Search Results for: extension

NNYADP Apple Research: Can Computerized Models Drive Precision Bloom Thinning?

Peru, N.Y.; March 8, 2021. The latest apple research results from the farmer-driven Northern New York Agricultural Development Program (NNYADP) evaluate how well computerized modeling programs help growers determine when to begin thinning the bloom in their orchards. Three commercial apple orchards in Peru, New York (Clinton County) participated in the NNYADP on-farm thinning trials in 2020: Everett Orchards, Forrence Orchards, and Northern Orchard.  The latest NNYADP apple research results report is posted at https://nnyagdev.org/index.php/2020-nny-projects.

“Thinning apples at bloom is an orchard practice with the greatest potential to increase apple size for the current year’s harvest as well as to promote a return bloom the next year,” says project leader Michael Basedow, a Cornell Cooperative Extension tree fruit specialist.

The optimal number of fruit per tree where yield, apple size, and fruit quality are well-balanced to bring the greatest economic return to the grower varies by the variety of apple. Two of the 2020 NNYADP in-orchard trials were in Honeycrisp variety orchard blocks; the third in a Gala block.

“Bloom thinning is a promising approach for managing crop load and is used extensively by apple growers in Washington State, but it is a difficult practice to perform as it requires precise timing of the thinning material applications,” Basedow notes.

Basedow’s research is applying the use of computerized modeling to determine when growers should apply

materials that help reduce the crop load to allow the trees to produce apples of optimal quality and size and in numbers thatalso allow the trees to efficiently bloom again the next year. The Pollen Tube Growth Model estimates the amount of time between pollination and fertilization of apple flowers to help growers plan for a first thinning application.

To gauge how well the trees have responded to the thinning process throughout the growing season, Basedow is evaluating the use of the Fruit Growth Rate (FGR) model that estimates the amount of crop still on the trees after each thinning application. This helps determine is additional thinning is needed.

In the 2020 trials, the FGR modeling over-predicted the remaining crop load by 10 percent at the Gala site and by 160 percent at one of the Honeycrisp site. The research team is evaluating factors, such as cold temperature damage to buds in the spring and fruit drop during period of high heat stress and drought, for possible influence on the FGR model’s accuracy. Both of these weather-related conditions occurred in northern New York in 2020.

This spring’s orchard bloom will let the growers know how well the timing of their applications in 2020 functioned to aid the return bloom for 2021.

Earlier precision apple management research results reports are posted in the Research: Horticulture section of the NNYADP website at https://nnyagdev.org.

Funding for the Northern New York Agricultural Development Program is supported by the New York State Legislature and administered by the New York State Department of Agriculture and Markets.

NNYADP Tile Drainage Research Results to be Presented During Virtual Crop Congress on Feb. 24

Chazy, New York; February 15, 2021. Unprecedented agricultural water quality research funded by the Northern New York Agricultural Development Program (NNYADP) is producing significant insight into how nutrients such as phosphorus and nitrogen are transported across and through soil. On February 24, 2021, project leader Laura Klaiber, a nutrient management researcher at the Miner Institute in Chazy, New York, will present the latest three years of data during the 2021 North Country Crop Congress, held via Zoom (see registration contact below).

In her presentation on February 24, Klaiber will share key points from year-round, edge-of-field research trials that have captured field surface and tile drainage runoff with monitoring equipment on a farm in Keeseville, New York. Tile drainage is a critical practice used in crop fields with naturally poorly-drained soils, and in short growing season areas, to significantly enhance and stabilize crop quality and yield.

“The use of tile drainage has come under scrutiny as a potential source of excess nutrients in watersheds. Prior to this Northern New York Agricultural Development Program-supported study, little research had been specifically designed to compare the impacts of common agricultural drainage practices on regional water quality,” Klaiber said.

“Now, through the continuous year-round monitoring of nutrient movement in surface runoff and tile drainage in farm fields provided for these trials, we are able to generate data to inform field management practices that will help conserve our natural resources,” Klaiber added.

This northern New York-based research is showing that non-growing season, weather-related events play a critical and consistent role in nutrient transport; however, more data is needed before researchers can more accurately pinpoint how the interactions between weather and field conditions relate to runoff quantity and quality.

“These trials are precedent-setting with insights that can only be developed with long-term studies due to the high variability of runoff rates and nutrient concentrations that occur across events and on an annual basis,” Klaiber said.

