and animals into the crops pets and livestock we know today. Generally any mutations that are widespread in domestic plants
because the section 4 (d) rule of the Endangered Species Act exempts most routine farming activity to protect the lesser prairie chicken including agricultural practices on cultivated lands that are in crop production as well as maintenance of infrastructure on these operations. â#oehowever they decided as part of
or convert back to crop production. The basis for this assurance is if one landowner makes the decision to convert the cover back to annual crop production there will likely be another landowner making the decision to enroll land in CRP
which creates a balancing effect The effort has been as much as possible to keep the impact on CRP participants within the lesser prairie chicken region the same as those outside the region Winkler said. â#oethere will
If destruction of the CRP cover is determined to cause adverse environmental effects then the CRP participant must obtain an approved conservation plan from the NRCS for destruction of the CRP cover for planned crop production.
The increases currently projected for crop production from biotechnology genetics agronomics and horticulture will not be sufficient to meet food demand.
More efficient technologies and crops will need to be developed --and equally important better ways for applying these technologies locally for farmers--to address this challenge.
A greater emphasis is needed in high-value horticultural crops he said. Those create jobs and economic opportunities for rural communities and enable more profitable intense farming.
Horticultural crops Davies noted are 50 percent of the farm-gate value of all crops produced in the U s. He also made the connection between the consumption of fruits
For example he said the fastest growing segment of new farmers in California are female non-Anglos who are intensively growing horticultural crops on small acreages he said.
They pollinate many food crops as well as those important for economic development and their products like honey
--and systems using cover crops and residue those are major ways agriculture can reduce the emission of greenhouse gases
Increasing crop yields and livestock feeding efficiency. Rice described this proposal as reducing inputs while maintaining or increasing outputs
Two possible speed bumpsmany crops are distinguished from their wild ancestors with a suite of traits called the domestication syndrome.
--and trying to grow'cash crops'such as cotton and coffee that are highly susceptible to global price fluctuations.
Researchers say that policy intervention to stabilize the price of cash crops and relieve indebted farmers may help stem the tide of suicide that has swept the Indian countryside.
those that grow cash crops such as coffee and cotton; those with'marginal'farms of less than one hectare;
Small scale farmers who cultivate capital-intensive cash crops --which are subject to massive price fluctuations--are particularly vulnerable to accruing debts they can't repay.
--but inequality as a predictor of suicide rates paled in comparison with cash crops and marginalized indebted farmers.
Areas such as Gujarat in which cash crops are cultivated mainly on large-scale farms have low suicide rates.
In fact liberalization has brought about a crisis in the agricultural sector that has pushed many small-scale cash crops farmers into debt and in some cases to suicide.
and Audubon California in the journal Western Birds scientists document the importance of irrigated agricultural crops in California's Central Valley to a conspicuous shorebird.
Crops like alfalfa provide critical habitat for the Long-billed Curlew the largest shorebird in North america and a species of continental conservation concern.
if a program of economic incentives can be devised for farmers to maintain flooding of crops such as alfalfa
David W. Taylor (University of Portland) and Gregory J. Anderson (University of Connecticut) took a close look at the fresh crops in the Puerto rican markets of Hartford
As biologists and specifically as botanists what really struck us was the diversity of fresh plant crops mostly of subtropical/tropical origin that were available in ethnic markets in the northern U s. Like their ancestors who traveled from Europe Africa
Over the course of nearly two decades Taylor and Anderson carefully and patiently measured the diversity of crops in the marketplace their availability over time the proportion of market space dedicated to each
The study published in the April issue of the American Journal of Botany includes the analysis of nearly 100 tropical crops
Results showed that consumers were often willing to pay more for culturally significant crops despite the availability of less-expensive nutritional equivalents.
and Anderson are investigating the market crops utilized by migrant communities worldwide. They are uncovering the foods that shape our identity
To improve the market in traditional medicines the study recommends linking traders to farmers in the form of grower groups especially women which could initially focus on the most traded species as alternative crops are recommended.
Veggie is a deployable plant growth unit capable of producing salad-type crops to provide the crew with appetizing nutritious and safe fresh food
However if the plants are used for producing biofuels the researchers go for a higher-density crop similar to that of forage crops:
This makes growing salad crops with'processable'leaves extremely important for the packaged salad industry as it reduces waste
and through crop production techniques to help the company improve the quality of their product she adds.
