understanding of sustainable agriculture and provides broad based, national exposure to successful and unique sustainable agriculture programs.

This fall, the fellows embarked on an agricultural tour of Nebraska and took an in-depth look at one Nebraska family farm. Tour stops included Nebraska farms, ranches and educational institutions, including the Horticulture Department and the Institute for the Culinary Arts at Metro Community College in Omaha, the University of Nebraska Lincoln’s Innovation Campus, Shadowbrook Farm’s high tunnels and creamery near Denton, the McLean family farm and feedlot near Benedict, Jim Knopik’s mob grazing ranch near Fullerton, The Grain Place (an organic farm and processing plant in Marquette), the Berns’ family farm and cover crop seed business near Bladen, and the Raising Nebraska Building at the Nebraska State Fair Grounds. Facilitated conversation kept the fellows engaged during locally sourced meals and van rides across the hills and plains of Nebraska.

The Fellows used a training tool developed by the Northeast SARE program called “Reading the Farm” to review detailed farm information, observe, and engage in facilitated discussion with Kevin Loth and Charuth Van Beuzekom Loth of Shadowbrook Farm and Dutch Girl Creamery near Denton, Nebraska. During the Reading the Farm exercise, the Fellows met with the Loth family and shared knowledge and insights within the context of the Loth’s vegetable farm and goat’s milk creamery businesses. After the tour, the fellows provided a written report summarizing their feedback for Shadowbrook Farm and Dutch Girl Creamery. That kind of engagement with producers and other Extension agents is one of the main draws to the Sustainable Agriculture Fellows program.

As we walked through pasture grasses at Jim Kopnik’s ranch the day after the Reading the Farm exercise, Utah State University Extension agent and 2013 Fellow, Matt Palmer, reflected on the program and explained how the Reading the Farm exercises have improved his interactions with farmers and have helped him better meet the needs of his local clientele. “It has been very valuable,” explained Palmer. “When I go back to the county that I’m from and I view farms, I understand how my recommendations interact with their other enterprises. I’m more apt to take a holistic view of their farm.”

Before sitting down to talk about cover crops with the Berns family at Green Cover Seed, University of Missouri Regional Horticultural Specialist and 2014 Fellow, Patrick Byers, echoed Palmer’s sentiments, saying that the Sustainable Agriculture Fellows program has fulfilled his expectations and more. “I’ve worked with farmers for many years,” said Byers. “This was a chance to delve more deeply into all aspects of sustainability and to build my skills as a person who is empathetic to the realities of sustainability for the farmers that I serve...I really can’t say enough things about what it has meant to me to be a Fellow.”

Curious about the Sustainable Agriculture Fellows program and the Reading the Farm tool? Learn about the people and the program online at sare.org/fellows.

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Growing the Field for Organic Conservation

Posted on by Stacie Clary

As producers work to meet regulations under the National Organic Program (NOP) and become certified organic, they often apply conservation practices that align well with the Natural Resources Conservation Service’s (NRCS) conservation activities, such as green manures, buffer strips, and rotational grazing. NRCS assistance is being sought by both new and established organic farmers to help meet resource stewardship goals.

Yet, NRCS staff, as well as other ag professionals such as organic certifiers, need an improved understanding of natural resource conservation on organic and transitioning farms in Oregon and California, according to Oregon Tilth and the Wild Farm Alliance. In answer to a survey administered by the two organizations, the majority of organic certifiers stated that they did not work with NRCS.

Oregon Tilth and Wild Farm Alliance, through their project  Growing the Field for Organic Conservation, expanded NRCS’ knowledge of soil health and conservation on organic and transitioning farms with the goal of reducing  the barriers to organic certification and increasing organic and transitioning farmers' participation in conservation programs.