Time and intensive study are required to isolate the diverse contributing factors and interactions that influence the biological uptake, release, and transport of agricultural nutrients through soil. The interaction of weather, cropping systems, field management, soil type and fertility, topography and other factors all impact nutrient retention or export from both surface and tile drainage.

“We are encouraged that the data show reductions in exported phosphorus and sediment. This can have important implications for the phosphorus-reduction efforts ongoing in the Lake Champlain Basin; however, this improvement must be considered in balance with the increased risk for nitrogen mobilization. Future research is needed to identify practices, or more likely suites of practices, that can improve both of these water quality parameters simultaneously,” Klaiber noted.

With each successive year of data analysis, the research team is evolving best practices related to manure, nutrient and crop management to help growers enhance production efficiency and farm-based environmental stewardship.

The NNYADP first began collaborating on this groundbreaking tile drainage-related water quality research in 2010. Water resource managers and farmers alike want to know more about the potential differences in soil erosion and the transport of nutrients from fields with and without tile drainage.

Project collaborators have included the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation, which provided land for trials at Lake Alice Wildlife Management Area in Chazy; the Lake Champlain Basin Program; SUNY Plattsburgh; the New England Institute of Water Pollution Control Commission; Champlain Valley Agronomics; River Bend Agricultural Engineering Services; and regional farms.

Klaiber has presented the results of this NNYADP-funded water quality research to agricultural and natural resource interest groups in New York, New England, and nationally through the annual joint meeting of the Soil Science Society of America, Crop Science Society of America, and American Society of Agronomy.

To register for the February 24, 2021 North Country Crop Congress, contact your local Cornell Cooperative Extension office or reach Cornell University Regional Field Crops Specialist Michael Hunter at 315-788-8450 or meh27@cornell.edu.

NNYADP tile drainage project results reports since 2010 are posted at https://nnyagdev.org/index.php/2020-nnyadp-projects.

Funding for the Northern New York Agricultural Development Program is supported by the New York State Legislature and administered by the New York State Department of Agriculture and Markets.

NNYADP Crops Research Advances Opportunity for Maximum Alfalfa-Grass Mix Quality

January 26, 2021.  The latest results of research to help regional dairy farmers achieve high quality forage grown as alfalfa-grass mix are now posted on the Northern New York Agricultural Development Program website under the Research: Field Crops tab at www.nnyagdev.org. The research evaluates the use of perennial meadow fescue varieties developed by European grass breeders.

“Our results continue to show that meadow fescue has great potential in a mix with high quality alfalfa to significantly improve forage quality. However, our data reveals that the grass yield and quality are not consistent across growing environments, highlighting the need for regional testing,” says project leader and Cornell University Animal Science Professor Debbie J.R. Cherney.

More than 120 meadow fescue varieties are certified in Europe; most have not yet been evaluated for yield or quality opportunity in North America. Almost all alfalfa grown in northern New York is seeded with a companion cool-season grass.

To test the meadow fescue varieties in northern New York, Cherney has established trials on four regional farms. Trials at Graceway Farm in Lowville, New York, and at Pominville Farms in Croghan, New York, were planted in 2018 and 2019 respectively. Trials at Garden of Eden Farm in Philadelphia, New York, and Paluck Farm in Constableville, New York, were established in the spring of 2020.

In 2021, the ongoing trials are focused on a specific set of meadow fescue varieties that have shown high fiber digestibility and that are potentially less competitive in a mix with alfalfa. The research goal of these trials is to identify the optimal grass variety selection and grass seeding rate needed to achieve a mix of 20 to 30 percent grass in combination with alfalfa under regional growing conditions.

One farm site with sandy loam soil that was very dry in summer 2020 showed visible variation in forage growth in the trial plot. Plant height varied by more than 12 inches within a given plot, with sharp lines delineating differences in soil condition.

The forage quality factors being evaluated by this research include crude protein, neutral detergent fiber (NDF), invitro true digestibility, NDF digestibility, acid detergent fiber, and lignin.

Cherney notes, “With a consistently high crude protein content for alfalfa, the crude protein content of grasses in the mixture is always going to be sufficiently high enough for lactacting dairy cattle. Most of the crude protein variation in our test results is due to the range of grass percentages in the mixtures. The less grass in the mix, the higher the crude protein will be in the grass.”

