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How we could actually cut fertilizer and not cut production.

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    How we could actually cut fertilizer and not cut production.

    Pretend for a minute that the porposed fertilizer reductions are actually about the environment, or emissions.

    If we were actually serious about doing this, for all the right reasons, I suggest it could be done, without cutting production, and while inreasing profits. Using existing technology.

    My definition would be cutting fertilizer or fertilizer emissions per unit of production. Any other measure is irrelevant. lbs of N per bushel of production has room for improvement.

    1) Drainage. Organized, coordinated, large scale. I realize this doesn't apply to all areas of the semi arid prairies, but where excess water is a recurring scourge, the losses due to denitrification and leaching and poor ROI on fertilizer applied, effective drainage would cut fertilizer use per unit of production by a wide margin. Instead we have layers of bureaucracy and NIMBY's and environuts blocking any attempts. In most places it is a very contentious issues with every man for himself with no access to public or communal drainage networks. As an added bonus, ( at least here) the lower areas have such high OM and deep rich soil that they don't require nearly as much fertilizer, specifically N to grow even more yield than the dryland.

    2) Irrigation How many dryland acres do not reach the potential that they were fertilized for due to lack or water, or weren't fertilized to their most cost effective potential due to concerns about lack or water. There is no shortage of water across the prairies. Proven to be very effective across Southern Alberta and into Saskatchewan. Providing the ability to fertigate, to apply nutrients at exactly the right time and rate, reducing risk of leaching, denitrification, or run off. Increased production per acre would reduce over all emissions/energy input per unit of production, since most other inputs are fixed. It doesn't require more seed or herbicide or fuel to grow the crop when the yield is double or triple.

    Even better yet, irrigation and drainage together to help repair saline soils so they can grow to the potential that they are fertilized for.

    We have already wasted billions on climate scams, if we would have invested that into drainage and irrigation, we would have something very tangible to show for it that would last for generations to come.

    3) Accurate long term weather forecasts This might be a pipe dream, and might involve technology that doesn't yet exist, but if we spent a fraction the money on this that we waste on prognosticating about global warming, there are bound to be improvements. If I could know my upcoming growing season weather before seeding, I could plan accordingly. cut back on the low areas and grow water tolerant crops on a wet year, give the low areas everything on a dry year, grow short season crops on a frost prone year, etc. Opposite for those in dry areas of course. This would reduce the wasted fertilizer on places or times when mother nature doesn't cooperate.

    4) Encourage livestock, especially livestock integration with grain. And this should have been #1. I don't need to explain to this crowd why this is necessary. The current mindset and profitability and subsidies and insurance have exactly the opposite effect. Shipping all the nutrients to intensive livestock in feedlot alley, or overseas, where there is already an excess of nutrients is not sustainable long term. I really think that tweaks to crop insurance and other programs could encourage livestock producers and grain producers to work together on using by products, and grazing stubble and spreading manure further than the 10 acres by the barn, and returning the nutrients directly by feeding in the same place where the nutrients came from. We are hollowing out our cattle sector at an alarming rate, and they truly are the most sustainable form of agriculture we have. If we really wanted to encourage sustainable organic production, it is going to require massive amounts of livestock. The attacks on livestock by animal rights and global warming zealots and NIMBY's are doing immeasurable harm to any attempts to reduce fertilizer use or get to sustainable agriculture.

    I will add more as I get time. What else do you have to add to the list?

    #2
    You can’t use science to rationalize what the liberals are doing. The #1 green house gas is h2o.

    Comment


      #3
      Originally posted by AlbertaFarmer5 View Post
      Pretend for a minute that the porposed fertilizer reductions are actually about the environment, or emissions.

      If we were actually serious about doing this, for all the right reasons, I suggest it could be done, without cutting production, and while inreasing profits. Using existing technology.

      My definition would be cutting fertilizer or fertilizer emissions per unit of production. Any other measure is irrelevant. lbs of N per bushel of production has room for improvement.

      1) Drainage. Organized, coordinated, large scale. I realize this doesn't apply to all areas of the semi arid prairies, but where excess water is a recurring scourge, the losses due to denitrification and leaching and poor ROI on fertilizer applied, effective drainage would cut fertilizer use per unit of production by a wide margin. Instead we have layers of bureaucracy and NIMBY's and environuts blocking any attempts. In most places it is a very contentious issues with every man for himself with no access to public or communal drainage networks. As an added bonus, ( at least here) the lower areas have such high OM and deep rich soil that they don't require nearly as much fertilizer, specifically N to grow even more yield than the dryland.