The results open the door to exciting further studies across a wider range of crops
so we can supply our ideas to them directly then Vitacress grow the crops which they supply to Sainsbury's. That sort of partnership is quite difficult for an academic group to achieve
Growing crops on photovoltaic farmsgrowing agave and other carefully chosen plants amid photovoltaic panels could allow solar farms not only to collect sunlight for electricity
but also to produce crops for biofuels according to new computer models by Stanford scientists. This co-location approach could prove especially useful in sunny arid regions such as the southwestern United states where water is said scarce Sujith Ravi who is conducting postdoctoral research with professors David Lobell and Chris Field both
Crops planted beneath the solar panels would capture the runoff water used for cleaning the PV panels
But which crops to use? Many solar farms operate in sunny but arid regions that are inhospitable to most food crops.
But there is one valuable plant that thrives at high temperatures and in poor soil: agave. Native to North and South america the prickly plant can be used to produce liquid ethanol a biofuel that can be mixed with gasoline
and the environmental benefits achievable by growing corn soybean and winter wheat under regimes that use one third of the usual amount of fertilizer--or none at all--with cover crops fertilizing the fields in winter.
The regime that used fewer chemicals resulted in more than 50 percent reductions in the amount of nitrogen that escaped into groundwater and rivers with crop yields close to those of standard management.
and other crops say the scientists. Their results are published in the April 9 advanced online edition of the journal Nature.
But growing crops for biofuel requires thousands of acres of land and vast quantities of fertilizer and water.
On the other there is a growing global movement among gardeners farmers and others to use another form of black carbon--biochar--to both boost crop yields and to counter greenhouse emissions by locking
While branching has relevance in agriculture it is also very important in bioenergy crop production. Brookhaven plant biologist Benjamin Babst and Brittany Wienclaw who was a summer intern as part of the DOE Science Undergraduate Laboratory Internship program at Brookhaven
and activities--such as metalworking pottery crop production tending and rearing livestock said Macintosh. I'm interested in how the skeleton adapted to people's specific behaviours during life
In Central europe adaptations in human leg bones spanning this time frame show that it was initially men who were performing the majority of high-mobility tasks probably associated with tending crops and livestock.
field study showsfor the first time a field test has demonstrated that elevated levels of carbon dioxide inhibit plants'assimilation of nitrate into proteins indicating that the nutritional quality of food crops is at risk as climate change intensifies.
In food crops it is especially important because plants use nitrogen to produce the proteins that are vital for human nutrition.
When this decline is factored into the respective portion of dietary protein that humans derive from these various crops it becomes clear that the overall amount of protein available for human consumption may drop by about 3 percent as atmospheric carbon dioxide reaches the levels anticipated to occur during the next few
Wildlife can damage valuable livestock crops or infrastructure some species carry diseases of agricultural concern
These techniques include growing crops away from native stands so cross-pollination isn't possible; introducing genes to make both the male and female trees or plants sterile;
This dream is coming closer to reality for University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign researchers who have developed a new computer model that can help plant scientists breed better soybean crops.
Next the researchers plan to use their model to analyze other crops for their structural traits.
and cassava guided by similar computational approaches with the end goal of making more productive and sustainable crops.
The paper published in the current issue of the Journal of Applied Ecology gives farmers of pollination-dependent crops tangible results to convert marginal acreage to fields of wildflowers said Rufus Isaacs MSU entomologist
and pollinate crops valued at $14 billion nationwide Isaacs said. Honey bees do a great job of pollinating blueberries
and build more secure livelihoods said plant geneticist Rajeev Varshney of the International Crops Research Institute for Semiarid Tropics in India who serves on the IPGI.
Until now we've bred peanuts relatively blindly as compared to other crops said IPGI plant geneticist David Bertioli of the Universidade de Brasã lia.
We've had less information to work with than we do with many crops which have been researched more thoroughly and understood.
For example fine sediments washed into rivers from farmland used to grow crops are known to be sources of methane gas.
crops throughout a mountainous east-west corridor along the historic Silk road suggests new research from Washington University in St louis. Our findings indicate that ancient nomadic pastoralists were key players in an east-west network
Ancient wheat and broomcorn millet recovered in nomadic campsites in Kazakhstan show that prehistoric herders in Central Eurasia had incorporated both regional crops into their economy
While these crops have been known to exist much earlier in ancient China and Southwest asia finding them intermingled in the Bronze age burials
and Southwest Asian crops eastward and the surprise is that it is nomads who are the agents of change Frachetti said.
disease-resistant varieties of riceas Earth's human population marches toward 9 billion the need for hardy new varieties of grain crops has never been greater.
