Agriculture Commons^™

Soil Testing: Christmas Tree Submission Form, Shyloh Favreau

UNH Cooperative Extension

No abstract provided.

Soil Testing: Biosolids & Septage Spreading Submission Form, Shyloh Favreau

UNH Cooperative Extension

No abstract provided.

Biological Control Of Three Major Cucumber And Pepper Pests: Whiteflies, Thrips, And Spider Mites, In High Plastic Tunnels Using Two Local Phytoseiid Mites, Yusuf Abou Jawdah, Nour Ezzedine, Aya Fardoun, Samer Kharroubi, Hana Sobh, Hagop S. Atamian, Margaret S. Skinner, Bruce Parker

Biology, Chemistry, and Environmental Sciences Faculty Articles and Research

To enhance food security, food safety, and environmental health, a bio-based integrated pest management (BIPM) strategy was evaluated at two coastal locations in Lebanon as an alternative to toxic pesticide sprays in commercial high-arched plastic tunnels common in many countries. The evaluation occurred during two cucumber and pepper cropping seasons: spring and fall. At each site, two commercial tunnels were used; farmers’ conventional practices were applied in one tunnel, while the BIPM approach was followed in the second tunnel. In the farmers’ practices, a total of 14 sprays of insecticide/acaricide mixtures were applied during the spring growing season, and 6 …

A Fork In The Road: Uncovering The Impact Of Industrial Animal Agriculture On The Physical Health Of Communities Of Color, Mariana Zepeda

Population Health Research Brief Series

Nearly all (99%) farmed animals in the U.S. come from Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs). CAFOs are industrial agriculture facilities defined by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) as operations where animals are raised in confinement and meet animal size and waste material thresholds. Communities located near CAFOs, which tend to have high shares of low-income and racial/ethnic minority residents, are at risk of exposure to CAFO-related air and water pollutants. This brief summarizes the health risks for communities located near CAFOs. Additionally, it calls for government regulations that improve transparency, management, and consumer empowerment.

Retaining Heifers: Is It Worth It?, Tonya L. Meyer

Center for Agricultural Profitability

Replacing females in the beef cow herd plays a pivotal role in a sustainable and profitable cow-calf operation. Analyzing the cost of raising replacements versus purchasing them can help make informed decisions. If retaining replacements, cattle producers must consider both the costs and potential returns associated with raising and integrating these heifers into the breeding herd. This article offers some key financial considerations.

Investigating The Accuracy And Comparability Of Various Lime Prediction Methods For Irish Grassland Mineral Soils, F. Mackessy, E. Mccarthy, E. Broderick, B. O'Donnell, Patrick Quille

Publications

Soil pH is a foundational element of agronomy, profoundly influencing biological, chemical and physical soil processes. Adjusting soil pH is a paramount factor for enhancing soil health and productivity with far-reaching environmental benefits. Over time soil naturally tends towards acidity, a process expedited by intensive agriculture practices. To determine the extent of necessary pH corrections, precise soil pH testing is imperative. Various methods including buffer systems, titrations, lime incubations and algorithms considering soil texture are used to assess a soil's lime requirement and each method carries distinct advantages and disadvantages. The Shoemaker–McLean–Pratt (SMP) buffer method is extensively used in Ireland …

High Tunnel Bell Pepper Spacing Trial, Bronwyn Aly

Midwest Vegetable Trial Reports

The objective of this trial is to determine an optimum spacing for bell peppers grown in a high tunnel production system. Six different spacing treatments were evaluated in this trial. Results from this study suggest that tighter plant spacing increased yield per unit area (100 feet of linear row) but decreased the yield per plant.

Value Of Gain In The Lamb Feeding Industry, Jay Parsons

Cornhusker Economics

Value of gain (VOG) is a term in the livestock feeding industry that refers to the average value of a pound of gain. It is the most appropriate revenue value to use in comparison to the cost of gain to determine profit margin.

Arkansas Soybean Performance Tests 2023, J. F. Carlin, R. D. Bond, R. B. Mulloy, J. C. Mccoy

Arkansas Agricultural Experiment Station Research Series

Soybean variety and strain performance tests are conducted each year in Arkansas by the University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture’s Arkansas Crop Variety Improvement Program. The tests provide information to companies developing varieties and/ or marketing seed within the state and aid the Arkansas Cooperative Extension Service in formulating variety recommendations for soybean producers.

