With the assistance of more than 240 producers, 6 field days were held in the Los Lagos region, in the provinces of Osorno, Llanquihue and Chiloé.
The concern of those who work in dairy and livestock activities for the adverse events generated by climate change has increased in the last decade and has generated interest in those practices that help mitigate its effects. The Seremi de Agricultura Tania Salas stressed that this concern has motivated the regional government of Los Lagos and the regional council to finance a special initiative to disseminate technologies that improve the fertilization of meadows and the feeding of livestock in the summer period.
This is the “Training program to improve the integral fertilization of permanent grassland in the Los Lagos region”, carried out by Seremi de Agricultura in collaboration with the Agricultural Research Institute (INIA), through which more than 240 farmers in the last three months , assets that have left a positive balance, according to the agricultural authority.
“It is important to remember that in the last few years, less than half of the rain has rained in the summer months in the region compared to what happened 40 years ago, which makes it necessary to take timely measures to deal with this phenomenon through the use of new forage species and varieties that are more tolerant of rain deficits, as well as strategic use of fertilizers,” said Seremi Tania Salas.
Recently, the initiative allocated 660 million pesos for the payment of incentives to optimize the fertilization of meadows used for agricultural activity, thus adding 317 beneficiaries in the provinces of Osorno, Llanquihue and Chiloé. A competition that will reopen in the autumn thanks to funding from the Regional Council.
recommendations
Alfredo Torres and Cristian Moscoso, pasture and forage crop specialists from INIA Remehue, were tasked with providing the technical recommendations to address adverse climatic events in livestock, in the 6 field days held in Osorno, Los Muermos, Ancud, Casma, INIA Remehue and INIA Butalcura.
Torres explained that “in order to seed lawns with more drought tolerant species such as fescue, bromine, grasses and festulolium and have a successful establishment, there are several factors to consider such as soil fertility and fertilization, working time, choice of species and varieties, seed quality, soil condition, seed quantity, inoculation and pelleting, seed disinfection, methods of regeneration and planting, types of machines, depth of planting and regeneration, control of resident vegetation and first use of the prairie.
He underlined that “all these factors have been addressed in the training, with the aim of providing tools to producers and technical consultants so that they can make the best decisions taking into account the reality of each area and farm”.
Moscoso, for his part, disclosed the work that INIA is carrying out on the behavior of the various forage species as the environmental temperature increases, and in this way give short-term productive and behavioral responses to the climatic situation that will arise in the future.
He also reported that “trials of drought-tolerant forage plants planted on producer farms, which produce between 50% and 133% more than ryegrass in the summer months, were visited every day. The producers were very enthusiastic about this project and have asked to come back often to receive training to see the progress and results”.
Patricio Nannig is one of them and explained that at the end of November, when the field day took place at the El Estero farm in Frutillar, there were visually no differences in the establishment of the different forage species, “however, when the As far as grazing is concerned, it was possible to appreciate that both the graminaceous plots, festuca and festulolium had better grazing than the ryegrass plot where the residue after grazing was greater”.
In this way, both farmers and consultants are evaluating new forage alternatives to face the summer and the rainfall deficit caused by climate change.
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