Today while bad weather periodically lowers crop yields in some places other regions are typically able to compensate to avert food shortages.
In the warmer weather of the future however crops in multiple regions could wither simultaneously the authors suggest.
--and maybe even predicting--regional crop yields. Guanter Joiner and Frankenberg launched their collaboration at a 2012 workshop hosted by the Keck Institute for Space Studies at the California Institute of technology in Pasadena to explore measurements of photosynthesis from space.
Unlike most vegetation food crops are managed to maximize productivity. They usually have access to abundant nutrients
This needs to be accounted for going forward in trying to predict how much of the atmospheric carbon dioxide will be taken up by crops in a changing climate.
Manure from livestock and fertilizer for crops release ammonia to the atmosphere. In the air ammonia mixes with other emissions to form microscopic airborne particles or particulates.
The benefits include higher crop yields increased income and resilience to climate change. Agroforestry is integrated an land-use management technique that incorporates trees and shrubs with crops and livestock on farms.
The study called Modeling the effects of adopting agroforestry on basin scale surface runoff and sediment yield in the Philippines uses a computer-based Soil
#Phloem production in Huanglongbing-affected citrus treescitrus Huanglongbing (citrus greening disease) is highly destructive and fast-spreading contributing to a reduction in crop yields in Florida
although succeeding crops are progressively smaller and of lower quality and new leaves do not grow to their typical size.
#Pesticides make the life of earthworms miserablepesticides are sprayed on crops to help them grow but the effect on earthworms living in the soil under the plants is devastating new research reveals:
When crops are sprayed with fungicide only a small part of the chemical is absorbed by the plant.
Waterfootprint developed primarily by Daniel Dourte a research associate in agricultural and biological engineering estimates water use in crop production across the U s. Waterfootprint looks at a farm in a specific year
and uses it to estimate the blue and green water footprints of crop production Dourte said.
For instance if irrigation water is used to grow crops it is exported essentially Dourte said. Once products are shipped overseas the water used to grow the commodity goes with it
Global food trade saves billions of gallons of water each year as food is exported from humid temperate places to drier locales that would have used much more water to grow crops Dourte said.
#Future heat waves pose threat to global food supplyheat waves could significantly reduce crop yields and threaten global food supply
Instances of extreme temperatures brought about by a large increase in global mean temperature can be detrimental to crops at any stage of their development but in particular around anthesis--the flowering period of the plant.
The impacts on wheat and soybean are likely to be less profound primarily because of the fertilisation effects that elevated levels of CO2 can have on these crops.
The study also identified particular areas where heat waves are expected to have the largest negative effects on crop yields.
Some of the largest affected areas are key for crop production for example the North american corn belt for maize.
When the CO2 fertilisation effects are taken not into account the researchers found a net decrease in yields in all three crops intensified by extreme heat stress for the top-five producing countries of each crop.
However extreme heat stress reinforced by'business-as usual'reduces the beneficial effects considerably in these two crops.
and reduce risks of extreme heat stress that threaten global crop production. Story Source: The above story is provided based on materials by Institute of Physics.
#True value of cover crops to farmers, environmentplanting cover crops in rotation between cash crops--widely agreed to be ecologically beneficial--is even more valuable than previously thought according to a team of agronomists entomologists agroecologists horticulturists and biogeochemists from Penn State's College
and how cover crops affect that suite of services. Cover cropping is one of the most rapidly growing soil
Our analysis shows how the effort to improve water quality with cover crops will affect other ecosystem services that we expect from agricultural land.
The research published in the March issue of Agricultural Systems quantified the benefits offered by cover crops across more than 10 ecosystem services.
For example nutrient-retention benefits occur primarily during cover crop growth weed-suppression benefits occur during cash-crop growth through a cover crop legacy effect
By integrating a suite of ecosystem services into a unified analytical framework we highlighted the potential for cover crops to influence a wide array of ecosystem services.