Procedures For Rangeland Condition Assessment In The Kimberley 2022, Department Of Primary Industries And Regional Development

Natural resources published reports

This report defines the procedures used in 2022 by the Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development (DPIRD) to complete rangeland condition assessment (RCA) in the Kimberley region which has grass-based pastures. For the rest of the pastoral estate, DPIRD uses the Procedures for RCA in the Pilbara and southern rangelands which have predominantly shrub pastures.

RCA is the process DPIRD uses to make systematic, lease-level assessment of rangeland. Rangeland condition considers both the condition of pastures (as defined in the Pasture condition guide for the Kimberley, Ryan et al. 2013) and soils as determined by erosion, using the …

Field Research Report: Results From The Enreec Vri Field For The 2021, 2022, And 2023 Crop Seasons, Derek M. Heeren, Ali T. Mohammed, Eric Wilkening, Christopher M. U. Neale, Alan L. Boldt, Ankit Chandra, Precious Nneka Amori, Ivo Z. Goncalves, Yeyin Shi, Guillermo R. Balboa

Department of Biological Systems Engineering: Conference Presentations and White Papers

Long-term irrigation management research has been conducted from 2014 to 2023 for corn and soybean at the Eastern Nebraska Research, Extension, and Education Center (ENREEC) Variable Rate Irrigation (VRI) Field located in subhumid east-central Nebraska (in the Lower Platte North Natural Resources District). The objective of this report was to present the overall results from the VRI Field for 2021 to 2023. Across the three growing seasons, there were the following irrigation treatments: Best Management Practice (BMP), 50% BMP, 125% BMP, rainfed, Spatial ET Modeling Interface (SETMI), SDD1, SDD2, machine-learning-based Cyber-Physical System (CPS), a student team recommended rate, and industry …

Different Levels Of Single-Strain Probiotic (Bacillus Subtilis) With Proteolytic Enzyme (Serratiopeptidase) Can Be Used As An Alternative To Antibiotic Growth Promoters In Broiler, Muhammad Mushtaq, Baseerat Ali, Majid Ali, Neelam Bibi, Rabin Raut, Gamaleldin M. Suliman, Ayman A. Swelum

Agricultural and Environmental Sciences Faculty Research

In the current study, the proteolytic enzyme (serratiopeptidase) was used to enhance the efficacy of Bacillus subtilis (B. subtilis) probiotic as a growth promotor in broiler chicken. The effects of serratiopeptidase on the efficacy of different levels of B. subtilis as a growth promotor in broiler chicks were evaluated regarding growth performance traits, villus histomorphometric characterization, and intestinal microbiota count. Day-old broiler chicks (n = 120) were allocated into 4 groups having 3 replicates/group. In the control group (C), the basal diet was kept without supplementation. In treatment groups (P100, P150, and P200), the basal diet was supplemented with 100, …

The Casnr L.I.N.K.S. Newsletter: Learning Innovation Network For K-12 Schools, Volume 3, Edition 3, March 2024, Bailey Feit, Tammy Mittelstet

CASNR L.I.N.K.S. Newsletter

The purpose of this L.I.N.K.S. newsletter is to provide a monthly update of opportunities and resources for K-12 schools to connect with the University of Nebraska's CASNR Food, Energy, Water, and Societal Systems (FEWS²) programs and partners.

Included in this edition:

K-12 curriculum and resources

CASNR Ag Tech Day, April 23

2024 Summer Soybean Institute, May 29-30 and July 16-18

Youth Energy Leadership Camp July 22-26

Other upcoming events

Analytic investigators spotlight: UNL Statstics, Forensic Science, Ag Economics

Educators workshops

Student opportunities including NAYI, Native American Coalition, Cultivando Caminos, Big Red Camps, and more

Teacher opportunities including Economic tidbits from …

Livestock Risk Protection Insurance: Feeder Cattle, Logan B. Haviland, Ryan Feuz

All Current Publications

Livestock risk protection (LRP) insurance is a partially subsidized livestock insurance provided by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) Risk Management Agency (RMA) that provides protection to producers against unexpected price declines. This fact sheet presents specific coverage information for feeder cattle and presents optimal coverage options based on historical contract performance.

Managing Saline And Sodic Soils And Irrigation Water, Burdette Barker, Grant Cardon, Matt Yost, Melanie Stock, Earl Creech, Jody Gale

All Current Publications

Salt is an important factor in plant and soil management. Excessive salt concentrations in soil can cause water to be less available to plants because of the osmotic forces of salt in the soil water. Excessive concentrations of different ions can also be toxic to plants. In agricultural soils and irrigation water, salts are typically described in two ways: (1) total salt concentration or salinity, and (2) sodicity, or the concentration of sodium relative to other cations (positively charged atoms or compounds). Understanding the effect of both total salinity and sodicity on plants and soils, along with management and reclamation …

Livestock Risk Protection Insurance: Swine, Logan B. Haviland, Ryan Feuz

All Current Publications

Livestock risk protection (LRP) insurance is a partially subsidized livestock insurance provided by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) Risk Management Agency (RMA) that provides protection to producers against unexpected price declines. This fact sheet presents specific coverage information for swine and presents optimal coverage options based on historical contract performance.

