UC tests deep-rooted crops as forage for dairy cattle

Typically, the Fernandes brothers grow wheat, corn, alfalfa and oats as feed crops on the land next to their third-generation Legacy Ranches dairy farm near Pixley, and pistachios as another source of revenue.

But last winter, they agreed when University of California Cooperative Extension specialist Steve Kaffka asked them to take part in an experiment at trying deep-rooted crops such as sugar beets and safflower to better manage water and nutrients while producing feed.

"Can we use crops we know to be deep rooted, like sugar beets and safflower, to improve water and nutrient management?" Kaffka asked.

Kaffka is the expert on safflower and sugar beets within the Cooperative Extension system; he discussed the possibility that both could serve as dry-times winter forage during an Alfalfa and Forage Virtual Field Day this fall.

So far, there have been promising results in the experiment with sugar beets as a winter forage crop that produces large volumes of feed for the cows while using extensive roots to mine the soil for water and nitrogen. The first year, yield was an impressive 58 tons of roots an acre that look to supply a component of high-quality feed, Kaffka said.

Legacy Ranches is already moving to adopt sustainable options, installing methane digesters at each of their two dairies last year that turn gas coming off the manure into clean energy.

The business traces its roots back a century to the days when Frank Fernandes immigrated to the Central Valley from the Portuguese Azores Islands and took up work in the dairy business.

Today, three of Frank's grandsons— Frank, Jared and Josh Fernandes—own and operate the ranch and have made a commitment to sustainable dairy farming.

CalGren Renewable Fuels installed the digesters last year, and methane from Legacy Ranches and other neighboring farms is piped to the green energy company's central facility, where it is turned into ethanol.

This clean energy is used to power the CalGren plant, with the remainder of the natural gas injected into the pipeline that serves local homes.

Legacy Ranches also installed a solar energy farm on the property, and uses goats for orchard weed control as part of a program of regenerative agriculture.

Both sugar beets and safflower are strong candidates to mine the soil for nitrates before they reach underground water already affected by years of dairy manure, and both are also able to produce quality forage with relatively little irrigation water.

"There's no lignin in beets, so it has high digestibility," Kaffka said. "At Legacy Dairy, we ensiled it with almond hulls to absorb the sugar, and it also improves the hulls. It was $50 to $60 a ton of feed when you bagged it with the almond hulls."

Once grown widely in California, acreage of sugar beets has dwindled to around 25,000 acres as more lucrative alternatives took over.

But safflower could be the superstar when it comes to drought management, Kaffka said, because it can produce a crop on just 12 inches of water, whereas sugar beets are deep rooted but still need to find 30 inches.

"Safflower is the deepest-rooted annual we know," Kaffka said. "I have seen roots all the way down to 12 feet. It is also good for weed management, because it smothers other things out."

Safflower is traditionally grown in the spring as a drought-tolerant seed crop used for oil, but Kaffka said he has seen generally promising results in his early trials at growing it as a winter forage crop, planted in October and harvested the next spring.

California farmers harvest around 50,000 acres of safflower a year, with the lion's share for seeds to be pressed into oil.

"The quality is very similar to small-grain silage," Kaffka said. "It has also been stable in storage when wrapped."

One management issue is whether to harvest safflower relatively early for the best forage, or leave it in the ground a little longer to maximize the impact in bringing water and nitrogen back up toward the surface.

"Silage quality in April is equivalent to small grains," Kaffka said. "Keeping it in the ground longer, until May, got you less yield but you recovered more water."

The research indicates dairy farmers working to manage water and nitrogen more efficiently may be able to help themselves by planting deep-rooted winter forage crops such as sugar beets and safflower.

Kaffka said his future research on safflower as winter forage will concentrate on possible planting and harvest dates, nitrogen fertilizer rates and the ability of the crop to manage for water and nutrients at different depths.

In his preliminary trials, Kaffka used zero nitrogen or 100 or 200 pounds, but said he hopes to develop more precise recommendations.

With sugar beets, he is looking to do feeding studies and some economic modeling on how efficiently the crop uses the land to produce forage.

(Bob Johnson is a reporter in Sacramento. He may be contacted at bjohn11135@gmail.com.)