As the project leaders developed a toolkit to advance knowledge of organic conservation practices and how certification and conservation programs work together, a thirty-page resource was developed to support NRCS conservation planners and other agricultural professionals as they work with organic producers. The National Organic Farming Handbook describes organic systems and identifies key resources to guide conservation planning and implementation on organic farms. The handbook was developed with a team comprised of NRCS staff and partner organizations from across the country and from a range of disciplines. Producers and other audiences may also find the handbook useful, particularly the resources listed in various sections.

Sarah Brown, Oregon Tilth, was pleased with the results. “We are incredibly pleased to have supported the development of the National Organic Handbook. This document provides the first comprehensive resource focused on the intersect of conservation and organic agriculture. It serves as a guide for conservation professionals, farmers, and others interested in supporting conservation on organic lands.”

In addition to the handbook, resources for organic certifiers were also developed. The Biodiversity Conservation: An Organic Farmer’s and Certifier’s Guide was created to clarify the National Organic Program’s new Natural Resources and Biodiversity Conservation Guidance. This guide gives farmers and certifiers practical and effective information to not only be in compliance but also to take advantage of the ecosystem benefits related to biodiversity. According to Jo Ann Baumgartner, Wild Farm Alliance, “The Biodiversity Conservation: An Organic Farmer’s and Certifier’s Guide has been well received by organic certifiers and is stimulating many to update their Organic System Plans.”

One clear outcome of the project, according to Al Kurki, Western SARE PDP Associate Coordinator, was that it catalyzed institutional change. “Not only did the project reach a lot of ag professionals and farmers, it also helped spur more frequent, regular dialogue and interaction between the National Organic Program and NRCS,” states  Kurki.

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Vegetable and Weed Degree-day Models

Posted on by Stacie Clary

Pest managers are familiar with the concept of using degree days to predict pest outbreaks. Insects, like many other organisms, develop according to the temperature around them and degree days are a way to measure accumulated temperature.

Plants – at least in part – also develop based on temperature, so a team in Oregon is adapting a degree-day modeling system built for pest management to make a tool for vegetable growers to better plan their planting and harvesting dates.

“The problem is when you’re trying to schedule a harvest, seed catalogs all give an expected maturity date in calendar days,” explained Oregon State University Small Farms Extension Agent Nick Andrews, who is spearheading the project. “Calendar days are pretty inaccurate, and growers recognize that.”

One seed catalog for example might say a broccoli variety needs 65 days to mature, while another claims the same variety requires 90 days. That range makes it tough to pick a planting day in May to hit a desired harvest date in August. And using calendar days ignores local temperature, which is a huge factor in how fast plants mature.

“Lots of things influence vegetable development rates so degree-day models aren’t perfect,”Andrews said. “But they seem to be more accurate than calendar days, and degree-day models are especially useful when crops are planted early or late, or when the weather is unusual.”

With a $203,000 grant from the Western Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education program – Western SARE – the Oregon team created a website called Croptimeto predict the time-to-maturity for a number of vegetable varieties important to Willamette Valley growers. Croptime was built on the backbone of the USPest.org pest-management degree-day modeling site, which was itself supported by another U.S. Department of Agriculture regional program, the Western Integrated Pest Management Center.

The combination is not a stretch, explained Len Coop, the associate director of the Integrated Plant Protection Center at Oregon State and architect of USPest.

“Temperature integrates everything. It drives the development of everything,” said Coop, who is a contributor to the new project. “It was never a foreign idea to merge crop models with degree-day models.” 

Maximizing Profits

Here’s why it matters. For fresh vegetable growers, harvest timing is critical. Processors want a consistent supply of produce throughout a growing season, not a glut followed by a shortage then another glut. And growers want to time their harvest when labor is available and demand is high so they can maximize profits.Harvest-timing helps ensure a consistent supply of fresh produce for local restaurants and for community-supported agriculture operations that deliver fresh produce to customers.

“We plan for each week's (CSA) share very carefully,”said Tanya Murray from Sauvie Island Organics in Oregon. “The dramatically different weather we’ve had this spring, and last, makes it hard to know what to expect. Using degree days to predict days to maturity would be very helpful.”

