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OCTOBER 2018
Submitted Photo
Firebird Artisan Mills is a gluten-free manufacturing plant in Harvey.
FIREBIRD ARTISAN MILLS THRIVES IN NICHE MARKET
Harvey facility sees growth in gluten-free demand
By JILL SCHRAMM
Senior Staff Writer jschramm@minotdailynews.com
HARVEY – Firebird Artisan Mills has a solid foothold in a niche market that’s generating growth for the company and economic benefit for a North Dakota small town. An international leader in gluten-free ingredients, Firebird doubled its volume with an expansion last year and is hiring a second shift to continue to increase production. Firebird does milling and mixing and has the capability to produce finished retail products such as dry flours and baking mixes. “We are really a one-stop shop from procurement all the way through the process to
include milling, blending and packaging in a variety of different bag sizes, from one pound all the way to 2,000 pounds,” said Mike Hallman, vice president of sales for Agspring in Kansas City, Kansas, the parent company of Firebird. Growth in the gluten-free market has been double-digit over the last five years, said Bradford Warner, vice president of marketing and sustainability for Agspring “That’s slowed a little bit, but it’s still a growing market base,” he said. “We see a change taking place, where a lot of consumer, packaged goods companies are looking to improve and enhance products that have been on the market. A lot of products that have been released years back were not really of the highest or comparable quality to
conventional.” Consumers desire the same level of quality, taste and nutrition in their gluten-free products, and there’s a huge number of ingredients now available to baked-goods companies to meet that consumer demand, Warner said. The grains that have been in demand over the last year from companies producing products such as cereals, snacks and baked goods include sorghum, buckwheat, millet, garbanzo, lentils and other pulses. “I think there’s an opportunity to create more domestic production of these ingredients that, in many cases, we have had to go elsewhere, even overseas,” Warner said. See MILL — Page 4
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Mill
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Hallman said the company wants to source more of its ingredient grains from the local area because it’s important to its customers to know the origin of the product and whether it is U.S. grown. With the imposition of new tariffs, U.S. grown crops are desirable for financial reasons as well. The pulses and ancient grains that Firebird purchases also lend themselves to sustainable operations. They can be grown with less fertilizer and other inputs compared to many crops. Brady Eckart, operations director at Firebird, said one of the unique challenges is educating the farming community on industry requirements because Firebird holds to certain standards in supplying its customers. “The fact that we are a gluten-free facility – that has a lot of ramifications. A lot of our issues with regional or locally grown sources is education of the farming community and their understanding of gluten-free integrity. There cannot be cross-contamination with non-gluten-free crops through equipment and handling on the farm,” Eckart said. “There’s a gap right now, we believe, with a lot of regional and local farmers to get them really up to speed to be able to sell us the quality we are looking for.” Firebird hopes to eventually close that gap and develop more local sources of grain in supplying both conventional gluten-free and organic gluten-free to the market. Firebird tests all materials coming in and going out to avoid any risk of gluten contamination. Firebird learned in August, upon completion of its annual Food Safety & Quality Audit, that it had achieved a coveted AA Rating for the fourth consecutive year. An audit rating is sought after by many food processing companies because domestic and overseas food processors and retailers require certification as a part of their individual food processing compliance activities. “The British Retail Consortium Audit is very rigorously demanding, but it allows us to do what we do best – operate by using the highest stan-
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M I N O T D A I LY N E W S dards in milling processes and practices,” Hallman said in a release announcing the achievement. “Our customers should expect and deserve nothing less.” The double AA rating requires a thorough examination of a company’s manufacturing processes, practices and documentation regarding plant management, site standards such as cleanliness, absence of allergens and other contaminants, and external and internal visual cohesiveness, process control, plans for continuous process and employee improvement and prevention of food fraud. In the news release, Harvey Mayor Ann Adams cited the value of Firebird to the community. “Firebird Artisan Mills is our southern anchor for Harvey’s Industrial Park and has emerged as a major agribusiness employer in our economic development area. The firm is a valued partner of our agricultural producers and offers an important outlet for agricultural products produced within the state of North Dakota,” she said. Founded in 2014, Firebird purchased the assets of a previous milling company, Earth Harvest Mills of Harvey. Firebird increased its milling capacity in the fall of 2017 to become the largest 100 percent dedicated, certified gluten-free and allergen-free flour mill in North America. The 32,000-square-foot, integrated plant has capacity to manufacture about seven million pounds of food product each year. Located in Harvey’s new Industrial Park, the plant’s staff numbers fluctuate up to about 25 people, including processing line operators, quality assurance staff, logistics and sales professionals. “We believe that we have the capacity to use the existing facility to manage our current growth,” Hallman said, “but we also always look for new things that we can be doing that make sense for our business and that has a need in the market place with our customers, and that certainly could offer expansion in the future.” Given current sales revenue and future projections, Firebird is hiring for a second shift to allow operations
OCTOBER 2018
Bulk raw grain awaits further processing at Firebird Artisan Mill.
