The Moos Room™

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Dr. Joe Armstrong: What is up everybody? This is Dr. Joe Armstrong, and you are listening to Part 2 of our time with Dr. Kim Stackhouse-Lawson, who is the director of AgNext at Colorado State University. We had too much information, too much great conversation to stick it all in one episode. If you haven't listened to last week's episode, I encourage you to do so because we are going to jump right into where we left off in the conversation from last week. Thank you for listening, pitter-patter, let's get to it.
I think it's time to switch gears a little bit, just go over some of the things that we've been reading about and had questions on that we thought would be valuable to our listeners when it comes to CSU AgNext, and some of the things in general that we use as terms in the industry. One of those things is adaptive livestock management. First of all, what is adaptive livestock management, and then how does that fit into the context of sustainability?
Dr. Kim Stackhouse-Lawson: We define adaptive livestock management as livestock grazing that is adjusted based on forage availability, weather, wildlife patterns, bird breeding grounds or breeding times, riparian areas, et cetera. It's basic form. It's adjusting livestock grazing management according to the region that you're in, the current weather conditions and forage availability that's there, and taking into account the other important life and ecosystems that exist on that particular operation.
I think the interesting thing about adaptive livestock management is that in Minnesota it may mean more intensive rotational grazing. In Colorado, it's going to mean something totally different to our producers. They're grazing in larger traps. The acres per animal are much greater. It's allowing those place-based management decisions to occur and to make sure they're informed with data. In the sustainability space, I'm actually really excited about a lot of things that are happening, especially as it relates to methane, [chuckles] which is interesting, just because that's the way my brain works.
I'm sure you guys are all aware of a lot of the innovations that are coming out in the space of adaptive livestock management. Precision herding, for example. Like using GPS collars. We're doing some work with ARS where we're actually layering real-time forage information, GPS-collaring the cattle. They have bite halters on them, so we're trying to estimate intake from bites and also control how and when cattle are grazing the forage. If we can understand through real-time satellite imagery when forage is growing, can we direct the animals through the GPS collar to that forage in real time where it's higher quality and do we actually see reductions in methane?
That's some of the cool work we're trying to do. We're getting at multiple things with-- We're trying to understand just regular old baseline emissions [chuckles] of methane on grazing animals in the shortgrass prairie steppe where we're at. Then also, how can we manipulate it and can we? We're also doing other things like comparing AMP grazing, more rotational grazing to continuous grazing, and seeing if that changes methane emissions or intensity.
I think there's a lot of really neat things that are taking place in the space of grazing and sustainability. Soil carbon sequestration is of course a huge topic. Well, I guess what I love about it the most is that our arid landscapes maintain 20% of the globe's soil organic carbon, and that's incredible. Incredible. We know that if we graze them, as long as we don't overgraze they don't flux the carbon. The carbon is in a total maintenance state. We also get food off of that. It's cool. That's awesome. The best way to maintain that carbon is to keep the grass right side up. The way we keep the grass right side up is to keep those farmers and ranchers profitable, period.
There's a lot of really cool win-win type work we can do in this space of sustainability and grazing.
Joe: That's something that I think we all have the passion for here especially, is trying to figure out what works in each region and why, and whether or not research done somewhere else can be applied in your region. Because that's something we struggle with a lot, especially when most of the research power is in states where there's just more cattle. It's a completely different system, though. It's hard to take a bunch of feedlot data from Nebraska and apply it to Minnesota because our feedlots are different.
I'm really into this place-based research, especially when it's this applied, and part of that is this adaptive livestock management. Great topic to learn more about. If you haven't heard that term, definitely throw it into old Google and see what comes up and start reading about it.
One of the other things we've been reading about is-- and we've talked about resiliency on this podcast before when it relates to mental health and how that relates to your operation and how you can be resilient. You guys talk about that quite a bit. That we need to increase that resiliency of operations. What does that mean to you? Then how does that really fit into-- Are we increasing the resiliency of the operation itself or the people or both?
