Location: Livestock, Forage and Pasture Management Research Unit
Project Number: 3070-21500-001-001-N
Project Type: Non-Funded Cooperative Agreement
Start Date: Aug 14, 2019
End Date: Aug 13, 2024
Objective:
The objective is to economically and efficiently produce hay to support the research beef cattle herd that is essential to the Grazinglands Research Laboratory’s (GRL) mission and to support the dairy production herd that is essential to support the Federal Correctional Institution (FCI) and Unicor’s mission to provide vocational training and work experiences as well as meet food requirements of inmates.
Approach:
Hay will be produced on GRL property collaboratively with Unicor employees and FCI inmates to support the ARS research mission and the FCI training mission and the Unicor production mission. Most equipment and labor will be provided by Unicor. Researchers and operations staff from GRL and operations staff from Unicor will meet semi-annually (early spring and late summer) to determine annual production goals for quantities of hay of various qualities for different research or production objectives. Land areas available for production will be determined and cost-sharing to equitably share the fixed and variable costs of production. Types of hay will include irrigated and rainfed alfalfa, native grass, other perennial grasses, wheat, and other annual forages, as determined to meet research requirements and dairy production needs. Agronomic operations and hay baling will be the responsibility of Unicor and bales will be delivered to ARS researchers to meet their research requirements.