      2) Irrigation How many dryland acres do not reach the potential that they were fertilized for due to lack or water, or weren't fertilized to their most cost effective potential due to concerns about lack or water. There is no shortage of water across the prairies. Proven to be very effective across Southern Alberta and into Saskatchewan. Providing the ability to fertigate, to apply nutrients at exactly the right time and rate, reducing risk of leaching, denitrification, or run off. Increased production per acre would reduce over all emissions/energy input per unit of production, since most other inputs are fixed. It doesn't require more seed or herbicide or fuel to grow the crop when the yield is double or triple.

      Even better yet, irrigation and drainage together to help repair saline soils so they can grow to the potential that they are fertilized for.

      We have already wasted billions on climate scams, if we would have invested that into drainage and irrigation, we would have something very tangible to show for it that would last for generations to come.

      3) Accurate long term weather forecasts This might be a pipe dream, and might involve technology that doesn't yet exist, but if we spent a fraction the money on this that we waste on prognosticating about global warming, there are bound to be improvements. If I could know my upcoming growing season weather before seeding, I could plan accordingly. cut back on the low areas and grow water tolerant crops on a wet year, give the low areas everything on a dry year, grow short season crops on a frost prone year, etc. Opposite for those in dry areas of course. This would reduce the wasted fertilizer on places or times when mother nature doesn't cooperate.

      4) Encourage livestock, especially livestock integration with grain. And this should have been #1. I don't need to explain to this crowd why this is necessary. The current mindset and profitability and subsidies and insurance have exactly the opposite effect. Shipping all the nutrients to intensive livestock in feedlot alley, or overseas, where there is already an excess of nutrients is not sustainable long term. I really think that tweaks to crop insurance and other programs could encourage livestock producers and grain producers to work together on using by products, and grazing stubble and spreading manure further than the 10 acres by the barn, and returning the nutrients directly by feeding in the same place where the nutrients came from. We are hollowing out our cattle sector at an alarming rate, and they truly are the most sustainable form of agriculture we have. If we really wanted to encourage sustainable organic production, it is going to require massive amounts of livestock. The attacks on livestock by animal rights and global warming zealots and NIMBY's are doing immeasurable harm to any attempts to reduce fertilizer use or get to sustainable agriculture.

      I will add more as I get time. What else do you have to add to the list?
      The Eco-Terrorists/Climate Change Cult will find a reason to stop every idea you have... they don't want solutions... they believe they will save the earth by starving out about 5billion of us...

      Logic and reason are not a solution obviously... Just like Putin... fear and violence rule the civilization we are developing today, irrational and destructive.

      God have mercy and give us the grace to forgive these evil actors1

      Blessing and Salutations! Pray for Peace... We fight not against flesh and blood, but principalities and dark evil powers in high places.

      Comment


        #4
        Originally posted by TOM4CWB View Post
        The Eco-Terrorists/Climate Change Cult will find a reason to stop every idea you have... they don't want solutions....
        See the first sentence in my first post in this thread. Or nearly any other post I've made about the climate cult and the ecoterrorists. I think we all accept that they aren't looking for workable solutions. I'm just throwing this out there to show what could be done if we were actually serious about solutions and if they were actually a serious problem to solve. It is apparent that neither of those conditions are true.
        Last edited by AlbertaFarmer5; Jul 26, 2022, 16:55.

        Comment


          #5
          another way ; compost liberals, then spread

          Comment


            #6
            Guys dropping out of cow/calf operation not sure how you figure manure can be a substitute for fertilizer on the vast acres of crop production in western Canada.

            And sure as shit guys who have never had livestock are not going to do 180's now, in fact it's the exact opposite.

            Not to mention cow/calf guys are working their asses off just trying to survive.

            Oh I forgot weren't you promoting that Gabe horseshit last fall.
            Last edited by foragefarmer; Jul 26, 2022, 15:18.

            Comment


              #7
              Originally posted by foragefarmer View Post
              Guys dropping out of cow/calf operation not sure how you figure manure can be a substitute for fertilizer on the vast acres of crop production in western Canada.

              And sure as shit guys who have never had livestock are not going to do 180's now, in fact it's the exact opposite.

              Not to mention cow/calf guys are working their asses off just trying to survive.

