Prestegaard-wilson brings nutrition management to livestock sustainability conversation
While sustainability may be perceived in different ways, depending on the audience, Jacquelyn Prestegaard-wilson, PH.D., is developing an educational campaign to create sustainable livestock systems across Texas.
Prestegaard-wilson is the statewide Texas A&M Agrilife Extension Service livestock sustainability specialist and an assistant professor in the Texas A&M College of Agriculture and Life Sciences Department of Animal Science, Bryan-college Station.
In her new role, Prestegaardwilson said she wants to take what she has learned as a ruminant nutritionist and improve the understanding of the role nutrition plays in establishing sustainable livestock systems.
From nutrient management to sustainability
Prestegaard-wilson grew up on a small cow-calf operation in Northern Illinois, and when she was headed to the University of Illinois for her undergraduate degree, she decided she wanted to go into ruminant nutrition.
She earned her bachelor's degree in animal science from the University of Illinois Urbanachampaign, her master's in ruminant nutrition from the University of Missouri-columbia and her doctorate in dairy cattle nutrition from Virginia Tech.
“A lot of how nitrogen and phosphorus end up in manure is related to what you feed the cows,” Prestegaard-wilson said. “Part of my graduate research involved using machine learning to find a combination of ingredients that were the perfect balance between profitability for the producer and excreting the least amount of pollutants from the manure.”
Economics and environment are two pillars of sustainability, with social being the third pillar, she said.
“That got me to thinking about sustainability, thinking about finding all of that balance and realizing there are pushes and pulls and lots of tradeoffs involved,” she said.
“That represents a large opportunity to help producers minimize their feed costs and maximize their outputs, but also minimize their environmental footprint.”
Building an impactful program As an Agrilife Extension specialist, Prestegaard-wilson said her current focus is to work directly with county agents and conduct training on proper nutrition management strategies, which are critical for ranchers or beef producers to stay in business.