Crop timing can also be a way growers avoid pests, an important integrated pest management principle. In fact, the Croptime model includes certain weed species to help growers – especially organic producers – pick varieties and planting dates to minimize weed issues.

Grower workshops identified the initial varieties to include in the Croptime system: 34 varieties of fruiting crops like beans, squash and sweet corn, seven varieties of carrots and parsnips, 15 varieties of broccoli, cabbage, cauliflower and kale, and seven varieties of spinach and lettuce.

The team has more than a dozen of those models up on the Croptime site now, and plans to have 50 loaded by spring 2017. The number of models it will take for the site to become widely used is an open question.

“Vegetable growers typically grow several varieties of the same crop, so we might have to get close to 200 models for it to really be noticed,” Coop said. “It’ll take a lot of effort to get to that.”

One way the system might be most useful is helping growers choose unfamiliar varieties to meet unexpected needs.

“When we have a couple weeks of wet weather in spring, we could use Croptime to choose varieties we might not be familiar with but that would help keep our production up,” explained Bob Egger of the Pumpkin Patch farm in Sauvie Island, Oregon.

To help build the number of models, the team is looking at the idea of developing a standard for each crop, then indexing individual varieties to that standard, Coop said. So one carrot variety might develop 10 percent faster than the standard carrot and another 10 percent slower, and Croptime could automatically make the adjustment.

Local Conditions

The whole system is based on using local weather conditions and forecasts, so growers can select the weather station nearest their farm. They then select from a number of different forecasts, including the 30-year historical average, 10-year historical average, last year’s weather, two years ago’s weather, and a new forecast by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration built from several different climate models.

“The default is the NOAA model, but if a grower thinks conditions are a lot like last year, or two years ago, they can select those instead,” Andrews said.

Once they’ve chosen a weather station and forecast to use, growers select the vegetable variety they are interested in and enter up to four different planting dates. Croptime then displays a report showing the dates that crop will go through critical stages – first leaves, flowering and reaching maturity for harvest.

Growers testing the site quickly pointed out a way to make it more useful.

“They want to enter a harvest date and have it display the planting date,” Andrews said. “It’s a really good feature and we thought, ‘Huh, we should have thought of that.’”

The team is also looking to add resources to the system, such as an irrigation scheduler developed by Washington State University. They also want to share Croptime models with other states and verify models indifferent climate zones to expand its usefulness beyond the Willamette Valley.

“It’s a long-term project,” Coop said. “We need to keep finding funding, and then we can expand it regionally, expand the database of varieties and focus on different crop types, such as winter vegetables and cover crops.”

Learn more on the Croptime website

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Lessons Learned During SARE/NACAA Fellows Tour

Posted on by Sean McGovern

LITTLE ROCK, Arkansas – Central Arkansas was the location for the spring 2015 tour for the SARE/NACAA Sustainable Agriculture Fellows program, where Cooperative Extension agents from across the country spent several days learning more about sustainable agriculture concepts.

The program, sponsored by Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education (SARE) and the National Association of County Agricultural Agents (NACAA), challenges county agents to assess strengths, weaknesses, and relevant sustainable agriculture applications in current agricultural systems. A major component involves tours aimed at exposing agents to the huge diversity of sustainability in practice.

This spring’s program brought participants to farms in Arkansas and was hosted by the University of Arkansas.

“Even though I’m an Extension livestock specialist, on our SARE Fellows tour I could see how the concepts of sustainability apply across all types of agricultural enterprises,” said SARE Fellows Susan Kerr, northwest livestock and dairy regional specialist at Washington State University. “We saw excellent examples of IPM (Integrated Pest Management) on a berry farm; a vegetable farm with high social capital but production challenges; a grazing operation that was under utilizing its grass resources; and a tree nut farm where the savvy owner kept close track of international market trends so he could capture a high price for his product.”

