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The 2007 SWCS Winter/Spring meeting, held April 5, welcomed two guest
speakers photo and story by Rick Mickowski
Guest Speaker Keyona Gonzalez
Keyona Gonzalez made a presentation about her trip to Belize through a
program at Delaware State University. Her
presentation was titled “Tropical, Agriculture, and Ecosystems in Belize”. She
talked about the very different foods found in the many markets in Belize. Her
group visited a bush doctor who used the forest plants for medicinal purposes.
They reviewed the citrus farming industry and how the many regulations are hard
on the small farmers and how imperfect fruit leads to a lot of waste. They
visited the Belize Foundation for Environmental Education where they worked on
some research projects, took night hikes and learned about bio-diversity. They
visited a banana plantation where they learned about the large number of
chemicals used to get perfect fruit and the impacts to the workers. They visited
a farm family and learned about sustainable farming practices. One crop that is
grown is jippy-jappa. They practice inter-cropping corn, bananas, beans,
cassava, and pineapples. Villagers share and barter their goods. They visited a
school where the children’s wishes were for books, paper and pens. Keyona
concluded that the trip was educational and inspirational and thanked the
Pocomoke Chapter for the financial assistance that made the trip possible.
Guest Speaker James Scott
James Scott talked about vegetative buffers and the Cooperative
Conservation Partnership Initiative (CCPI) grant agreement between NRCS
and Delmarva Poultry Industry, Inc. He reviewed the importance of the
poultry industry on the Delmarva peninsula. The broiler industry raises
567 million birds each year valued at over 1.6 billion dollars. There
are 1950 farms in 11 counties with 5100 bird houses bringing in 71% of
farm income. Sussex County is still the #1 county for broilers.
Some of the challenges the industry is addressing are neighbor
relations, environmental quality, and bio-security. Neighbor relations
involves the mitigation of “nuisance” dust and “offensive” odors and
visual “pollution” issues. Environmental issues include air and water
quality revolving around nutrient runoff, tunnel fan emissions of
ammonia and particulate discharges of feathers, dust and other
particles. Bio-security deals with disease prevention and transmission.
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From left to right Jayme Arthurs, Keyona Gonzalez, and James Scott
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Mr. Scott’s state that a well-planned, well planted vegetative buffer is an
efficient, cost-effective part of the solution. There are no silver bullets.
Vegetated buffers include windbreaks and wildlife buffers but are also installed
for efficiency and bio-security reasons. DPI received a grant from
NRCS and matching support from four
poultry companies to initiate this program. The buffer is an integrated part of
the farm operation and must meet certain standards for effectiveness. The term
VEB or Vegetated Environmental Buffers is being used for this program. It is a
multi-row planting of trees and shrubs around poultry houses and related
structures that is installed and maintained to accomplish four main objectives.
Several planning ideas must be considered. The first row must be kept 50 feet
away from the sidewall fans and tunnel fans. A plan for each side of the farm is
needed. Keep the prevailing winds in mind. Irrigation and weed control are
critical. Trees grow 40% faster if mulched with plastic mulch. Mower blades and
string trimmers are a plants worst enemy and the mulch keeps these away from the
bark. Plant selection is important. There is a high stress area around the
tunnel fans. This is a tough area to find suitable evergreens and native plants.
They need some real world trials to take place. They don’t use Leyland Cypress.
Loblolly Pine and White Pine are self-pruning but have high mortality around the
fans. The ammonia and dust particles are hard on plants.
DPI is developing a VEB Tool Kit and promotional materials. They assist the
farmer with education, initial design consultation and plan development, advice
on plant selection and care and identify potential financing opportunities. They
are seeking solutions to the neighbor relations issues, promoting further
research, advocating for funding and cooperation, exploring new value added
alternatives such as the use of switchgrass and hybrid willows. They are working
with some RC&D Councils to explore hybrid willows. The hybrid willows could
possibly be used as a bedding material in the poultry houses.
They are promoting teamwork through in-service training, site consultation,
mutual referrals, and uniformity in recommendations. James Scott can be reached
at 302-856-9037.
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