seven days a week, Eckart said. The company expects to reach employment of 35 people. A smaller labor pool is a challenge associated with locating in a smaller
community, but it’s offset in Harvey by other factors, including access to two major highways. “Overall, it’s a great community for this facility to be in,” Eckart said.
Submitted Photo
“Not only is it a great community for us to be in, it’s a vital business for a small community – to have a manufacturing sector to help maintain employment and growth.”
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Growers experiment with industrial hemp By KIM FUNDINGSLAND
tiles, recycling, automotive, furniture, food, paper, construction mateStaff Writer kfundingsland@minotdailynews.com rials and personal care products. “Some processors take the seed. Some sell it whole. Some grind it Officially it is still a Schedule 1 into flour and extract the oil,” said controlled substance, a narcotic. But Gehring. “People like it too. It has a it is being grown legally at prescribed high protein content. You can take locations in North Dakota. The state the seed, remove the outer coating is completing its third year of an in- and warm it up for breakfast.” Industrial hemp differs from its dustrial hemp pilot program. “People have to apply to be close cousin, marijuana, in that it processors or growers,” explained can only contain .3 percent THC Doug Gehring, North Dakota agri- (delta9 tetrahydrocannabinol). By culture commissioner. “If they are is- law, if a hemp plant contains more sued a license to cultivate or process, than .3 percent THC it must be deit is just for that growing year. They stroyed. The current proposed farm bill have to apply every year.” Across the state this year 3,300 under debate in Congress contains acres of industrial hemp were language to deregulate hemp which planted by 57 individual growers. In would remove it from being under addition, the state approved licenses the control of agriculture departfor five processors. Industrial hemp ments. “If the farm bill is passed, signed is processed for a wide variety of uses. It can be used for oil, fiber, tex- by the president, industrial hemp
Industrial hemp flour can be used in baked goods and other food items. Hemp fiber can be used for fiber board, traditional ropes and in furniture. It has benefits for concrete products as well.
would no longer be under the authority of the Ag Department or universities and treated like any other commodity and process it,” said Gehring. Three years of conducting a pilot program for industrial hemp in North Dakota has already provided some interesting data. Included in the learning process, said Gehring, is the misnomer that help is drought tolerant. “Like every other crop it needs moisture,” said Gehring. “We have industrial hemp clear across the state. We are geographically spread out which helps in our research.
Some crops did well. Others never germinated or just ran out of steam. Some growers got hardly anything. Others were pretty good.” According to Gehring, a good yield for industrial hemp is about 970 pounds per acre. When the pilot program began three years ago the market price for a pound of hemp was $1. It has since dropped to 40cents per pound. “If there is deregulatioin and no supply management, it could potentially flood the market,” said Gehring. “As we’ve increased the acres we’ve seen the price go down. It’s about developing new markets.”
Industrial hemp flour can be used in baked goods and other food items. Hemp fiber can be used for fiber board, traditional ropes and in furniture. It has benefits for concrete products as well. “It’s a very tough fiber and lighter than concrete,” remarked Gehring. “Its weight is less but the strength is greater.” In early September an industrial hemp field harvest day was held near Grand Forks. One of the presenters was Chris Adams, a producer in the state’s industrial hemp pilot program. There prospective industrial hemp growers saw plants in the field, asked questions about growing hemp, how to manage it from planting to harvesting. “At a dollar a pound it’s a pretty viable crop, even a bit lucrative,” said Gehring. “At 60-cents it’s not a bad crop. At 40-cents it is challenging.”
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Relying on Mother Nature Jill Schramm/MDN
About 30,000 acres of corn were planted in Ward County in 2016, according to available statistics, and this year that acreage is even less, said Paige Brummund, Ward County Extension agent-Agriculture and Natural Resources.