The research team includes Cornell University soil and crop scientist J.H. Cherney, animal science specialist Rink Tacoma-Fogel, Cornell PRO-DAIRY dairy forage specialist Joe Lawrence, and Cornell Cooperative Extension regional field crops specialist Mike Hunter. A collateral study is underway at the University of Vermont; the results of that study will be noted in the final report for this NNYADP project.

Funding for the Northern New York Agricultural Development Program is supported by the New York State Legislature and administered by the New York State Department of Agriculture and Markets.

At left: Cornell University entomologist Elson Shields holds an alfalfa root protected by biocontrol nematodes applied in an NNYADP-funded research trial in Belleville, New York. Photo: NNYADP

Act Now to Reduce Alfalfa Snout Beetle, Corn Rootworm Impact in NY and U.S.

Northern New York; January 19, 2021.  Cornell University entomologist Elson Shields, Ph.D., has written a paper on the true cost of alfalfa snout beetle to a farm to encourage dairy and crop farmers to act now to reduce populations of the alfalfa pest on their farms. Shields says, “We estimate that if alfalfa snout beetle becomes fully established on a dairy farm growing its own alfalfa, it can cost the farm $300 to $600 per cow per year.”

Shields’ biocontrol nematodes protocol for managing alfalfa snout beetle (ASB), highlighted in the paper, also shows great promise for managing corn rootworm.

The research foundation for the use of biocontrol nematodes to save alfalfa crops in New York State, and now being used or evaluated in multiple other crops and in other states, was established with the support of the Northern New York Agricultural Development Program (NNYADP). The “What is the True Cost of Alfalfa Snout Beetle on Your Farm” paper and “Persistent Biocontrol Nematodes: What, Why, How, When, and Where to Get Them” fact sheet are posted on the NNYADP website at www.nnyagdev.org.

Shields began the quest to find a solution to alfalfa snout beetle in 1989 on the Peck Homestead Farm in Great Bend, New York, where ASB damage to alfalfa crops was significantly decreasing milk production.

Due to the importance of alfalfa as a forage crop in the dairy, beef cattle, equine and other livestock sectors, the farmer-driven NNYADP made a firm commitment to fund the research needed to find a solution. Today, the inexpensive biocontrol solution developed by that research benefits dairy farmers and alfalfa, corn, and berry growers in northern New York, organic farmers throughout the Northeast, and corn growers across the U.S. and in Ontario, Canada.

“To date we have applied biocontrol nematodes to nearly 28,000 acres in northern New York on more than 140 farms. In those fields, the alfalfa stand life has increased back to 4 to 6 years compared to the previous ASB-ravaged 1-2 years. Neighboring farms should work together to control ASB on both farms,” says Shields, who will speak virtually about the biocontrol nematodes with corn growers in the American Southwest in late January, and recently shared the research results with the Ontario Ag Conference.

Shields breaks the $300 to $600 per cow per year cost of ASB into two areas: the cost of forage loss from the field with the cost of replanting, and the cost of purchasing off-farm protein to replace the alfalfa protein lost with the ASB-damaged crop.

Analysts with the W.H. Miner Agricultural Research Institute, Chazy, New York, and Oak Point Agronomics, Hammond, New York, have estimated the cost of losing and reestablishing an alfalfa stand at $200 to $500 per acre. The cost of additional purchases of soy protein once ASB becomes established and damages a farm’s alfalfa crop ranges from $4.70 to $16.80 per cow per month.

How do you know if you have ASB? Shields says that alfalfa stand loss that is often blamed on winterkill may actually be a result of ASB. He notes, “Alfalfa snout beetle often kill out the alfalfa on the high spots in the field first, a symptom which should draw attention from the truck as you are driving past.” The best time to survey a field or farm for ASB is in October when yellowing alfalfa plants can be dug up to examine for ASB larvae.

What can you do if you have ASB? Alfalfa snout beetle can be controlled for many years with a single application of native New York biocontrol nematodes on each field, using a protocol developed by Shields and Cornell University Research Support Specialist Antonio Testa while working with more than 120 dairy farmers in northern New York. The cost to apply the biocontrol nematodes is a one-time expense in the range of $40 to $60 per acre. More recent research has shown the biocontrol nematodes can be applied as part of a liquid manure application.

Do the biocontrol nematodes also control corn rootworm? “We first began to see indications that the biocontrol nematodes were having an impact on corn rootworm on one of the northern New York farms rotating its alfalfa crop with corn. Recent trials with the biocontrol nematodes in New York and now in other U.S. states are showing their effectiveness at reducing corn rootworm populations including rootworm populations becoming resistant to Bt-RW-traited corn,”Shields says.

