Location: Pasture Systems & Watershed Management Research
Project Number: 8070-21500-001-000-D
Project Type: In-House Appropriated
Start Date: Dec 12, 2023
End Date: Dec 11, 2028
Objective:
Objective 1: Evaluate existing and novel forage and animal management strategies to facilitate climate-smart agriculture in integrated crop-pasture-livestock systems.
Sub-objective 1. A: Develop cover crop management strategies to improve forage production, grazing potential, N use efficiency (NUE), resilience to climate change, and environmental impact in integrated crop-pasture-livestock systems.
Sub-objective 1. B: Evaluate productivity, nutritive value, resilience to climate change, and environmental impact of novel forages and forage management strategies in integrated forage crop-grazing livestock systems in the Northeast.
Sub-objective 1. C: Evaluate the effects of interseeding annual forages into established pastures and corn for improved soil health, increased resilience to climate change, improved annual forage production, integration of livestock with crops, and improved NUE.
Objective 2: Development and validation of data collection and computational tools for monitoring and optimizing management to improve production efficiency and environmental sustainability in integrated crop-forage-livestock systems.
Sub-objective 2. A: Develop, evaluate, and refine precision monitoring technologies for pasture and forage systems at multiple scales.
Sub-objective 2. B: Incorporate enhanced monitoring capabilities into decision support systems to increase production, profitability, and ecosystem services provisioning while reducing environmental impacts.
Approach:
There is renewed interest in re-integrating farming enterprises to focus not only on plant and animal productivity but also on improved carbon sequestration, nitrogen use efficiency, water quality, pollinator habitat, and resiliency to climatic changes. However, there is a lack of comprehensive, interdisciplinary research that addresses integrating crops, pasture, and livestock on the diverse landscapes of the Northeast. This project will take a multifaceted approach to evaluate management strategies and technologies for agricultural productivity and ecosystem services to understand better the trade-offs and synergies in environmental and economic impacts related to the management of crop-livestock systems in the Northeast and nationally. Objective 1 of this project plan will investigate how on-the-ground changes in forage and animal management strategies in integrated crop-pasture-livestock systems can mitigate or adapt to climate changes to reduce environmental impact while maintaining sustainable and profitable farming enterprises. Objective 2 leverages technologies to create monitoring and decision support tools, based upon data gathered in Objective 1, to promote production efficiency and environmental sustainability of crop-pasture-livestock systems. Agricultural resilience to changing climates requires elements of both mitigation and adaptation. No single variable can capture the potential range of responses. Instead, the agronomic experiments provide essential information on forage and crop management strategies that have the potential to improve both provisioning and regulating services; modeling offers an approach to quantifying the outcomes of those strategies under potential future climates and across agricultural landscapes.
We will collaborate with larger USDA-led research networks, including the Long-Term Agroecological Research network (LTAR), Conservation Effects Assessment Project (CEAP), and Dairy Agroecosystems Working Group (DAWG). Such networking provides expertise and data on outcomes from management strategies for integrated crop-pasture-livestock systems that will be used to complete the objectives of this project.
Opportunities for greater integration of crops, pastures, and livestock on farms in the diverse landscapes of the Northeast are abundant. Research is needed to establish the production, logistical, and environmental limitations and consequences of integrated-crop–livestock production systems and to understand the potential interactions among various components. Integrated systems are expected to more tightly couple nutrient and water cycling, benefiting crop and forage species and supporting biomass production. Negative interactions may also occur, including increased crop pests and pathogens due to alternate hosts, increased weed pressure after cover cropping, and undesirable changes in forage availability or quality. Quantifying positive and negative interactions ensures that future management recommendations are valuable and accurate and will improve sustainability.