Livestock Risk Protection Insurance Faq, Logan B. Haviland, Ryan Feuz

All Current Publications

Livestock risk protection (LRP) insurance is a partially subsidized livestock insurance provided by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) Risk Management Agency (RMA) that provides protection to producers against unexpected price declines. This fact sheet presents commonly asked questions and answers surrounding livestock risk protection insurance. It outlines the purpose of the program and explains how producers can use LRP insurance to mitigate price risk.

Livestock Risk Protection Insurance: Fed Cattle, Logan B. Haviland, Ryan Feuz

All Current Publications

Livestock risk protection (LRP) insurance is a partially subsidized livestock insurance provided by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) Risk Management Agency (RMA) that provides protection to producers against unexpected price declines. This fact sheet presents specific coverage information for fed cattle and presents optimal coverage options based on historical contract performance.

2022 Census Of Agriculture: Nebraska Highlights, Kathleen Brooks, Bradley Lubben

Cornhusker Economics

In February 2024, the United States Department of Agriculture National Agricultural Statistics Service published data from the 2022 Census of Agriculture. This data is collected every five years. The current article highlights a few of the Nebraska numbers. Two significant highlights from the data are the total number of farms and the total value of production. U.S. farm numbers declined modestly in the U.S. from 2.04 million in 2017 to 1.90 million in 2022. The total value of production for U.S. farms and ranches increased substantially from $388.5 billion in 2017 to $543.1 billion in 2022. Crop production accounted for …

Bull Value Cow-Q-Lator (Bvcql): What It Is And How To Use It, Matt Stockton, Shannon Sand, Randy Saner

Center for Agricultural Profitability

It’s that time of year when commercial ranchers and cattle producers are looking to make bull purchases for their operation. With so many different breeds and types of bulls available, picking the right bull at the right price is not easy. To help in making the best selection possible the University of Nebraska-Lincoln Beef Economics Team created the Bull Value Cow-Q-Lator (BVCQL). This tool can be used to compare your current bull value with up to 10 bulls. The Bull Value Cow-Q-Lator is a spreadsheet available to download at https://cap.unl.edu/livestock/tools.

Each ranch or farm is going to have different …

Increasing Workforce Skills: The Possible Disconnect Between Employers And Potential Job Seekers, Cheryl A. Burkhart-Kriesel

Cornhusker Economics

In a multi-year survey of potential job seekers, those who are likely to change jobs in the next year or who are likely to reenter the workforce in the next year, several key training obstacles for improving their employment situation were identified. There seemed to be only slight differences in how they viewed these challenges, regardless of whether they saw their potential job as a career, a steppingstone to a career, or just a job to get by. The cost of training, the lack of available training, the distance or transportation to the training, lack of time, and the knowledge …

Paying Family Members On The Farm Or Ranch, Jessica Groskopf

Center for Agricultural Profitability

For many farm and ranch families, bringing children or grandchildren into the operation is the ultimate goal. Successfully bringing additional family members into the operation may require some creativity as all parties need to maintain a viable standard of living. This is the first in a series of articles that will highlight ideas and tactics for bringing another family member into the operation.

One tactic is to provide new family members with monetary compensation, such as an hourly wage or salary. The total compensation should be comparable to the market value of wages to hire a non-family member to do …

Embracing Diversity In Agricultural Economics, Timothy L. Meyer

Cornhusker Economics

To steal an overused cliché, “There’s room in the tent for everyone.” Over the 2023 academic year, I have reiterated this message to all my students, with one addition. Not only is there room for everyone, but all are invited AND welcome. Food is something we all have in common, no matter the background. I think this is why producers in the state of Nebraska feel as strongly as they do about the food they produce; it is life-giving and should be taken seriously. Nebraska Agriculture is part of what makes our state great, and that is not a secret …

Fear, Racism, Agriculture: The Drive For Japanese Internment, Brandon James March

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

The focus of this dissertation is the timing of the forced evacuation of the ethnic Japanese population from the West Coast in 1942. This work focuses on three key factors driving the timing of the evacuation: racism, security concerns, and agriculture. Racism has been studied and written about extensively; however, an overview of this factor is critical as it directly influenced the removal of Japanese American citizens in addition to Japanese immigrants. This dissertation will focus on the intellectual origins of racism and prejudice by focusing on key figures and tracing the ideas and beliefs and how they influenced the …