Are the biocontrol nematodes effective against other crops? Shields and Testa have successfully applied the biocontrol nematodes to control pests in berry crops and have trials underway to examine their effectiveness in managing wireworms and Colorado potato beetle.

Who can you call for help? For more information on the use of biocontrol nematodes, farmers should contact their local Extension office. In northern New York, contacts include Cornell Cooperative Extension field crops specialists Michael Hunter: 315-788-8450, and Kitty O’Neil, Ph.D.: 315-379-9192, and Cornell PRO-DAIRY Dairy Forage Systems Specialist Joe Lawrence: 315-788-4815. Mary DeBeer, 518-812-8565, is a northern New York-based provided of the biocontrol nematodes.

To see a history of the NNYADP alfalfa snout beetle research projects, visit the Research: Field Research: Alfalfa Snout Beetle pages on the website at www.nnyagdev.org. Funding for the Northern New York Agricultural Development Program is supported by the New York State Legislature and administered by the New York State Department of Agriculture and Markets.

LINKS:
.  “The True Cost of Alfalfa Snout Beetle on Your Farm”

. Persistent Biocontrol Nematodes: What, Why, How, When, and Where to Get Them

Canton, New York: December 16, 2020.  Research conducted by a team of veterinarians and dairy specialists with Quality Milk Production Services, the William H. Miner Agricultural Research Institute, and Cornell Cooperative Extension evaluated how different teat end treatments impact cow health under winter conditions. Based on their findings, the researchers recommend several best management practices for dairies milking in colder temperatures. A Northern New York Agricultural Development Program grant funded the project.

A six-week mid-winter trial evaluated two types of post-milking teat dips: a powdered chlorhexidine acetate teat treatment and a foaming 1 percent iodine dip. The final dataset totaled 331 cows that were milked three times a day. The cows were housed in freestall barns bedded with sand or sawdust or in a tiestall barn with foam mattresses bedded with sawdust. All cows received pre- and post-milking dip treatments.

Teat skin chapping and thickening of the outer layer of skin on the teat ends can reduce the ability to achieve clean teat ends. This creates the opportunity for increased environmental bacterial pathogen colonization and thus increases the risk of mastitis and higher somatic cell count. The 331 cows in the study were evaluated for clinical mastitis and subclinical mastitis infections, somatic cell count, linear score, teat skin condition, and teat end score.

At the start of the trial, the percentage of udder quarter samples with a negative culture test for the powdered treatment group was 66 and for the iodine dip group, 65. At the end of the trial, the percentage of quarter samples with a negative culture test for the powdered treatment group was 79 and for the iodine dip group, 86.

While there was no difference in clinical mastitis between the two groups, the powdered treatment group showed a greater risk of new subclinical infection (odds ratio of 1.59) and had a greater risk to have a positive culture result for a minor mastitis organism (odds ratio of 1.63) or Staph. aureus infection (odds ratio of 2.32) at the end of the trial.

There was no difference in number or odds ratio for coliform or Streptococcus spp. infections. The researchers found no significant difference between the two study groups as to teat skin condition, teat end scoring, or linear scoring.

To reduce the risk of cold climate-related mastitis infections, Heather Dann, Ph.D., a research scientist with the William H. Miner Agricultural Research Institute, Chazy, N.Y., suggests the following as best management practice for dairies milking in colder temperatures and in situations where cows may be exposed to cold and windchill in the barn or going to and from the milking parlor:

• Use hygienic milking protocols
• Make sure milking equipment is properly functioning
• Continue using an effective post-milking teat dip
• Remove excessive post-milking teat dip from teat by gently blotting to reduce moisture waiting for dip to dry to prevent freezing
• Troubleshoot barn and parlor facilities to reduce opportunity for windchill
• Maintain dry and clean bedding.

The average temperature of 42 degrees Fahrenheit in the barns during the trial was moderate for a northern New York winter. The researchers emphasize that different results might have been recorded under harsher, more typical winter temperatures.To read the complete Powdered Teat Dip Post-Milking Under Cold Weather in NNY report, see the Research: Dairy Research projects tab at www.nnyagdev.org.

Funding for the Northern New York Agricultural Development Program is supported by the New York State Legislature and administered by the New York State Department of Agriculture and Markets.