The American Society of Agronomy, Soil Science Society of America, and Crop Science Society of America applaud the President’s support of food, agriculture, and natural resources research in his just-released budget proposal.
In the battle against thrips, Cornell breeder Martha Mutschler-Chu has developed a new weapon: a tomato that packs a powerful one-two punch to deter the pests and counter the killer viruses they transmit.
The most serious ongoing water pollution problem in the Gulf of Mexico originates not from oil rigs, as many people believe, but rainstorms and fields of corn and soybeans a thousand miles away in the Midwest. An expert on that problem — the infamous Gulf of Mexico “Dead Zone” — today called for greater awareness of the connections between rainfall and agriculture in the Midwest and the increasingly severe water quality problems in the gulf.
Kansas State University agronomy researcher Mary Beth Kirkham found that elevated levels of carbon dioxide in the earth's atmosphere have an upside -- a reduced need for moisture in some important crops.
Rendering some of the world’s toxic soils far less unfriendly, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Boyce Thompson Institute for Plant Research and Cornell researchers are learning to grow stress-tolerant crops on formerly non-farmable land.
Farmers face unique challenges when severe weather strikes. That is why a University of Kentucky professor wants to get the word out about what they, and everyone living in rural areas can do ahead of time to protect themselves from severe storms.
Conversion of large swaths of Brazilian land for sugar plantations will help the country meet its needs for producing cane-derived ethanol, but it also could lead to important regional climate effects, according to a team of researchers from Arizona State University, Stanford University and the Carnegie Institution for Science.
Scientists at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies have identified patterns of epigenomic diversity that not only allow plants to adapt to various environments, but could also benefit crop production and the study of human diseases.
Thanks to wheat breeding programs like the one at Kansas State University, producers have ever-improving options of wheat varieties to plant. Whether it’s improved resistance or increased yields, wheat breeders are creating varieties that meet producers’ changing needs. Wheat breeding is partially responsible for yields more than doubling since the first Kansas wheat crop was planted in Johnson County in 1839. Kansas State University has released 42 wheat varieties, each a step forward in some capacity over previous varieties. The newest variety, ‘1863’ honors the founding of the university.
Learn how Kansas State University researchers are using spectral analysis to increase the efficiency of the soybean breeding line selection process. Spectral analysis, a method of analyzing the electromagnetic radiation coming from plants and other objects, is being used in the K-State Agronomy Department to determine the level of photosynthetic activity of vegetation in many different situations.
A shift away from traditional coffee-growing techniques may be increasing the severity of an outbreak of 'coffee rust' fungus that has swept through plantations in Central America and Mexico, according to a University of Michigan ecologist who studies the disease.
Faced with an increasingly hungry world and limited supplies of water for food production, how do we ensure water security for future generations? That's the central question being addressed at a AAAS symposium on Sunday, Feb. 17.
A team of researchers from Michigan are characterizing simple, cheap measurements of labile soil organic matter that could predict the performance of corn crops and help farmers optimize their cropping systems.
Researchers from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign find that Bt corn has higher yields and uses nitrogen more efficiently than non-Bt corn.
Researchers from Oklahoma State University use soil water deficits to create a "calendar" of seasonal drought patterns.
Ecologists at the University of Toronto and the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich (ETH Zurich) have found that, given time, invading exotic plants will likely eliminate native plants growing in the wild despite recent reports to the contrary. A study published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) reports that recent statements that invasive plants are not problematic are often based on incomplete information, with insufficient time having passed to observe the full effect of invasions on native biodiversity.
Beef production in the United States is expected to decrease 4.8 percent in 2013, the second largest year-over-year decrease in 35 years. Many analysts expect the 2013 numbers to be followed by a 2014 decrease of 4.5 percent or more.
For many years, cheap grain meant almost anything that enhanced grain use and feedlot measures of technical efficiency were consistent with beef industry efficiency. This is no longer true.
Chefs and home cooks in the eastern U.S. could soon have easier access to a homegrown “super food,” thanks to a Cornell-led team of researchers working to expand broccoli's availability at farms, farmer's markets and grocery stores from Maine to Florida.
Researchers in China investigate corn's ability to act as a trap crop and control sunflower broomrape.
Climate change poses a major challenge to humanity’s ability to feed its growing population. But a new study of sorghum, led by Stephen Kresovich and Geoff Morris of the University of South Carolina, promises to make this crop an invaluable asset in facing that challenge.
In the rain forests of the Congo, where mammals and birds are hunted to near-extinction, an impenetrable sound of buzzing insects blankets the atmosphere.
The future landscape of the American Midwest could look a lot like the past—covered in native grasslands rather than agricultural crops. This is not a return to the past, however, but a future that could depend on grasslands for biofuels, grazing systems, carbon sequestration, and other ecosystem services. A major threat to this ecosystem is an old one—weeds and their influence on the soil.
A comprehensive map three years in the making is telling the story of humans’ impact on the Great Lakes, identifying how “environmental stressors” stretching from Minnesota to Ontario are shaping the future of an ecosystem that contains 20 percent of the world’s fresh water.
The American Society of Agronomy, Crop Science Society of America, and Soil Science Society of America commend PCAST on a report that identifies threats to America’s agricultural preparedness and proposes recommendations for strengthening it.