Kim: Great question, and something our group is really passionate about. When you think about the challenges our producers face-- No, it doesn't matter. Just farmers and ranchers face across the globe, it's unpredictable. Things like weather, things like markets, things like labor availability. They're constantly challenged and yet somehow they continue to deliver food to the masses. Somehow they continue to push forward.
Beef producers in the arid west where we're at are no different, and yet I'm not sure we've ever seen them challenged like we're about to see them challenged. As this climate changes. As these market forces become more pressing. As there are fewer and fewer people actually producing food. We're at now 1.7, I think, percent of the population produces food for the rest. All of those challenges, whether they be real or emotional or perceived, it doesn't matter. They're still challenges.
When we talk about resiliency, it's long-term success of producers, and including profitability, generational transfer, climate adaptation. The list goes on and on. I think, to your point, it's the people, it's the operation, it's the community. I mean, this out-migration that we're seeing in rural communities and lack of infrastructure for things like schools. I have a friend who ranches in Southeast Colorado. She drives her children to school one and a half hours one way. She's there with her parents. Their operation is substantial, it's beautiful. How is she supposed to do that? They have bought a house in town and she leaves during the week.
Those are the kinds of questions that nothing I study around methane [chuckles] frankly are going to answer. Yet if we're not saying those things out loud that that's a problem and needs to be addressed, I'm not sure any of our research can truly address that whole continuum. It's our job to talk about it, and it's our job to say our producers frankly deserve better and it's about to get even tougher for them. I don't have any solutions in that space, but we care deeply about it and we want to elevate how important that is whenever we can.
Joe: Yes. Staying power of an operation is really how I think about resiliency, about operation. Can it just be around and still function and be profitable, not just in a 5 or 10-year space? We're talking through generations. Even if that generation passing isn't to a child or a family member, figuring out how that transfers to someone else who wants to be in that agricultural space and keep that mission going and that operation viable. All right. We're switching topics again. Bradley, you're up.
Bradley: We've certainly talked a lot about beef and Herefords and a lot of that. Maybe I'm a little harsh on the dairy industry, and it seems like the beef, maybe they just do a better job at marketing and trying to get out that we're working on this sustainability effort, but what's the status in the dairy industry? Do you know where might that end up as far as the dairy world? It seems like the dairy gets picked on a lot from a sustainability standpoint. What's the status?
Kim: I think dairy really has the most robust industry strategy for sure. They were early adopters of sustainability and have pushed very, very hard through their central organizational efforts. They've done some incredible work. They're certainly way ahead of beef in terms of research. It's a little bit of a different beast. It's important to recognize that the inputs and outputs, comparing the two, yes, that it's the same animal that's being used for food cultivation but the system is exceptionally different. As such, we see emissions very pretty substantially.
In beef, of course we know that the majority of the emissions are happening in that cow-calf sector but we also include, and when we do lifecycle assessment we include everything. The same happens within dairy. At the same time, they tend to be a little bit more self-contained, and as such, a little bit easier to manipulate and, to Joe's point, a little bit easier to make place-based. These systems, and the beef systems too, have originated more place-based but there's more infrastructure to support those self-contained place-based dairy systems today than in comparison to beef.
Because they're self-contained, they're not quite as complex or different between regions. There's more similarities between the systems, and I think that has helped them. Because they're self-contained, solutions are very different for them. Digesters work and are beneficial. We do see more emissions coming from manure in dairy systems significantly more. The importance of enteric emissions is it takes up less of a percent of their total footprint. They're able to engineer their way into some solutions that have been very profitable for dairy producers as well.
Now, do we still have the same issues in enteric methane? Yes. At the same time, we see mitigation strategies work better in dairy cows because the diet is different. They eat more. There's more kind of methanogenesis happening. Our ability to decrease it is actually easier from a research question. It's not quite as hard as we see in beef systems, specifically confined beef systems. [unintelligible 00:11:44], you got to really have something that works for us to pick up the difference. In dairy systems, you can pick up a 10-12% difference in methane mitigation pretty quickly.