During the tour, SARE Fellows used the Reading the Farm training tool to conduct in-depth analyses on North Pulaski Farm, an organic vegetable and fruit farm north of Little Rock. Reading the Farm looks at farms as whole systems; participants learn to assess how economic, environmental, and social factors interconnect and influence farmer decision-making.

"The Reading the Farm exercise completely changed my perspective relative to assessing the social and economic aspects of farming sustainability,” said SARE Fellows Patrick Byers, regional horticulture specialist with University of Missouri Extension. “This tool has already benefited me in my programming efforts with farmers in Missouri, and would without a doubt benefit my MU Extension colleagues.”

Fellows also toured several other agricultural production systems in Arkansas. These farms and systems included Wye Mountain Flowers and Berries, which grows flowers and U-pick blueberries and blackberries; Heifer Ranch; a pecan orchard; and rice production on an agronomic farm.

They also met with the co-chair of the University of Arkansas' Arkansas Discovery Farms program to learn how the university is working with farms to collect data and make recommendations.

About the SARE/NACAA Sustainable Agriculture Fellows program. The two-year Fellows program provides a training opportunity that enhances understanding of sustainable agriculture and provides broad-based, national exposure to successful and unique sustainable agriculture programs. Participating Fellows are better able to create new programs that meet the needs of their local clientele. Learn more about the Sustainable Agriculture Fellows program, including biographies of current Fellows.

--30—

Published by the Southern Region of the Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education (SARE) program. Funded by the USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA), Southern SARE operates under cooperative agreements with the University of Georgia, Fort Valley State University, and the Kerr Center for Sustainable Agriculture to offer competitive grants to advance sustainable agriculture in America's Southern region.

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Improving Nutrient Use Efficiency in Montana Wheat

Posted on by Andy Zieminski

"This was a landmark study because we knew we were losing nitrogen, we just didn't know how we were losing it," says farmer Curtis Hershberger.

When nitrogen fertilizers are applied to the soil surface using certain application practices, a significant amount can be lost when the nitrogen converts to ammonia gas and enters the atmosphere. This process, known as volatilization, represents an economic loss for farmers and is a source of atmospheric pollution.

An on-farm study lead by Montana State University Soil Scientist Richard Engel and funded by SARE has shed light on the urea fertilization practices that are most susceptible to nitrogen volatilization. The team also studied nutrient losses from a green manure cover crop. They developed recommendations that have improved the sustainability of wheat farms across Montana. As a result of this work, farmers statewide are saving an estimated $5 million per year in improved nutrient use efficiency and crop yield.

For the study, the research team determined the fraction of applied urea fertilizer lost as ammonia gas when applied to winter wheat from late fall to early spring (see ammonia gas collectors in the field at the video's 2:30 mark). Based on their findings, they recommend against surface-applying fertilizer to frozen or wet ground, particularly in the winter, and instead to apply it in the spring on dry ground a day or two before significant rain. They also recommend subsurface applications and the use of urease inhibitors.

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From Fruit to Fuel

Posted on by Andy Zieminski

As tree fruit growers know well, annual harvests do not remove all the fruit from the orchard. A great deal is left behind littering the orchard floor. While pondering his fruit waste problem, Dan West of Macon, Mo., who grows apples, peaches, apricots, nectarines, plums and pears, hit upon a novel approach: Why not turn the waste into energy?

West already had been distilling the waste fruit into natural wine using a still he designed out of a beer keg. (West received a distilling permit from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.) Then, driven by an over-supply of waste fruit, coupled with his growing concern about the supply and cost of fossil fuel, West decided to produce ethanol from his fruit wine by heating it and removing the alcohol, at a rate of about 1.5 gallons per hour.

“Using waste was the main thing,” recalled West, who has been running an orchard on 10 acres since 1995, and received a SARE grant in 2003 to experiment with ethanol production. “I also thought it would be nice to be self-sufficient, using our ethanol to power our mower and tractor.”