Harvesting during a drought year, rain during harvest time
It hasn’t been an easy year for farmers with drought and then rain coming during harvest. Paige Brummund, Ward County Extension agent-Agriculture and Natural Resources, said, as of early the week of Sept. 23, the majority of the small grains have been harvested. “There are some acres, primarily in the northern part of the county which is to be expected, that is still left to be harvested but the majority of the small grains are off. There’s not much canola or flax standing anymore either.” As of the last week of September, she said no corn was being harvest yet and won’t be for awhile. “We still need the corn to dry down quite a bit,” she said. She said some silage corn was being chopped but she had not seen any grain corn being combined Brummund said only about 30,000 acres of corn were planted in Ward County in 2016, according to available statistics, and this year that acreage is even less. Brummund said there’s a couple reasons for the lower corn acreage. “It’s not as profitable. There’s not as big of a margin of return on corn,” she said. “The farther north you get up here, the shorter growing day that you have so you often have to pick a variety that has a shorter growing season and the yield isn’t as high.” If the growing season is longer, she said producers can run into issues in getting it dried down in time.
By ELOISE OGDEN
Regional Editor • eogden@minotdailynews.com
She said there’s also some drying costs and storage costs associated with corn so it just isn’t as popular in the area. She said the majority of those who plant corn have a market for it – cattle feed or they may even take it to the ethanol plant. The other part of the corn acres is silage corn for people who are feeding cattle. “It’s a different game itself. Silage corn will be a taller variety, stays green longer and produces more tonnage – more plant material,” she said. Brummund said soybeans are “hit and miss” across the county. “We were dry this year and we were dry in August which is the key time for soybeans to be filling their pods and needing some moisture,” she said. She figured the yields might be average to below average due to the drought stress this summer. The worst drought spots were in the east side of Ward County but it See CROPS — Page 8
Soybean yields this year might be average to below average due to the drought stress this summer, said Paige Brummund, Ward County Extension agent-Agriculture and Natural Resources. Photo by Jill Schramm/MDN
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was dry all across the county, she added. “You have that challenge, and we have the current marketing challenge for soybeans,” she said. As of early in the last week of September, she said some have started to harvest soybeans but it has been very slow. “For the most part, the majority of soybeans are still drying down,” she said. She said the rain the week before has everyone waiting for some sunshine to get going again. She said there aren’t as many sunflowers as in the past two years but still there’s significant
numbers of sunflower acreage (confection and oil) in Ward County. “They’ve been looking OK this year,” she said. She said sunflowers are better with tapping the root system down to access moisture. When they’re up and growing, she said sunflowers can handle a little bit more drought than some other crops and still produce. “The drought is going to affect some crops’ yields and there’s always weed control challenges when you’re in a dry season as well,” Brummund said. The drought has also impacted rangeland grazing, she said. She said some pastures are struggling to recover from last year’s drought and with the lack of moisture this year, that’s been hurting production as well. What’s ahead for next year?
“You can’t predict Mother Nature so you have to try to manage what you have – try to conserve as much moisture as you can,” she said. She said that’s one of the reasons no till is very popular here. “You have to just manage with what you are given. There are things you can do – being aware and planting crops that are more resistant to drought. There’s varieties within crops that handle drought better so maybe selecting those in years that are forecasted to be dry might be a good plan as well,” Brummund. “Farming is tough because you do rely on Mother Nature and it’s hard to predict to plant around that. A lot of things are out of a farmer’s control,” she said.
OCTOBER 2018
Farming is tough because you do rely on Mother Nature and it’s hard to predict to plant around that. A lot of things are out of a farmer’s control.
–Paige Brummund
Ward County Extension agent
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Send your historical farm or ranch stories, photos Is your farm or ranch in northwest or north central North Dakota 100 years old or more? If so, please send us a story about your farm or ranch along with photos (not less than 200 resolution). Email is preferred. Please send your information and photos to eogden@minotdailynews.com as soon as possible. Be sure to include your name, city and a daytime phone number. Your farm or ranch may be selected for the next edition of the Centennial Farms & Ranches of North Dakota magazine.
