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Dr. Kim Ominski
- University of Manitoba |
| Farmscape for December 10, 2003 (Episode 1402)
The University of Manitoba has kicked off a three year project to assess the environmental implications of applying swine manure to pasture and the nutritional value of the forage produced.
The multi-disciplinary project got underway this fall with site establishment and will examine the performance of beef cattle grazed on pasture fertilized with hog manure.
The work is being funded through several agencies, including the federal greenhouse gas initiative, the Manitoba Livestock Manure Management Initiative, MRAC and livestock commodity groups.
Dr. Kim Ominski, with the U of M's Department of Animal Science, says the focus is productivity and environmental sustainability.
Clip-Dr. Kim Ominski-University of Manitoba
The departments that are involved include the Department of Animal Science, the Department of Soil Science and the Department of Food Science.
The project is to examine the production associated with the application of hog manure on forage, so we'll look not only at forage production but we'll look at animal response.
We also would like to examine the environmental sustainability of that practice.
When I say environmental sustainability, we're going to really focus our efforts in three areas.
One of them is looking at net greenhouse gas production.
The second one is looking at nutrient cycling in terms of nitrogen and phosphorus, so what's happening to nutrients in the system.
The last area that we're going to look at in the environmental area is an examination of the potential for either survival of pathogens or cycling of pathogens from one species to another.
Dr. Ominski says several organizations, including the provincial departments of Agriculture and Conservation, the livestock commodity groups, the Manitoba Forage Council and PFRA are also involved in the research.
She says the project will be accessible as a demonstration site and is scheduled to continue until 2006 with a first report expected next fall.
For Farmscape.Ca, I'm Bruce Cochrane.
*Farmscape is a presentation of Sask Pork and Manitoba Pork Council |
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| Keywords: environment, nutrition |
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© Wonderworks Canada
2003 |
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