West built a second still from a 500-gallon propane tank, in which he heats his fruit wine to just below boiling, gathers steam in a fractionating column, and distills the alcohol portion of that steam to 190 proof. This still should easily produce 4–5 gallons per hour, although he expects to speed up the distillation as he improves the second still.

“Even at $2-a-gallon fuel prices, my ethanol distillation process is well worth doing,” West said. Discounting the labor to gather and crush fruit — now his most time-consuming task — distillation costs only 65 cents per gallon in electricity costs. Those gallons of ethanol, however, now power his farm engines at a higher octane than gasoline and provide a cleaner burn.

“It’s exciting,” he said, reflecting on the first time he powered up his lawn tractor with homemade ethanol.

Others have been similarly fired up. At least 1,000 people per year visit West’s orchard, about 120 miles from Kansas City, in part to see his energy-saving invention.

West never stops thinking up innovative ways to get the most from his farm. Since gathering waste fruit is time consuming, he has focused his keen inventor’s mind on finding a better way. With a second SARE grant, West is designing a machine that gathers up waste fruit, then crushes it into pulp, some of which is spread back on the orchard floor as fertilizer, and some of which is squeezed into juice and then fermented into wine.

West also received another SARE grant to design a closed-loop energy production system using a solar concentrating method that reduces electricity needed to heat the still. The prototype has produced 170-proof ethanol. “When it worked after three or four tweaks, I was jumping up and down,” he recalled. “Winning the initial grant opened up many doors for me.”

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Testimonials from Past Fellows

Posted on by Andy Zieminski

Each year, four Extension agents are selected to participate in the SARE Sustainable Agriculture Fellows program. The following are reflections from a few Fellows on their experiences in the program.

Walt Bumgarner, Penn State Extension (2007 Fellow)

As part of the first class of SARE Fellows, I want to tell my fellow NACAA members that their participation in the SARE Fellows Program could possibly be the highlight of their career in Extension....To be offered the chance to travel the country and experience different aspects of sustainability is invaluable.

Ronnie Barentine, University of Georgia Cooperative Extension (2007 Fellow)

To gain further knowledge of sustainable agriculture systems, I had the highest honor to be chosen as a member of the 2008-2010 SARE and NACAA Fellows Program....The trainings were held in the states of Arizona, Georgia, South Carolina, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Iowa. While visiting these states, I studied organic fruit and vegetable production, livestock production in arid lands, endangered species of desert lands, illegal entry of non U.S. citizens on ranch operations, grass fed all natural beef and organic beef production, dairy modernization, conservation tillage, farmers markets, and conservation of soil and riparian water resources.

Richard Brzozowski, University of Maine Cooperative Extension (2008 Fellow)

My Extension programming with farmers and growers has benefited greatly on account of my participation [in the SARE/NACAA Fellows Program]....I learned a great deal about sustainable agriculture and its components as I met farmers and Extension workers from different regions of the country. I have cultivated working relationships and friendships with many of these individuals. As a result of my experience, I have integrated many of these ideas and methods into my programming.

Stephen Komar, Rutgers New Jersey Cooperative Extension (2009 Fellow)

The SARE Fellowship provides a unique opportunity for agricultural educators, producers and others to interact with individuals that they may not normally deal with in their respective specialties....Since participating in this program, I have personally worked with some of the other fellowship awardees on grant projects, articles and other educational programs....I highly recommend that NACAA members, regardless of experience, participate in this program.

Mark Blevins, North Carolina Cooperative Extension (2009 Fellow)

My agricultural awareness and understanding has exploded during the SARE Fellows program! I come from a horticultural background and was searching for ways to gain a broader sense of agriculture with a focus on sustainability, but received so much more....This has been a remarkable experience for me as an agent in my first 5 years, but this program could benefit any agricultural educator at any point in their career.