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OCTOBER 2018
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Using cows as biological combines
By KRIS RINGWALL Beef Specialist NDSU Extension
in extensive beef cattle operations for many years. All these studies have a common outcome; that is, cow-calf producers tend to underutilize their cows Cows are harvesters, sort of a biologi- when harvesting forage. Some harvesting opportunities simply never are utilized. cal combine, and dining on crop afterMore recently, beginning in 2016, math can be a real component to center scientists Songul Senturklu and profitable commercial beef production. Yes, bison, yaks and many other four- Doug Landblom tested several harvesting units under various scenarios. The legged precursors were company comresults were amazing. The units that petitors, but as far as production units, only harvested grass were more expenthe cow combines win out. Cow comsive because their overwintering costs bine units come in various colors, dewere greater, $209 per unit. Interestingly, pending on the dealer one chooses, but finding some more cropland and cover all have pretty good track records. Mixing and matching the header unit crop to harvest into the fall reduced wintering costs by almost a third (32.5 perwith the combine unit is possible and cent), to $141. certainly a producer’s choice, realizing So, carrying that thought farther, letthat many producers prefer a solid-colting those harvesting units go around the ored unit. But keep in mind, the performance level of the mixed unit seems agronomic fields a second or third time and complete a late harvest of standing to have more production capacity than summer grass growth cut the overwinter the straight units. charges by more than two-thirds (65.1 The use of cows as biological combines is not new, and the Dickinson Re- percent), to $73. No question about it: The cow is the vehicle to harvest fall search Extension Center has been studying the impact of extended grazing plant growth.
This win-win scenario lowers costs and improves production maintenance of the cow. That leads to another thought: Cows need to be in good condition at calving next spring and even better condition at breeding next summer. The middle three months of gestation, or pregnancy, in other words, are the time to improve cow condition. Can this be accomplished while the cows are harvesting well into later fall to early winter? The answer is “yes,” but keep in mind that herd management and calving dates also need to focus on grazing. In other words, calve on growing grass in the spring to maximize a cow’s grazing potential. But fall crop aftermath grazing is beneficial regardless of calving time. Right now, cow milk production is decreasing for spring-calving cows, the weather is favorable and, generally, crop aftermath is bountiful. When moisture tends to run short, grain production acreage often is shifted into potential cow feed. While crop production has many
variables, standing plants are meant to be tasted. I always ponder, when I drive by fields that are not fenced nor have access to water, how much a cow would enjoy that field. A moderate-milking, 1,300-pound cow would like to eat her fill of good, green grass prior to weaning, actually eating all that she can to produce milk. After weaning, that same cow keeps eating if feed is available. When a cow eats above her requirements, she gains weight. In this case, replacing the weight she lost raising her calf, along with adding more body condition (commonly called fat) in preparation for winter, is the hoped-for scenario. Now that is the scenario cow-calf producers like. Because the third trimester of gestation has not been reached, milk production ceases at weaning and good weather provides the opportunity to utilize cheaper feed resources. Essentially, the cow will eat in excess of her requirements in the crop aftermath buffet. In addition, a good management option is to sort the thinner cows and send
them to the best fall pastures. One scenario is to consider weaning the calves of those cows early, reducing the milking stress on their mothers. The fall pastures will put the needed feed in front of the thinner cows and the cows will improve their body condition score. In the meantime, the moderately to heavier-conditioned cows can be grazing areas that are less lush. However, most producers will let all their cows enjoy fall aftermath grazing, keeping life simple. All the cows should respond with increased conditioning and be better prepared for winter and next year’s calving and breeding. Remember that when the third trimester of pregnancy starts, rebalance the ration and involve your local nutritionist to develop a proper herd nutritional program. Also remember to keep an eye on the cattle, identify potential fall plant toxicity and visit your local Extension agent, particularly if you are implementing new grazing strategies. Input is always good. May you find all your ear tags.