              Oh I forgot weren't you promoting that Gabe horseshit last fall.
              I think you have me confused with someone else.
              And nowhere do I say that I expect the average grain farmer to suddenly want to become a cowboy. But there are a lot of landless cowboys begging for an opportunity.
              Unite them with their grain farmer neighbors under a mutually beneficial arrangement, that makes use of the byproducts and crop failures and land unfit for cultivation. While simultaneously increasing the productivity of the cropland at almost no cost to either party. I had to thread on this very topic a while back. Our beef sector is not competitive with countries without winter time. We either give up on the beef sector or we find a way to make it competitive. Buying expensive land and expensive tractors and equipment and facilities and fertilizer and trucking feed all over the country and feeding them eight months of the year, isn't working. Especially when there are so many opportunities for synergies between the two industries.

              Do you have any constructive suggestions on this topic? It is going to be forced on us whether we like it or not.

              Comment


                #8
                We're about to get mugged the same way the oil industry got mugged. Anybody who tells you there's any logic or reason involved is delusional or complicit in the scam or both. We won't get consulted - our opinion is irrelevant to the Lib brain trust. We need to either elect a Conservative government next time out or separate. Any other suggestions are just as delusional as the whole nitrogen reduction scam.

                Comment


                  #9
                  Originally posted by bobofthenorth View Post
                  We're about to get mugged the same way the oil industry got mugged. Anybody who tells you there's any logic or reason involved is delusional or complicit in the scam or both. We won't get consulted - our opinion is irrelevant to the Lib brain trust. We need to either elect a Conservative government next time out or separate. Any other suggestions are just as delusional as the whole nitrogen reduction scam.
                  Western Canada has elected conservatives all along. I don't think that's going to help either.

                  The drought last year received no standing at the ag committee in Ottawa while the conservatives put the PEI potato on the agenda along with the BC floods.

                  Both deserved attention but why were farmers and ranchers ignored?

                  Comment


                    #10
                    Products like this have been around for a while , some used to call them snake oil . We’ll time will tell but this will the next level that of fertilizer reduction if they perform.


                    Comment


                      #11
                      Originally posted by bucket View Post
                      Western Canada has elected conservatives all along. I don't think that's going to help either.

                      The drought last year received no standing at the ag committee in Ottawa while the conservatives put the PEI potato on the agenda along with the BC floods.

                      Both deserved attention but why were farmers and ranchers ignored?
                      The feds are spending big $ on irrigation and still pay 60% of crop insurance premium for farmers. No other industry gets ins premiums paid for them and a guarantee that farmers will be paid if crop loss. Must be worth something.

                      Comment


                        #12
                        Originally posted by foragefarmer View Post
                        Guys dropping out of cow/calf operation not sure how you figure manure can be a substitute for fertilizer on the vast acres of crop production in western Canada.

                        And sure as shit guys who have never had livestock are not going to do 180's now, in fact it's the exact opposite.

                        Not to mention cow/calf guys are working their asses off just trying to survive.

                        Oh I forgot weren't you promoting that Gabe horseshit last fall.
                        Being that you are a “forage farmer” you would see firsthand the cow business has been shit for years. With mandated reductions in nitrogen use it is worrisome the cattle industry will be the baby thrown out with the bath water because of less grain grown. I seen cows were going nowhere 6 years ago and halved the herd. I do not regret it. Talking with a friend who is more gung ho about cows and he’s talking about halving his herd because it’s a money hemorrhage. Even $1800 steers this fall isn’t enough to wipe the stink off this industry.

                        Comment


                          #13
                          Originally posted by furrowtickler View Post
                          Products like this have been around for a while , some used to call them snake oil . We’ll time will tell but this will the next level that of fertilizer reduction if they perform.
                          You're absolutely right - technology may save us from governmental malice. This is not the only example of this type of technology that is under development. Nitrogen fixing cereals would absolutely reduce "emissions" from the evil fertilizer industry. I guarantee you though that Marie Clod Bobo knows exactly nothing about this technology and Skippy knows even less.

                          Comment


                            #14
                            Originally posted by bobofthenorth View Post
                            You're absolutely right - technology may save us from governmental malice. This is not the only example of this type of technology that is under development. Nitrogen fixing cereals would absolutely reduce "emissions" from the evil fertilizer industry. I guarantee you though that Marie Clod Bobo knows exactly nothing about this technology and Skippy knows even less.
                            Was a slap in the face to ag when shithead put this in as our ag minister. How could you take anything out it’s mouth as worth listening to or believing. It’s like armoured keep as the energy minister.

                            Comment


                              #15
                              Originally posted by furrowtickler View Post
                              Products like this have been around for a while , some used to call them snake oil . We’ll time will tell but this will the next level that of fertilizer reduction if they perform.


                              have tried it and its snake oil

                              Comment

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