Giant ragweed lives up to its name, towering over crops and choking out surrounding plant species. Just one ragweed plant per square meter has been shown to reduce crop yields 45 to 77 percent. Now giant ragweed has evolved resistance to the herbicide glyphosate, which had been effective at controlling the weed.
Dalhousie Faculty of Agriculture scientist, Dr. Raj Lada, driven by a commitment to rural sustainability, is providing support and research to innovate the Christmas tree industry in Eastern Canada. Lada has established the first, national (international) Christmas tree Research Centre (CRC) in Truro/Bible Hill.
Justine Vanden Heuvel is a an assistant professor in the Department of Horticulture at Cornell University and a former cranberry specialist at the UMass Cranberry Station in East Wareham, Mass. She comments on the challenges and triumphs of the 2012 cranberry season.
No Thanksgiving dinner is complete without a succulent roasted turkey. The U.S. Department of Agriculture estimates that consumers cook and eat more than 45 million turkeys every Thanksgiving. Very few Americans, however, know much about the difference between their gravy-smothered poultry and the poultry that earlier generations of Americans ate to celebrate the holiday. “Ancient turkeys weren’t your Butterball,” said Rob Fleischer, head of the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute’s Center for Conservation and Evolutionary Genetics. “We set out to compare the genetic diversity of the domestic turkeys we eat today with that of the ancestral wild turkey from South Mexico. Some of what we found surprised us.”
An international scientific collaboration that includes two Kansas State University researchers is bringing home the bacon when it comes to potential animal and human health advancements, thanks to successfully mapping the genome of the domestic pig.
The popularity of organic foods and products continues to climb, creating greater demand for organic agriculture. Effective natural alternatives to synthetic chemical weed and pest management are needed to meet organic standards. Essential oils, such as clove oil, offer an avenue to explore.
Soil scientists and archeologists have uncovered evidence that the Maya grew corn sustainably in the lowlands of Tikal, Guatemala, but that they may also have farmed erosion-prone slopes over time.
The 1930s Dust Bowl was a singular event in U.S. history, but Dust Bowl-like droughts and conditions do still occur. Experts are available to discuss what events like the 2012 U.S. drought mean for us now and how we can prepare for similar events in the future.
Twenty years after its inception, the continued need for water quality improvement has led to a call for further advancement of the Phosphorus Index.
What is the best course of action when an invading noxious weed threatens to attack crop yields and assault grazing land? Invite a friend to dinner. In this case, the friend is a plant-eating insect—the stem-mining weevil.
Not only are feedlots paying record prices for feed and essentially record prices for feeder cattle, it has been recognized for quite a while now that the supply of feeder cattle will be increasingly inadequate to maintain feedlot inventories at any price.
Instead of an early snowfall this time of year, farmers along the eastern seaboard are dealing with flood waters and wind damage from Hurricane Sandy, which is expected to affect everything from poultry production to grocery prices.
A Kansas State University professor's research analyzing lipids is helping scientists around the world understand plant responses and develop better crops that can withstand environmental stress.
On October 23 at 1pm, top USDA and academic researchers will address agriculture and climate in a special session of the Soil Science Society of America’s annual meeting. And they’ll take on a third, largely new aspect of climate change and agriculture: how nitrogen pollution compounds climate change, and vice versa. The work draws from a new special report to the United States’ National Climate Assessment published in the journal Biogeochemistry.
Scientists have identified three neighboring genes that make soybeans resistant to the most damaging disease of soybean. The genes exist side-by-side on a stretch of chromosome, but only give resistance when that stretch is duplicated several times in the plant.
Weed scientists in Oregon have found that the timing of herbicide application along with reseeding of native grasses offers the best recipe for restoring native grasslands while controlling invasive weeds. Grasslands are a valuable resource for ecosystems, providing soil conservation, food and fiber production, and wildlife habitat. When threatened by invading exotic species, the quality and quantity of forage for wildlife can be reduced, fire frequencies can be altered, soil moisture and nutrients can be depleted, and the costs of land management can increase.
Cornell University, New York’s Land Grant university, has several teams of researchers and extension specialists working to support the state’s growing wine industry. These experts say it was a challenging year for the region’s vineyards and bottlers, but that 2012 should prove to be a very good year.
Drought conditions have had a significant effect on feeder cattle supplies, with feedlots expected to feel a noticeable pinch in the months ahead as they will be unable to maintain current inventories.
Researchers at Arizona State University are examining the ethical aspects of food production and consumption. They are helping consumers navigate the maze of moral choices involved in filling their plates and bellies. And they are finding that being morally mindful can lead to better nutrition, as well.
It’s a battleground down there — in the soil where plants and bacteria dwell. Even though beneficial root bacteria come to the rescue when a plant is being attacked by pathogens, there’s a "dark side" to the relationship between the plant and its white knight, according to University of Delaware research reported in Plant Physiology.
Kochia, a weed that is rapidly becoming more abundant across southern Canadian prairies and the Great Plains of the United States, can reduce crop yields by up to 60 percent. Fighting this weed has become difficult because more than 90 percent of kochia populations are now resistant to acetolactate synthase (ALS)-inhibiting herbicides. The phenomenon of negative cross-resistance, however, may offer another path to defeating the spread of this weed.
The “siloed” structure of U.S. health agencies is hindering efforts to spot and combat animal-to-human afflictions, such as West Nile Virus, New York University sociologist Colin Jerolmack has concluded after conducting an organizational analysis of their operations.
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