Joran Viers, New Mexico State University Cooperative Extension (2009 Fellow)

When I applied in 2009 for the SARE Fellows program, I thought it would be fun and mildly educational. After all, I had a strong background in organic production, having spent six years running our state’s organic certification program....It has been fun, extremely fun, but much more than “mildly” educational. Through trips to various regions of the country, looking at all kinds of agriculture at all sizes, I have learned far more than I imagined I would....This program has been one of the best professional development opportunities I’ve had, by far.

Suzanne Mills-Wasniak, Ohio State University Extension (2010 Fellow)

My first year as a SARE Fellow has greatly changed the way I analyze a client’s operations. Working in a two-thirds urban / one-third rural county, often more emphasis in the rural areas is placed on economic viability while the urban areas focus on social responsibility. Now instead of zeroing in on what the client perceives as the problem, I look at the operation as three equal components, socially responsible, environmentally sustainable, and economically viable; all of which must be in equilibrium to be totally sustainable.

Lauren Hunter, University of Idaho Extension (2010 Fellow)

The SARE Fellows program has increased my knowledge on sustainable agricultural practices used across the US. The knowledge gained thus far has been incorporated and used in grower presentations as well as current research projects....The SARE Fellows program has also given me more national recognition as an Educator specialized in sustainable and organic farming. I also value the networking opportunities it has provided with other Extension Educators from across the US.

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Researchers and Educators Collaborate to Teach Youth about Cover Crops

Posted on by NCR SARE Intern

Across the region, farmers are planting cover crops, a method of revitalizing soil, curbing erosion, and managing pests. Steve Sutera, an Extension educator at South Dakota State University (SDSU), saw an opportunity to bring together Bon Homme County’s Extension service, FFA Chapter, 4-H Club, and ongoing research at SDSU.

In 2008, Sutera submitted a proposal and was awarded a $2,000 grant from the NCR-SARE Youth Educator Grant Program to educate students about cover crops, both in the field and in the classroom.

“The Dean of Agriculture and Biological Sciences at SDSU encourages Extension Educators to get youth involved in our research projects,” explained Sutera. “I felt this was an excellent opportunity to involve, educate, and empower local youth to assist with this sustainable agriculture project. It provided an opportunity for youth to take on leadership and responsibility roles. Also, the work they accomplished could be reported in their FFA or 4-H project work.”

Gary Kriz, a local farmer who was producing winter wheat, helped Sutera and area youth prepare 1½ acres for their test plots. Starting in July, with assistance from a technician from the SDSU Plant Science Department, Sutera and a dozen students staked out the plots, planted 10 different crops with 12 repetitions throughout, and put up signs and markers. Crops included oats, barley, triticale, cowpeas, soybeans, turnips, radishes and millets. The students labeled the harvest bags and did all the harvesting. Over the course of three fall harvests, they submitted close to 40 samples to SDSU to be weighed, dried, and analyzed for feed quality. In addition to the hands-on field work, Sutera provided 2½ hours of classroom instruction for 24 Bon Homme High School students. Several of the students who had assisted with the plot shared information and observations.

“The teamwork and cooperation from the FFA students and 4-H members was outstanding,” said Sutera. “Doing a hands-on project such as the research plot was really a great way for them to connect and understand the whole concept of how cover crops can help us sustain and improve our environment and our land as a resource.”

Sutera sent the samples to SDSU to be evaluated for feed quality based on total dry matter production, crude protein content, acid detergent fiber content, and neutral detergent fiber content. The data from the samples gathered by these students will contribute to an ongoing, multi-state, USDA Special Grant project called “Five States Ruminant Consortium.” This ongoing $563,000 special grant is supporting research and Extension faculty and stakeholder cooperators who are examining opportunities within the ruminant livestock industry for economic development in western South Dakota, southwestern North Dakota, southeastern Montana, eastern Wyoming, and northwestern Nebraska.

