Hubs take on trial & error so farmers can confidently adopt change
Farmers need new methods of growing crops, new crops, and ways to adopt innovative technology, but it takes trial and error. That process presents a risk many producers can’t afford to take. Alberta’s 12 Agriculture Innovation Hubs (Hubs) mitigate that risk of exploring change at the farm level.
Hubs are independent, farmer-led, nonprofit organizations. They work both individually and collaboratively to conduct unbiased research to meet the needs of Alberta food producers.
“Instead of everybody continually reinventing the wheel, failing or succeeding on an individual basis, Agriculture Innovation Hubs take on that risk,” explained Mike Gretzinger, Research Coordinator at Farming Smarter in Lethbridge.
Hubs explore options for new crop varieties, refine agronomy methods and evaluate adaptations for technologies e.g., drones, precision planters.
A recent novel crop success story is hemp for food, seed and fiber. Hubs conducted research to make hemp a viable crop in rotations for Alberta farmers. In 2020, Alberta planted nearly 9,000 acres of hemp and leads the hemp industry in North America. Now a new use for hemp is on the horizon.
Battle River Research Group’s Research Manager, Nasima Junejo notes that producers want alternative forages that are drought tolerant, have excellent nutrition, and provide a new crop for rotations. Junejo discovered that hemp could check all those boxes and began research.
“While doing that research, I found that hemp has very high protein, macronutrients and fiber,” said Junejo. Hemp looks very promising as a source of forage.
While producers now recognize hemp as a rotation choice, quinoa and rice are in early stages of this process.
“Our first year, the quinoa we planted started and came up, but we had pest issues,” said Gretzinger. “We even had to hand weed because there wasn’t anything we could spray in crop. We had to go back to the drawing board.”
Ultimately, quinoa became part of a multi-year crop rotation trial, and researchers addressed the challenges. Now crop producers can add quinoa to rotations. Rice, however, is in earlier stages of research.
“Farming Smarter has a trial with upland rice specifically bred to grow under normal irrigation, rather than flooded,” said Gretzinger. “This project is at the ‘is it possible?’ stage.”
Irrigators like to conserve water while ensuring crops get optimum moisture. A Farming Smarter project, in cooperation with UBC, places moisture sensors in fields. The sensor data combined with variable rate irrigation allows irrigators to adjust the amount of water coming from a pivot. Stamp Seeds high generation seed production fields can have different crop types each with different water requirements under one irrigation pivot.
“Some fields have substantial amounts of variability. The traditional way of moisture sampling is to walk into the crop feeling soil by hand,” said Nathan Stamp, Farm Operations and Agronomy Manager of Stamp Seeds. “These sensors allow us to see moisture levels on a platform that creates a real time zone-based prescription for the next irrigation application.”
Another technology where Hubs conducted research that helped Stamp Seeds involves planters developed for corn but adaptable to other crops. These specialty planters precisely place seed as set up by the farmer.
Farming Smarter research proved that using a precision planter allowed for narrow spaced rows in seed canola. The research isolated row width in its study and kept all other parameters in check. The results gave Stamp the confidence to change his equipment and try narrower rows.
“I took it back to the farm and it has really helped with the overall production of seed canola,” said Stamp.
Farmers trust information coming from Alberta’s regional Hubs because they are unbiased, non-profit organizations led by farmers. They communicate research results to producers through print, digital, and in-person field days.