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Industry Partners
Prairie Swine Centre is an affiliate of the University of Saskatchewan
Prairie Swine Centre is grateful for the assistance of the George Morris Centre in developing the economics portion of Pork Insight.
Financial support for the Enterprise Model Project and Pork Insight has been provided by:
Site-specific Application of Fertilizer N for reducing Greenhouse Gas Emissions
Posted in: Environment by admin on January 1, 2003 | No Comments
The Lack of Science in Kyoto: A Solution for a Non-Existent Problem
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The Kyoto Protocol is a political solution to a non-existent problem without scientific justification. In the late 1980s, the global temperature appeared to be increasing. This brought a concern to the public and “global warming” quickly became an unsupported fact. Some scientists think that it is the carbon dioxide that is warming the earth while some think it is changes in the sun that are creating this increase. The problems with the global warming theory involve work by scientists that have consistently been proven incorrect, inaccurate computer simulations of the environment, and false facts (such as the earth’s atmosphere working as a greenhouse; this is an inappropriate analogy). Rather than the Age of Information, Age of Speculation would be more fitting. Y2K is an example of a speculation that became concern and caused the government to needlessly spend a lot of money on it. Global warming is following the same trend that global cooling followed from 1940 to 1980 where they predicted an ice age eventually. Global flooding is the concern with the ice caps melting. However, how do scientists know that the ice doesn’t displace the same amount of volume as melted water? There may be no change in sea level whatsoever. The panic of ice shelves breaking apart should not be so concerning; it is what ice shelves do! Computer modeling systems are highly inaccurate in both prediction and overall understanding of climate. Whatever the exact figures, human contribution of CO2 is minimal when the entire environment is taken into account. The earth has warmed throughout history (i.e. – North America melted some 20,000 years ago), and it can be safe to assume that this was not due to human-contributed CO2. The media has had its part in increasing concern. They tend to take the theory and distribute it to the public as a solid prediction of what will happen.
Plant remediation of soil beneath an abandoned animal waste lagoon
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In the 21st century, remediation of the soil beneath animal waste lagoons will become an important issue, as they are closed due to environmental regulations. Methods to remediate abandoned lagoons to prevent environmental degradation have not been developed. One remediation method might be to grow plants in the contaminated soil. They would stabilize the soil and prevent erosion. No work has been published to see if plants will grow in abandoned animal waste lagoon soil with its high level of ammonium N. Thus, the first objective of this experiment was to determine under greenhouse conditions if barley (Hordeum vulgare ‘Weskan’), the most salt tolerant of commercially important crops, would grow in the lagoon soil. A second objective was to determine if plant residues (oat (Avena sativa) straw and maize (Zea mays) cobs) added to the lagoon soil would tie up N, because of their high C:N ratio. The lagoon soil came from the bottom of a closed swine lagoon. The high concentration of ammonium N in the swine-lagoon soil (1349 mg kg-1) did not inhibit barley emergence and growth. The lagoon soil with no residues sustained barley growth. Plants grown in soil amended with oat straw grew as well as plants grown in the soil with no residues, but barley grown in lagoon soil with maize cobs grew poorly for two reasons. First, the maize cobs provided an inadequate seedbed and emergence was low. Second, water moved through preferential paths in the soil with maize cobs and was not retained in the pot for plant growth. More N remained in the lagoon soil with both types of residues than in the soil without residues. Results showed that the physical characteristics caused by the residue were of most importance in permitting sustained barley growth in swine-lagoon soil.
Quiz Your Understanding of Manure
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Much of the nitrogen from the manure spread during cold weather, on soil that contains moisture, is held in the soil and is available in the spring. 25 to 50% of the organic nitrogen converts to nitrogen that is readily available to the growing crop if manure is spread in March or April. Agitating manure in storage before spreading it will improve nutrient uniformity, though it is still important to test the manure and spread it uniformly on the fields, especially if it is sand-laden manure. Sand-laden manure that is stored in a pit varies significantly in consistency and nutrient composition from the beginning to the end of emptying so 3 manure tests should be taken. Straw-packed manure also has less nutrient value than liquid manure so should be tested.
The different sources of nitrogen make no difference to their uptake in crops. Crops cannot tell the difference between fertilizer, livestock manure or green manure cover crops. It also makes no difference if it is the first time manure is put on a field or not, it still will have equal nutrient values. Spreading on the same field over three years, on the other hand, can result in a significant amount of nitrogen being “slow released”. After the third year, manure that was spread two or three seasons earlier will still be releasing nitrogen. It is therefore important to test the soil for how much nitrogen is available.
Altering Water Use by Diet Manipulation
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Performance of a passive feedlot runoff control and treatment system
Posted in: Environment by admin on | No Comments
Prospering Under Pressure – Who is the Enemy?
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Raising livestock involves stresses of production goals, environment, and the image of agriculture. Environmental enemies include an uninformed public, politicians, relations, anti-organizations, and even some producers. Education must be provided to the public in order to remove these negative thoughts of the confined livestock industry. Often a politician will use the livestock industry as an electoral advantage. They may use unflattering or even false information to their advantage to win the trust of the public or use their authority to influence regulatory agencies. The livestock industry must remain involved in politics so that they do not become overwhelmingly targeted. Regulatory agents/agencies that do not understand the environment or agriculture are very bad for the industry. Regulations should be scientific and have some involvement from the livestock industry itself. Anti-organizations can hinder the start-up of new facilities by getting the uninformed public on their side to protest. There is even precedence of a permit renewal being denied due to an anti-organization. They are also capable of crimes such as vandalism when they want to get a point across. Some producers themselves may run operations that contribute to this concern with poorly designed facilities that contribute to the degradation of the environment. Some producers also elect to not participate in improving the education of the public and choose poor sites for their operations. Suggested environmental protocol includes inspections, manure management plans, records, groundwater protection, regulatory involvement, permit review, system redundancy, knowing neighbours and enemies, and continuing educational efforts.