I think there are some interesting comparisons, and there's certainly still a lot to be discovered in both systems. Dairy has done a tremendous job really looking at greenhouse gas mitigation and really trying to understand where opportunities may exist in those self-contained units. Their checkoff program is much more robust than beef's, and that's been, I think, a huge driver for that. They have funded research. Dairy has been very brave and have funded a lot of this research, and so they're not as far behind, I think. That gap we talked about, it's not quite as extreme in dairy as it is in beef.
Speaker 4: Well, Kim, I think you just won over all of our dairy listeners, so-
Kim: Oh, good. [laughs]
Speaker 4: -well done on that. We have discussed so many things today and covered a lot of different topics, and it's been a lot of us asking you questions. We're curious, what questions do you have for us?
Kim: What do you guys hear are the biggest concerns from your producers in your region when they talk about sustainability? What are they worried about? What are their pressures?
Joe: They're always worried about, and rightly so-- The perception is that to be more sustainable it's going to cost more, whether that's time or money or other resources. I think that is our biggest barrier on the producer side of things, is to convince them that there are strategies and systems. There is that holy grail there of a recommendation that actually allows that operation to have more time or more money, be more profitable, more efficient, and be more sustainable. That's what you've been talking about this whole time, is that that exists and we're looking for it.
That's the biggest pushback I get immediately besides just the stubborn Minnesotan that says, "Don't tell me what to do." Besides that, it's that the immediate reaction is, "It's going to cost me more money or more time."
Kim: In fairness, they can't be burdened more.
Bradley. I agree with Joe. I think that's a lot about the cost. Some worry about the regulations that are going on and how do we fix this. I think about it from the aspects of-- I was just in California and learning out there, talking with farmers about some of the environmental regulations. How do we do this? They're very progressive in trying to solve those issues because they have to if they want to stay in business. Sometimes those are on a much larger scale.
Farms that I've talked to, if you've got 75 cows and you're a dairy operation, how do I make this work with 75 cows from a smaller perspective? We can use scale and do these things, but from a smaller farm, what are the efficiencies that go into that? That's one thing that I think they worry about from a size perspective, is how do we deal with these issues on a smaller scale.
Speaker 4: I'm going to kind of be the mean one, but we all know that they're out there. The producers that just say, "I've been doing it this way for 40 years and I'm not going to change it now." Probably the number one pushback I get from people is just-- It's, "I don't want to do all the extra work and have that extra burden." Something you've referred to several times here today. I think that-- and I echo Joe on the cost. I think tied in with that too, things like land access. Like some producers who feel, "I'd need more land to do some more sustainable things. There is no land for me to get."
In the overall picture of sustainability as well, it's hard for anyone, including farmers, I think, to navigate some of the conflicting interests we see. In sustainability, we tie in things like renewable energy and all of that. They're like, "How can I make all the moves to that?" or, "How can I support some of these things where they can't get land now because it's owned by a solar farm or something?" A lot of those kinds of social issues, I think, really play a role. Maybe people wouldn't necessarily identify them or label them that way, but I think some of that perception piece as well all plays a role in this.
Kim: Yes. We hear the same things.
Speaker 4: Well, Kim, I think I speak for all of us when I say thank you so much for taking time out of your busy schedule to join us for this recording.
Kim: Thanks.
Speaker 4: Again, I think I speak for all of us, we all learned a lot, and I hope our listeners learned a lot from this episode as well.
Kim: Awesome. Well, thanks, guys. Appreciate it.
Speaker 4: There, I think, is the perfect spot to wrap it. If you have any questions, comments, or scathing rebuttals about today's episode of The Moos Room, you can email those to themoosroom@umn.edu.
Joe: That's T-H-E-M-O-O-S-R-O-O-M@umn.edu.
Speaker 4: You can also call and ask us a question on our listener voicemail. If you'd like to do that, you can call 612-624-3610. You can find us on Twitter @UMNmoosroom, and you can also learn more about our work at extension.umn.edu. If you're interested in learning more about CSU AgNext, you can find them online at agnext.colostate.edu. That's a wrap.
Joe: Bye.
Speaker 4: Bye.
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