We estimated that cover crops increased eight of 11 ecosystem services. In addition we demonstrated the importance of
when she led the cover crop study. Now an assistant professor in the department of soil and crop sciences at Colorado State university she noted that the planting of cover crops will become more attractive
if fertilizer prices rise or if modest cost-sharing programs like the one currently in place in Maryland are developed.
Researchers simulated a three-year soybean-wheat-corn rotation with and without cover crops in central Pennsylvania
The cover crop rotation included red clover frost-seeded into winter wheat in March and winter rye planted after corn was harvested in the fall.
The planting of cover crops already is accepted as an environmentally prudent practice. It is so beneficial in fact that the National Resource Conservation Service last month set a goal to increase the acres planted nationally in cover crops from the current 2 million to 20 million by 2020.
According to NRCS in 2006 only 5 percent of cropped acres in the Chesapeake bay region had planted cover crops every year
and 88 percent of acres never had planted any cover crops. In 2011 52 percent of acres had planted cover crops at least once every four years
and 18 percent of acres had planted cover crops every year. The NRCS estimated that the increased annual use of cover crops in 2011 led to an average 78 percent reduction in sediment loss 35 percent less nitrogen surface loss a 40 percent
cut in nitrogen subsurface loss and a 30 percent decrease in total phosphorus loss. But many farmers have not planted cover crops because they have not seen financial incentives to do so according to Kaye.
That is largely because the traditional method of calculating the economic value of cover crops used by agricultural producers--only estimating the resulting increase to cash-crop yields over a short period--was not compelling.
The most common metrics for evaluating cropping systems are grain and forage yields and short-term profitability he said.
Within this context cover crops are treated as a tool to be used only if they do not interfere with cash-crop production.
Story Source: The above story is provided based on materials by Penn State. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.
Journal Reference e
#Diversity in UK gardens aiding fight to save threatened bumblebees, study suggestsecologists at Plymouth University in a study published this week have shown the most common species of bumblebee are not fussy about a plant's origin when searching for nectar and pollen among the nation's urban gardens.
But other species--and in particular long-tongued bees--do concentrate their feeding upon plants from the UK and Europe for
#Global food trade can alleviate water scarcityinternational trade of food crops led to freshwater savings worth 2. 4 billion US-Dollars in 2005
While parts of India or the Middle east alleviate their water scarcity through importing crops some countries in Southern Europe export agricultural goods from water-scarce sites
Combining biophysical simulations of the virtual water content of crop production with agro-economic land-use and water-use simulations the scientists were able for the first time to determine the positive and negative impacts on water scarcity through international
trade of crops livestock and feed. The effects were analyzed with high resolution on a subnational level to account for large countries like India
Despite the fact that Europe alone exports virtual water in food crops worth 3. 1 billion US-Dollars the scientists found that international trade of food crops today globally accounts for water
Trade reduces global crop production and area due to regionally different livestock production efficiencies: one kilo of beef for instance can be produced with much less input feed in the US than in Africa
Two University of Illinois economists analyzed infrastructure of interstate trade for food-grain crops in three Indian states
and vegetable crops which are highly perishable tend to have less regulation than the grains and oilseeds.
For vegetable crops if farmers don't have those linkages they really can't sell perishable products.
#Climate change will reduce crop yields sooner than thoughta study led by the University of Leeds has shown that global warming of only 2â°C will be detrimental to crops in temperate and tropical regions with reduced yields from the 2030s onwards.
Our research shows that crop yields will be affected negatively by climate change much earlier than expected. Furthermore the impact of climate change on crops will vary both from year-to-year
and from place-to-place--with the variability becoming greater as the weather becomes increasingly erratic.
The researchers state that we will see on average an increasingly negative impact of climate change on crop yields from the 2030s onwards.
in order to safeguard crop yields for future generations. Climate change means a less predictable harvest with different countries winning
The biochar has a one-two punch in that it can be used to both increase crop yields
Less land would be used to grow the crops used to feed the animals and therefore less fuel to produce the same amount of beef.
and the insects that feed on those crops this knowledge will help us develop better pest-management strategies that are more in tune with nature.
and hurt the few crops the region grows (only 1 percent of Mongolia is arable land).
and shrubs with crops and livestock on farms--could be a win-win solution to the seemingly difficult choice between reforestation
As humans burn fossil fuels dose crops with chemical fertilizers and dispose of manure from livestock they introduce extra nitrogen and other nutrients into the soil air and water.