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OCTOBER 2018
Long-time brand inspector looks back
By JILL SCHRAMM
Senior Staff Writer jschramm@minotdailynews.com BISMARCK – Granville native Stan Misek stepped down this past summer as North Dakota’s chief brand inspector but that doesn’t mean he’s not checking cattle brands anymore. Misek still keeps a hand in the business as a parttime local inspector because after nearly 35 years in the business, going cold turkey would be tough, he says. He’s also gained a lot of friends through brand inspecting and it’s hard to turn one’s back on that. Misek acknowledged he’s come to know ranchers from across the state – and there truly are ranchers all across the state. Many of them have an acquaintance with Misek. “I know a lot of brands. I can put a lot of names to a lot of brands. I don’t know how I had such a good memory for brands, but I did,” Misek said. With more than 20,000 brands registered in the state, it occasionally happened that he would encounter one new to him, though. Some ranches have more than one brand. Also, some retired ranchers who aren’t producing more cattle still keep their brands registered. Misek farmed and ranched near Granville until becoming the state’s chief brand inspector in 2011. Misek had become a brand inspector in 1983. He had been doing other work at a sale barn in Minot when the brand inspector at the market talked him into becoming an inspector. He trained under that inspector and discovered he enjoyed the work. “It’s the people,” he said of the source of the enjoyment. “You meet everybody that comes through the sale barns. I would never have met half the people I met if I hadn’t been at the sale barns, and you get to know a lot of them really well and make time to go have coffee with them.” His work in brand inspection had begun taking so much time away from his farm and ranch that he’d reached a crossroads by 2011. He took the path that led him to the state position in Bismarck. “It was either do that or quit brand inspecting and stay home and tend to business, because I was getting so big I couldn’t get it done. I was running all the time,” he said. The chief inspector position involved more paper-
work but also enabled him to better know the state’s inspectors and to interview new applicants to determine whether to bring them on board. Brand inspection isn’t for everyone, and some who try it don’t continue, Misek said. Of the several inspectors who trained under him over the years, he was pleased to see all stick with it. Knowledge of the industry and familiarity with cattle are essential qualities for an inspector, he said. It can be dangerous work, and Misek knows what it’s like to be beat up or thrown over a fence by an angry or nervous animal. The chief brand inspector and fieldmen with the state office are required to complete law enforcement academy and be licensed. Misek said there were times when it was necessary to utilize that license, although he and his staff typically called on county sheriff’s offices when arrests needed to be made. In most cases, arrests were prompted by suspected bank fraud in connection with cattle sales. Inspectors also may be called upon to verify ownership in some cattle abuse cases. In 2016, Misek helped look into instances of butchered and missing cattle during the Dakota Access Pipeline protests. Misek still goes to the sales barns and takes in other activities of the North Dakota Stockmen’s Association, of which he’s been a member for 39 years, just to visit with the people. He also still keeps tabs on the home farm since his mother and brother who lived there passed on. He remains in Bismarck, where his wife works for Basin Electric. Jill Schramm/MDN The state’s chief brand inspector as of last Aug. 1 is Granville native Stan Misek retired this summer as North Blaine Northrop, who oversees about 180 full-time or Dakota’s chief brand inspector but continues to stay in- part-time brand inspectors. Many of them are local involved in inspecting. spectors who work on-call. Full-time inspectors are assigned to sales barns. The number of sales barns has declined significantly over his 35 years in the inspection business, Misek said. Two of the barns where he did considerable work – in Harvey and Minot – are no more. Cattle numbers haven’t seen that same decline, although ranches are fewer, he added. As much as he loves being around cattle, Misek said he is content with part-time inspecting for now. He expects he’ll stay busy in retirement. “Everybody has that bucket list of things they want to do,” he said. “I would like to do more traveling and a lot more fishing.”
Friendships were a highlight for former chief brand inspector
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Groups like corporate farm law ruling for different reasons BISMARCK (AP) — North Dakota’s two largest farm groups have been on opposite sides of a two-year legal battle over the state’s Depression-era anti-corporate farming law, but both are finding at least partial victory in a judge’s decision to uphold the law but order changes in how it’s applied. Meanwhile, state officials who enforce the law say the ruling won’t change the status quo because they’re already doing what the judge ordered. Some existing farm operations confirm that. U.S. District Judge Daniel Hovland on Sept. 21 upheld the law that state voters approved in 1932 to protect the state’s family farming heritage by barring corporations from owning or operating farms. However, he also said a change made by state
lawmakers in 1981 to allow exceptions for small “domestic” family farm corporations — primarily as a tax- and estate-planning tool — violates the Commerce Clause of the U.S. Constitution if it is applied only to in-state operations. “The court finds that such a requirement would clearly discriminate against out-of-state interests,” Hovland wrote in ordering North Dakota to extend the exception beyond state borders. Challenging states’ corporate farming laws by arguing they violate interstate commerce became a popular choice for opponents after the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in 2003 ruled that South Dakota’s law violated the Commerce Clause, according to the National Agricultural Law Center.