“The incorporation of cover crops into our farming practices is a concept that will take time to implement,” said Sutera. “The information and data from this research Researchers and Educators Collaborate to Teach Youth about Cover Crops project will be used to help producers make good decisions when they select the cover crops and mixes that will benefit them, primarily for grazing alternatives. By providing our youth with a positive educational hands-on experience, they can now assist us in promoting cover crops as a part of the sustainable agriculture efforts in our area.”

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Researchers Study Forage Chicory for Parasite Reduction in Sheep

Posted on by NCR SARE Intern

Sheep and goat production is a growing enterprise for small and limited resource farmers in the North Central region. While small ruminants (sheep and goats) are adaptable to many different production systems and can be raised with relatively few inputs, they present production challenges. For instance, control of internal parasites, especially gasrointestinal nematodes including Haemonchus contortus (barberpole worm, stomach worm), is a primary concern for many sheep and goat producers and is particularly challenging in humid regions. In Ohio, researchers are examining the use of forage chicory as part of a gastrointestinal nematode parasites control strategy for sheep.

“Sheep farms that utilize managed grazing are both economically profitable and environmentally sustainable,” said Bill Shulaw, professor and Extension Veterinarian and at the College of Veterinary Medicine at Ohio State University. “In our region, perhaps the greatest threat to this production system is gastrointestinal parasites, especially the blood feeding Haemonchus contortus. Loss of productivity associated with parasite infections is usually more costly to the farmer than animal deaths, although mortality attributed to parasite infection can be significant too.”

In 2008, Shulaw, together with Ohio State Extension Educators Rory Lewandowski and Jeff McCutcheon, applied for a NCR-SARE Research and Education grant, and was awarded $137,150 to measure animal performance and the potential of plant secondary metabolites found in forage chicory to reduce the impact of parasite infections in sheep.

“Research reports describing plants with possible activity against internal parasites in sheep and goats have been appearing for several years,” said Shulaw. “Here in the U.S., much of the work has focused on Sericea lespedeza and the role of condensed tannins (CT). However, this plant is not particularly desirable in our region, and other reports, mostly from outside the U.S., have suggested that forage chicory might also be useful.”

As the team began investigating forage chicory as a parasite control strategy, they learned that Dr. Joyce Foster and her colleagues at the USDA’s Agricultural Research Service Appalachian Farming Systems Research Center had conducted research with several varieties of forage chicory studying its nutritional value and palatability for small ruminants. They contacted Foster, and together the team of four had collective expertise in sheep management, management intensive grazing techniques and forage production, internal parasite biology and control, and in forage chicory, including the biochemistry that might be involved. The team worked with farmers John Anderson, of Shreve, OH, Curt Cline of Albany, OH, and Bruce Rickard of Fredericktown, OH.

The two-year, on-farm, research project sought to determine the usefulness of a non-traditional forage, forage chicory (Cichorium intybus L.), in controlling gastrointestinal nematode parasites (GIN) in grazing sheep. A comparison forage, brown mid-rib (BMR) forage sorghum (Sorghum bicolor (L.) Moench.) x sudangrass (Sorghum sudanense Piper) hybrid was used to provide a comparable forage to provide a low, or no, parasite challenge. SARE’s Agricultural Innovations fact sheet, Sustainable Control of Internal Parasites in Small Ruminant Production, provides basic information on each parasite approach and cites resources for training and further information. It’s available online at sare.org/SmallRuminant

“Chicory contains sesquiterpene lactone (SL) and small amounts of condensed tannins, and it has been shown to have negative effects on the survival of adult and larval stages of internal parasites of sheep and farmed deer in research conducted in other countries,” said Shulaw. “Published research suggests that the SL concentration is likely the principal factor affecting parasite numbers although this is still incompletely studied.”