Vertimass anticipates that the ORNL technology will be in demand by existing corn-based ethanol production plants as well as new refineries coming online that aim to convert non-food crops such as switchgrass
and chickens rather than primarily relying on growing crops for human food and animal fodder.
Isotopic analysis of the ancient pig bones found at the site also suggests that they were free-ranging rather than penned and given fodder from harvested crops.
#Stricter controls of wastewater reuse on crops needed to meet WHO guidelineswastewater used to irrigate agricultural crops in countries where water is scarce may contribute to significant public health risks such as diarrheal disease in children from rotavirus.
The authors say that more research on the rate of viral decay on various crops would increase the accuracy of risk estimations.
#Banana plant fights off crops invisible nemesis: Roundwormsthe banana variety Yangambi km5 produces toxic substances that kill the nematode Radopholus similis a roundworm that infects the root tissue of banana plants--to the frustration of farmers worldwide.
This roundworm infects banana crops worldwide. The nematodes are invisible to the naked eye but they can penetrate the roots of banana plants by the thousands.
This method could also be applied to other crops and other species of nematode. Nematodes pose a growing threat to rice production in Asia for example.
These trees are also more tolerant to drought to the presence of weed-killer to in vitro and ex vitro crops to contamination
versus historical data to achieve various crop yields and they could aid in making expensive infrastructure investments by helping to determine their economic viability.
because different crops have different root depths and distributions for optimal water uptake. Next a soil moisture profile is developed with the principle of maximum entropy model (POME)
The result is input into the Decision Support system for Agrotechnology Transfer (DSSAT) program a software application program that comprises crop simulation models for over 28 crops
Mishra applies as many quantified inputs about crops and weather conditions possible to this model except one:
and Remote Sensing Laboratory covered a 10-square-kilometer area that included dry land-farmed crops relying on rainfall only irrigated crops varying crop types pasture and fallow land.
and estimated crop yields were significantly comparable with county averaged National Agricultural Statistics Service yield data and ground-based precipitation-induced DSSAT results Mishra says.
Cornell research shows that the combination of natural enemies such as ladybeetles with Bt crops delays a pestâ##s ability to evolve resistance to these insecticidal proteins. â#oethis is demonstrated the first example of a predator being able
Bt genes have been engineered into a variety of crops to control insect pests. Since farmers began planting Bt crops in 1996 with 70 million hectares planted in the United states in 2012 there have been only three clear-cut cases in agriculture of resistance in caterpillars
and one in a beetle. â#oeresistance to Bt crops is said surprisingly uncommonâ Shelton. To delay or prevent insect pests from evolving resistance to Bt crops the U s. Environmental protection agency promotes the use of multiple Bt genes in plants
and the practice of growing refuges of non-Bt plants that serve as a reservoir for insects with Bt susceptible genes. â#oeour paper argues there is another factor involved:
the conservation of natural enemies of the pest speciesâ#said Shelton. These predators can reduce the number of potentially resistant individuals in a pest population and delay evolution of resistance to Bt.
Healthy bees are vital to our food supply as they pollinate many important crops. This virtual hive is an important new research tool to help us understand how changes to the environment impact on bee health.
and fat and they rely increasingly on a short list of major food crops like wheat maize
but relying on a global diet of such limited diversity obligates us to bolster the nutritional quality of the major crops as consumption of other nutritious grains and vegetables declines.
The new study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences suggests that growing reliance on a few food crops may also accelerate the worldwide rise in obesity heart disease and diabetes
The research reveals that the crops now predominant in diets around the world include several that were already quite important a half-century ago--such as wheat rice maize and potato.
In contrast many crops of considerable regional importance--including cereals like sorghum millets and rye as well as root crops such as sweet potato cassava and yam--have lost ground.
Many other locally significant grain and vegetable crops--for which globally comparable data are not available--have suffered the same fate.
and the pressure increases on our global food system so does our dependence on the global crops and production systems that feed us.
The price of failure of any of these crops will become very high. As the authors probed current trends in food consumption they documented a curious paradox:
and Asia have widened actually their menu of major staple crops while changing to more globalized diets.
This comprehensive new study relying on data from the Food and agriculture organization of the united nations (FAO) encompassed more than 50 crops and over 150 countries (accounting for 98 percent of the world's population) during the period 1961-2009.
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