North Dakota Farm Bureau and others sued in 2016 to do away with North Dakota’s law, making the interstate commerce claim and also arguing the law limits farmers’ business options. North Dakota Farmers Union helped the state defend the law. Hovland refused to strike it down but did rule that the state must “permit corporations and limited liability companies organized under the laws of other states to utilize the family farm exception” — as long as they meet all of the law’s requirements. Those include that family corporations involve no more than 15 people who all have certain degrees of kinship. Farm Bureau applauded that part of the ruling. “This removes the (state’s) ability to discriminate on that
non-resident family to engage (in farming) here, President Daryl Lies said. State officials hailed Hovland’s upholding of the law as a victory. They also said that his order on the family farm exception doesn’t change anything because it “is consistent with the way the Office of Attorney General and the Office of the Secretary of State have historically interpreted and implemented” the law. Trish Buxbaum of Fairview, Montana, said she and her husband, Brian, had no problems getting permission from the North Dakota Secretary of State’s office for B n’ T Farms, which is incorporated in Montana and operates in North Dakota. “We have a good working relationship with them,” she
said. Edwin Jonas III, who with his wife, Connie, operates Nevada-incorporated Red River Valley Ranch Co. in North Dakota, said the same. The former Montanan also believes North Dakota is fixated too much on a perceived threat from large companies. “I don’t think they should worry about out-of-state corporations,” he said. “They should be more worried about farmers who buy up all the land they can.” Statistics from the most recent federal Census of Agriculture show that farms in North Dakota have become fewer and larger. The number of farms with annual sales of less than $100,000 dropped by about 22 percent over a 15-year period from 1997 to 2012, while farms
with sales greater than $100,000 increased 44 percent. Farmers Union, which has supported the law for nearly a century and applauded Hovland’s decision to uphold it, believes that small family farms are still viable and still worth protecting even if larger operations are more economical. “It’s not so much of a size thing as it is someone a little more tied to the land, having ownership of the land, wanting to keep that stewardship going,” President Mark Watne said. “I think we have the model. I think it works. Obviously we’ve got to have sustainable prices, which is always a challenge. But when it comes down to it, I really don’t see where a corporate structure is any more efficient than what we have.”
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Australis Aquaculture employee Khanh Huynh checks on seaweed cultures, near Ninh Hai, Vietnam. Australis’s “Greener Grazing” project seeks to make a kind of seaweed that helps reduce methane emissions in livestock available to more farmers.
Gassy cows are bad for the planet; could seaweed diet help? By PATRICK WHITTLE Associated Press
The smelly reality is that cows will always pass gas. But if farmers had more access to seaweed, cow flatulence might just stink a little less for the planet. That’s the thesis of a New England-based aquaculture company which is launching a drive to become the worldwide leader in an emerging effort to thwart climate change by feeding seaweed to cows. The concept of reducing livestock emissions by using seaweed as feed is the subject of ongoing scientific research, and early results are promising. University of California researchers have found that cows that eat seaweed appear to emit less methane, a greenhouse gas that contributes to global warming, when they belch and pass gas. But one of the big challenges to
implementing the seaweed solution is getting enough of the stuff to farmers, and the kind of seaweed that has shown results in cows isn’t commercially farmed. Enter Australis Aquaculture of Greenfield, Massachusetts, which is in the midst of research at facilities in Vietnam and Portugal that is part of its push to become the first farm to produce the seaweed at commercial scale. The company calls the effort “Greener Grazing” and it expects to be operating at commercial scale in two years, said Josh Goldman, the company’s chief executive officer. “If you could feed all the cows this seaweed, it would be the equivalent of taking all these cars off the road,” Goldman said. “Greener Grazing’s mission is to cultivate this, and accelerate scaling of this kind of seaweed.” The type of algae in question is a red seaweed called Asparagopsis, and it grows wild in many parts of the
OCTOBER 2018
AP Photo
world. Researchers from the University of California, Davis, found earlier this year that methane emissions were reduced by 24 to 58 percent in a dozen cows that ate one variety of the seaweed, depending on dose. The seaweed constituted only a small percentage of the cows’ food, but researchers found that the dent it could make in emissions would be significant if it were available to farmers. The methane from cow’s burps makes up 25 percent of methane emissions in the U.S., according to the university. The seaweed interrupts the bacterial process of producing methane in their guts, Goldman said. Challenges remain, said Ermias Kebreab, a professor of animal science at UC Davis. The seaweed needs more tests to determine if it would impact meat and milk quality from the animals. The challenge of producing
enough of the seaweed is staggering, leading Goldman to call it an “aquatic moonshot.” He estimated that the amount of seaweed needed to reach every cattle operation would be greater than the amount presently farmed in the world. “We need to have a consistent product. We need to find a way to grow it in a more consistent way,” Kebreab said. That’s exactly what Australis Aquaculture is working on. The company has collected different strains of Asparagopsis seaweed to establish a seed bank of seaweeds that can grow in different climates, Goldman said. The next step will be to reproduce the seaweed on the company’s farms, Goldman said. Creating the seed bank will make it possible for farmers to grow the seaweed elsewhere, he said. The effort has attracted the attention of the World Bank, said its senior aquaculture specialist Randall Brum-
mett. He said scaling up farming of the seaweed in the developing world could make livestock operations more climate friendly and boost the economies of poorer nations. Skeptics remain. The seaweed has yet to be proven palatable to cows, and the milk that they would yield hasn’t proven to be safe for human consumption, said Frank Mitloehner, a professor and air quality extension specialist in the animal science department at UC Davis. “When you look at it a little deeper, some serious concerns have to be addressed before it can be considered a serious mitigation tool,” he said. There’s also the question of whether it will find acceptance with farmers. Jenni Tilton-Flood, a dairy farmer at Flood Brothers Farm in Clinton, Maine, said she’d be willing to try it, but cost and availability are also important.
