Posts Tagged: silage
'More crop per drop' drought strategy touted
Corn silage producers can get 'more crop per drop" with deficit irrigation, however productivity will decline, reported Dennis Pollock in Western Farm Press. Pollack based the story on a seminar at the World Ag Expo earlier this month presented by Mark Lundy, UC Agriculture and Natural Resources Cooperative Extension advisor for Colusa, Sutter and Yuba counties.
Lundy said there are certain times in the crop's development that farmers will not want to stress the corn silage - when tassels and silk are forming. At other times in its development, even if the corn is stressed, the application of more water does not bring a proportionate increase in yield.
The UC ANR advisor suggested farmers choose planting dates, varieties and cultural practices that will maximize irrigation efficiency.
“Look at what you choose to grow and perhaps plant later with a short variety or drought tolerant variety,” he said. “And get weeds under control. They take up water.”
An invitation to dairy silage producers to step up in 2011 and gain experience with CT production systems
If you’ve been at all interested in or curious about conservation tillage systems for silage crop production, now is the time to begin preparations and to gear up for the 2011 season.
In recent years, members of California’s Conservation Tillage and Cropping Systems Workgroup have been working directly with a number of Central Valley dairy silage producers and together they have learned how to most effectively and successfully adopt a variety of CT practices for silage production. During this time, there have been considerable gains in the overall knowledge base that is needed for successful and sustained CT silage management. There is now also a decent experience base that can help new CT farmers avoid problems and mistakes that can lead to trouble.
Through an NRCS Conservation Innovation Grant program called the “BMP CT Challenge,” dairy silage producers once again have an opportunity this year to gain experience with CT systems, to work with CT advisors, to borrow CT equipment and to secure risk management support if CT test strip yields are lower than standard till yields.
For more information and to take part in one of our workgroup’s upcoming dairy silage breakfast meetings in your region, please give any of the following folks a call or send an e-mail to them at the addresses indicated below.
Ladi Asgill (209) 604-6554 lasgill@suscon.org |
Jeff Mitchell (559) 303-9689 mitchell@uckac.edu |
Johnnie Siliznoff (559) 252-2192 Ext. 121 johnnie.siliznoff@ca.usda.gov |
Information is available for dairy operators interested in conservation tillage.
Tom Barcellos consistently uses strip till in silage
Tom Barcellos of Barcellos Farms in Tipton, California, has been in the no-till and strip-till business perhaps longer and more consistently than just about any other dairy silage producer in the entire SJV.Gordon Foster (pictured at right), a Barcellos Farms employee, has done the bulk of the farm’s no-till and strip-till corn seeding since Barcellos started with CT in 1993.
“The bulk of our corn is now strip-tilled,” he said, “due to the overall advantages we’ve seen with this system.”
Time and costs between crops are reduced. One of the primary lessons that Barcellos has learned through his years of using CT is the absolute need to be on top of water management.
“You may end up putting on less water with CT than conventional tillage systems, but you’ve really got to be prepared for earlier and perhaps more frequent irrigations," has been a learning-curve consideration that he reinforces to folks who are interested in getting into CT.
Animal feed generates lots of valley ozone
Scientists have been puzzled by the fact that the San Joaquin Valley often suffers high ozone levels even though the mostly rural, agricultural domain has fewer cars and trucks than big cities. Research by UC Davis scientists is now showing that some of the ozone in the valley is being generated by fermented animal feed, according to a story posted yesterday on the website Science News.
While ozone provides a protective barrier for the earth in the stratosphere, it is an unwelcome molecule to have around where people are breathing. Ozone (O3) is a powerful oxidizing agent, far stronger than O2. It can harm lung function and irritate the respiratory system.
The UC Davis team, led by environmental engineer Cody Howard, tested seven types of animal feed in a one-meter-square tented chamber, according to writer Janet Raloff, author of the Science News story. They added a mix of gases that matched the valley’s air and simulated sunlight with lamps. The result was lots of ozone.
Corn silage generated about 125 parts per billion ozone, alfalfa silage a little less, and mixed oat-wheat silage 210 ppb, Raloff reported. These emissions pale in comparison to cars. However, because the San Joaquin Valley has so much silage to feed its animal agriculture industry, the feed appears to be the single biggest contributor to the region’s ozone problem, the story said.
Cars and light-duty trucks in the valley can generate 13 metric tons of ozone per day, while feed for the valley’s 10 million head of dairy cattle can produce 24.5 million tons of ozone per day.
Corn silage livestock feed.