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Full-Text Articles in Life Sciences
Comparing Organic And Conventional Yield Responses To Climate Variations, Joost Wilken Meyer
Comparing Organic And Conventional Yield Responses To Climate Variations, Joost Wilken Meyer
Graduate Theses and Dissertations
This thesis compares the responses of organic yields and conventional yields towards climate variations. To achieve this objective, weather variables such as growing season weather conditions (average temperature, precipitation, cloud cover, relative humidity, drought index), weather anomalies, the occurrence of severe or extreme droughts and excessive rainfalls, are combined with 23 data sets gathered from previous studies that compare organic and conventional yields from the same location and time periods. To narrow the scope, the thesis focuses on soybean, maize, and wheat production in Europe and North America. Study-level fixed-effects models are used to control for any time-invariant factors such …
Soil Health, Phosphorus And Carbon Dynamics In Response To A One-Time Compost Application And Cover Crops In Organic Dryland Winter Wheat, Idowu Ademola Atoloye
Soil Health, Phosphorus And Carbon Dynamics In Response To A One-Time Compost Application And Cover Crops In Organic Dryland Winter Wheat, Idowu Ademola Atoloye
All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023
Organic dryland winter wheat (Triticum aestivum) growers in the U.S. are faced with high interannual variability in yields. This is related to the low annual precipitation and low soil fertility on the cultivated soils. Improving soil health is the key to increasing and maintaining crop yields. In this study, we compared the effects of different rates (0, 12.5, 25 and 50 Mg DW ha-1 compost and 2 Mg ha manure-1) of large quantities of steer manure compost and the inclusion of cover crops versus fallow on soil health and on carbon and phosphorus dynamics in …
Forage Species Selection For Transitional Organic Production In The Southeastern United States, Jonathan Kubesch
Forage Species Selection For Transitional Organic Production In The Southeastern United States, Jonathan Kubesch
Masters Theses
Despite the vast production markets for forage and organic products nationally, so far limited work has been done to develop organic forages specifically for Middle Tennessee or the mid-South in general. The present organic research field focuses on vegetable and grain production; however, forage production offers an easier transition for producers moving into certified organic agriculture. The present study seeks to evaluate several forage blends for optimizing forage production under low-input transitional organic conditions. Ideally a forage system could be tailored to the beef cattle operations of Middle Tennessee, the dominant forage consumption market in this region of the mid-South. …
Untangling The Economic And Social Impediments To Producer Adoption Of Organic Wheat, Donya L. Ralph-Quarnstrom
Untangling The Economic And Social Impediments To Producer Adoption Of Organic Wheat, Donya L. Ralph-Quarnstrom
All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023
Consumer demand for organic products has shown double-digit growth in recent years encouraging the development of a wider range of goods (Greene, 2017). Americans with an annual household income under $30,000 actively purchase organic foods at nearly the same rate as households with over $75,000 in annual incomes, 42% versus 49% (Greene et al., 2017). Previous research observed the adoption of organic farming practices on a combination of different grains, fruits and vegetables, meat, and dairy products from across the globe. However, this is the first study to examine the adoption of organic wheat in the Western U.S. By addressing …
Consumers’ Willingness To Pay For Hydroponic Lettuce, Daniel Gilmour
Consumers’ Willingness To Pay For Hydroponic Lettuce, Daniel Gilmour
Graduate Theses and Dissertations
With continued advances in hydroponic plant production technology, an increasing number of farms have begun using hydroponic techniques to grow leaf lettuce and other food crops in a controlled environment. Recent controversy about the ongoing inclusion of hydroponics in the USDA organic program has highlighted uncertainty about marketing for hydroponic crops. In November 2017, the National Organic Standards Board voted not to recommend that hydroponic farms be banned from applying for organic certification. Since then, continued controversy has led a group of organic producers to start an additional independent certification program that would exclude hydroponic crops. While hydroponic production may …
Gopher Intrusion In Cropping Systems, Kenneth Romero, Paul Cardinalli
Gopher Intrusion In Cropping Systems, Kenneth Romero, Paul Cardinalli
Agricultural Education and Communication
The purpose of this project was to determine if no till vs. till on gopher populations was more beneficial. Which is more efficient at controlling gophers and explain the damage they can cause and the diseases they can potentially vector. What are the different options of pest managements that have to be used when dealing with a gopher infestation in a tilled field vs. a no-tilled field.
Evaluating The Sustainability Of Four Organic Vegetable Production Systems, Delia W. Scott
Evaluating The Sustainability Of Four Organic Vegetable Production Systems, Delia W. Scott
Theses and Dissertations--Plant and Soil Sciences
A field study evaluating the sustainability of four organic vegetable production systems was conducted in Lexington, Kentucky in 2006 and 2007. The four systems included no-till, raised beds covered with biodegradable black mulch, bare ground with shallow cultivation, and bare ground with shallow cultivation and wood chip mulch. The two-year study compared yield, weed control, labor, and costs associated with each system, as well as physical, chemical, and microbiological soil characteristics. In 2006, tomatoes (Lycopersicon esculentum Mill.) were grown in the four systems, with no significant difference in yield. Summer squash (Cucurbita pepo L.) was grown in the …
Determining Compost Carryover For Optimal Use In An Organic Corn Squash Rotation, Davey J.R. Olsen
Determining Compost Carryover For Optimal Use In An Organic Corn Squash Rotation, Davey J.R. Olsen
All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023
In 2008–2011 a graduate project was undertaken by Davey Olsen under the supervision of Utah State University (USU) Plant, Soils and Climate professors, Drs. Jennifer Reeve, Dan Drost, and Astrid Jacobson. The project investigated a new way of measuring the benefits of applying compost to organically certified horticultural crops. In particular, the carryover of these benefits in the three years following a one-time application was studied. A field trial at the USU Organic Farm modeled the carryover of nitrogen and phosphorus in a corn and squash rotation, while laboratory analysis investigated aspects of nitrogen availability and compost decomposition over time. …
The Effects Of Living Mulches On Organic, Reduced-Till Broccoli Growth And Management, Sarah Elizabeth Broughton
The Effects Of Living Mulches On Organic, Reduced-Till Broccoli Growth And Management, Sarah Elizabeth Broughton
Masters Theses
Conservation tillage programs have been successfully implemented for many agronomic cropping systems, but adoption of reduced tillage for vegetable crops has been slow. As many conventionally managed conservation tillage programs rely on synthetic herbicides for clean cultivation, alternative methods must be devised to suppress weed pressure and reduce reliance on mechanical cultivation to aid in the development of reduced tillage programs for organic cropping system. Strip tillage is a reduced tillage method that is well suited to vegetable crop production, and the utilization of cover crops and living mulches between rows provides a viable weed management option for organic systems. …