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INSIDE AG
M I N O T D A I LY N E W S
OCTOBER 2018
PAGE 21
Makoti Threshing Show
Ashton Gerard/MDN
Every year the Makoti Threshing Show hosts a parade of hundreds of operating units from cars to tractors. The threshing show offers over 300 operating units every year.
Ashton Gerard/MDN
Pictured is the inside of the Stationary Building at the Makoti Threshing Show. The entire collection belonged to Wayne Jones from Ryder. According to Hunter Andes, the director of the Makoti Threshers Association, said that Jones used to have every machine out, dusted and running every year.
ABOVE: Every year the Makoti Threshing Show hosts different demonstrations. Shown is a threshing demonstration. The Makoti Threshing Show is North Dakota's largest Threshing Exhibition and was held Sept. 29 and 30. LEFT: A group works to start one of the stationary engines at the Makoti Threshing Show in September. Ashton Gerard/MDN
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INSIDE AG
OCTOBER 2018
PAGE 22
Dakota Agronomy Partners expands agronomy assets Dakota Agronomy Partners announced in September that it has doubled the size of the company with the recent consolidation of agronomy assets. The agronomy assets of its three parent cooperatives, CHS SunPrairie, Border Ag & Energy, and Enerbase Cooperative Resources, were all moved under the Dakota Agronomy Partners Grain. According to a press release, this will increase the buying power and storage capacity of Dakota Agronomy Partners and will enable patrons of all three parent cooperatives better access to products at more competitive partners. On their own, each cooperative had limited supply, buying power, storage, manhours available and rolling stock. Dakota Agronomy Partners now has three strategically-placed dry fertilizer mega-plants at their fingertips in Bowbells, Bottineau, and Minot. DAP now has increased buying power for seed, crop protection products, and crop nutrients and is able to buy in much larger quantities for the entire territory. DAP went from 46 employees to 109 employees, according to a spokesperson. No employees lost their positions due to the merger, according to the spokesperson. “We kept everyone on staff as they know their territory best and are all valuable to DAP,” said Jayme Burkhartd in an email. According to the press release, another benefit of growing the LLC is becoming much more attractive
Providing for our community together. Our Ag Lenders have experience in the field and behind the scenes providing financial solutions for you, our community farmers and ranchers. Let’s work together to get you prepared for the season ahead. We’re not just here for you, we are you.
Jacob Fannik Tom Larson
Andrea Johnson/MDN
CHS SunPrairie in Minot is part of the Dakota Agronomy Partners LLC.
when looking for qualified people that can help meet the needs of today’s operations. The demand for precision ag and variable rate mapping is increasing and some of the outlying areas are having trouble finding qualified people. Finally, the newly-expanded footprint of DAP will create some opportunities to share help and custom application equipment from south to north during the busy spring and fall seasons, according to the press release.
“It is hard to believe that this coming February 2019 will be the 20-year Anniversary for Dakota Agronomy Partners LLC. I doubt that any of the original board members that helped form the LLC twenty years ago imagined it would be the agronomy powerhouse that it is today,” said Dan Sem, DAP general manager, in the press release. “The growth DAP has seen these past two decades is the result of an amazing team of individuals whose common goal is to help their growers succeed.”
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