Impacts Of Harvest Date And Concurrent Alkali Pretreatment And Ensiling On Anaerobic Digestion Of Pennycress Biomass, Liangcheng Yang, Tuba Yasmin Lubna, Michael A. Moklak, Barsanti Gautum, Nicholas J. Heller, Robert L. Rhykerd, David E. Kopsell, John C. Sedbrook

Faculty Publications – Biological Sciences

Pennycress (Thlaspi arvense L.) is an annual cover crop known for its exceptional cold tolerance and high oil and protein yields. Pennycress can be integrated into a corn–soybean rotation in the U.S. However, the utilization of pennycress biomass remains largely unexplored, including assessing compositional changes through its growth and organic matter digestibility. This study harvested pennycress at three growth stages, characterized the biomass for anaerobic digestion (AD), and tested the effects of concurrent alkali pretreatment and ensiling on the biomass methane yield. Results showed that the biomass harvested when the plants were undergoing senescence (“third-harvest”) had higher contents of …

The Importance Of Strategic Planning For Farmers And Ranchers, Larry Van Tassell

Center for Agricultural Profitability

Planning, or more specifically, strategic planning, is a process of defining long-term goals and objectives of an organization and determining the best course of action to achieve them. It involves such steps as defining the current situation, identifying strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats, and developing a plan of action to take advantage of opportunities and overcome challenges. Parsons (2018) outlined six key components of a business plan and why a farm or ranch should make the effort to develop a business plan.

The Casnr L.I.N.K.S. Newsletter: Learning Innovation Network For K-12 Schools, Volume 3, Edition 2, February 2024, Bailey Feit, Tammy Mittelstet

CASNR L.I.N.K.S. Newsletter

The purpose of this L.I.N.K.S. newsletter is to provide a monthly update of opportunities and resources for K-12 schools to connect with the University of Nebraska's CASNR Food, Energy, Water, and Societal Systems (FEWS²) programs and partners.

Included in this edition:

K-12 curriculum and resources and upcoming events

Career explorations: pathways for students

Teacher and student opportunities

CASNR Ag Tech Day

Data Driven 4-H statistics field day

2024 Summer Soybean Institute

UNL CASNER six interest areas

School of Natural Resources

Department of Agronomy and Horticulture

Environmental stewards spotlight

Seed Your Future Green Career Week

Cultivando Caminos

Kudos to our partners …

Agricultural Groundcover Update January 2024, Justin Laycock

Natural resources published reports

Summary

• About 94% of the grainbelt had adequate (more than 50%) vegetative groundcover to prevent wind erosion in January 2024.
• In the northern half of the grainbelt, a larger-than-average area has 51–60% groundcover, which is expected to decrease to below 50% over the coming months.
• Just under 6% of the grainbelt (855,000 ha) had less than 50% groundcover, which is inadequate to prevent wind erosion. West Midlands Ag Soil Zone had the highest risk of wind erosion and 14.5% of this farmland had inadequate groundcover.
• Less than 0.5% of the grainbelt had a high to very high risk of wind …

Studying The Genes And Conditions That Influence Root Development, Tessa Holtkamp, Hannah Ordonez Webb

Undergraduate Research Symposium

Root development in plants is essential for their survival and understanding how hormones influence their development can explain how plants grow under different circumstances. Researching how Indole-3-butyric acid (IBA), a hormone that induces root production, affects the plant model Arabidopsis thaliana helps explain the hormone's effect in agricultural crop systems. To understand root pathways, we performed assays on mutant lines of Arabidopsis by growing plants on varying concentrations of IBA. For wild-type and mutant lines, phenotyping experiments like branching of roots, lengths of stems, and root length were conducted along with PCR and restriction digest genotyping experiments to compare their …

Slight Cost Of Production Changes Noted In The 2024 Nebraska Crop Enterprise Budgets, Glennis Mcmclure

Cornhusker Economics

The Nebraska crop budgets are available for the 2024 production season. The 84 enterprise budgets prepared in the October 2023 timeframe use input prices collected as of that time. Overall, estimates reflect slight cost of production decreases in the budgets when compared to the 2023 cost estimates. For 2024, the main drivers of cost decreases are due to decreased fuel and fertilizer costs. In some cases, pesticide costs decreased, yet for some of those products, prices increased. Seed and interest costs have increased for 2024 adding to cash expenses, while land opportunity costs and depreciation costs have continued to rise …