Statistical analysis of the data collected over the two-year period revealed that during the respective grazing periods, lambs grazing the BMR gained slightly more weight than the lambs grazing the chicory, but the fecal egg count (FEC) of the lambs grazing the chicory increased less than those grazing the BMR. Shulaw believes that this suggests that the antiparasitic effect of chicory was attributable to a direct effect on GIN. Given the slightly superior weight gain in the BMR lamb groups, Shulaw thinks there was an antiparasitic effect on the GIN in the lambs grazing chicory, at least with regard to their egg output, and that this was likely due to a direct effect of chicory on the worms (as opposed to merely an effect of improved nutrition for chicory, as has been suggested in other studies).

The team disseminated project results to farmers, students, veterinarians and researchers using face-to-face workshops, web programming, field days, presentations at forage and grazing conferences and publication in professional journals.

“Our project examined just one piece of a very large problem in the sheep and goat industries,” said Shulaw. “Going into it, I don’t think any of us, farmers included, believed that forage chicory would be the ‘silver bullet’ that solved the parasite control problem. But we all learned a great deal about various forages, grazing techniques, and the complexities of internal parasite control. I believe that it is this continual questioning and learning process, coupled with applying what we learn, that contributes to sustainability in agriculture.”

Bill Shulaw’s research team created a multi-page fact sheet that describes basic parasite biology for gastrointestinal worms acquired by sheep and goats on pastures, and provides several strategies for managing internal parasitism. It’s available online.

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Grant Puts (Good) Crimp in Farm Operations

Posted on by Andy Zieminski

It all began in 2002 with a $6,500 SARE grant and the seed of an idea. Today, that idea has grown into hundreds of research projects around the country, an international business and a new, effective no-till tool that farmers are adding to the ways they suppress weeds in cash-crop fields.

The tool is the roller crimper, a drum with blades mounted to the front- or back-end of a tractor and used to roll down, crimp and kill cover crops, creating thick, weed suppressing mulch. Until the crimper, farmers were largely left with two weed-control options: cultivate the weeds into submission or spray herbicides. The former disturbs the soil and allows for erosion; the latter is often expensive for conventional farming, and unusable for organic.

“I had the idea for the tool,” says Jeff Moyer, director of farm operations at the Rodale Institute in Kutztown, Penn. “But without SARE’s help, it might not have happened. That first grant started a whole tidal wave of looking at cover crops differently and it allowed us to build the very first roller crimper.”

A picture of a tracker in a field

Today, the roller crimper is a common sight on land-grant university research plots, according to Moyer, who leveraged that first SARE grant into a larger USDA grant to further refine the tool. One Pennsylvania company, I&J Manufacturing, saw opportunity in the burgeoning technology and now has a thriving business building and shipping roller crimpers domestically and overseas.

Farmers across the country are starting to add the tool to their arsenal of weed control options. Kentucky farmer Joel Armistead, who is collaborating on an EPA-funded project with the nonprofit Cumberland River Compact to explore ways to reduce chemical inputs, says while he ran into problems with the weather, he was able to reduce his spraying considerably by first using the crimper and then spraying just enough to take down the rest of the cover crop.

SARE is continuing to fund other crimper research around the country to explore how the tool works in different climates, geography, and with different cash and cover crops. The crimper, while not a fix-all, has shown promise in using about 40 percent less energy than cultivating or spraying; reducing erosion; retaining moisture; and allowing for more flexibility, since roll downs do not need to be timed to dry conditions.

Tim Bock, who runs a 100-acre certified organic farm outside Kutztown, has tried the roller on more than 20 acres for another SARE-funded project. After two years of success, he plans to completely switch his soybean production to rolled rye. “The results have been outstanding,” Bock says. “I’ve really reduced my weed pressure and drastically reduced the number of trips across the field. I eliminated a complete tillage cycle.”

Moyer cautions that roller crimpers are not for farming 101. A farmer must be quite experienced with the nuances of their fields and work on rotations that match cover crops to the cash crop. “One must grow the cover crop with the same attention paid to the cash crop.”

Want more information? Visit SARE's database of projects and search for the term "roller crimper."

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