Evaluating the Benefits of Restricted Grazing to Protect Wet Pasture Soils in Two Dairy Regions of New Zealand

Many dairy farms in the Manawatu and Southland regions of New Zealand have poorly drained soils that are prone to treading damage, an undesirable outcome on grazed pastures during the wetter months of the year. Removing cows to a stand-off pad during wet conditions can reduce damage, but incurs costs. The objective of this study was to evaluate the impact of different levels of restricted grazing (from 0 to 10 hours grazing time/day for lactating cows) on pasture yield, damage and wastage, feed and stand-off expenses, and farm operating profit. A simulated farm from each region was used in a farm systems model. This model simulated pasture-cow-management interactions, using site-specific climate data as inputs for the soil-pasture sub-models. Days to recover previous yield potential for damaged paddocks can vary widely. A sensitivity analysis (40 to 200 days to recover) was conducted to evaluate the effect of this parameter on results. Full protection when there is risk of damage (0 grazing hours/day) appeared to be less profitable compared with some level of grazing, because the advantages of reduced damage were outweighed by the disadvantages of managing infrequently grazed pastures. The differences in operating profit between full protection and some level of grazing became less as the recovery time increased, but for both regions grazing durations of 6-8 hours/day when a risk of damage is present appeared to be a sensible strategy irrespective of recovery time

Representation of Hearing loss and Hearing Aid(s) in the United States Newspaper Media: Cross-sectional Analysis of Secondary Data

Purpose: News media plays an important role in formulating people's knowledge and opinions about various aspects of life, including health. The current study explored how hearing loss and hearing aids are represented in the U.S. newspaper media. Method: A cross-sectional study design was selected to analyze publicly available newspaper media data. The data sets were generated from the database, the U.S. Major Dailies by ProQuest, by searching key words for newspapers published during 1990–2017. Cluster analysis (i.e., text pattern analysis) and chi-square tests were performed using Iramuteq software. Results: The hearing loss data set had 1,527 texts (i.e., articles). The cluster analysis resulted in 7 clusters, which were named as (1) causes and consequences (26.1%), (2) early identification and diagnosis (9%), (3) health promotion and prevention (22.1%), (4) recreational noise exposure (10.4%), (5) prevalence (14.3%), (6) research and development (12.4%), and (7) cognitive hearing science (5.6%). The hearing aids data set had 2,667 texts. The cluster analysis resulted in 8 clusters, which were named as (1) signal processing (20.2%), (2) insurance (8.9%), (3) prevalence (12.4%), (4) research and development (5.4%), (5) activities and relation (16.2%), (6) features to address background noise (13.8%), (7) innovation (12%), and (8) wireless and connectivity (11.1%). Time series analysis of clusters in both “hearing loss” and “hearing aids” data sets indicated changes in the pattern of information presented in the newspaper media during 1990–2016 (e.g., Cluster 7 focuses on cognitive hearing science in a hearing loss data set emerging only since the year 2012 and growing rapidly). Conclusions: The text pattern analysis showed that the U.S. newspaper media focuses on a range of issues when considering hearing loss and hearing aids and that patterns or trends change over time. The study results can be helpful for hearing health care professionals to understand what presuppositions society in general may have as the media has the ability to influence societal perception and opinions

Cost-effective mitigation of greenhouse gas emissions from different dairy systems in the Waikato region of New Zealand

The New Zealand dairy industry produces approximately 17% of this country's total greenhouse gas emissions (GHG-e) and it is also this nation's largest export industry. The industry needs to reduce GHG-e under proposed policy directives and for ongoing market security. Given these pressures, there is the need to identify cost-effective management strategies to reduce on-farm GHG-e. The objective of this study was to investigate how the management of dairy farms in the Waikato region of New Zealand could change to minimise the abatement costs associated with GHG-e mitigation. Three typical farm systems importing low (less than 10%), medium (10–20%), and high (more than 20%) amounts of supplement are modelled using a non-linear optimisation model. A reduction in nitrogen fertiliser application was the production factor that changed the most to achieve the cap in all of the simulated systems, followed by a reduction in stocking rate. With the prices used in this study, decreasing farming intensity by reducing nitrogen fertiliser by 21–42% and stocking rate by 8–10% represented a cost of $68–$119/ha and a production reduction of 54–117 kg MS/ha for the three systems studied. Improving reproductive performance proved to be effective in reducing GHG-e, allowing for fewer replacement cows to be supported. However, it did not have a significant effect on profit when emissions were unconstrained. Nitrification inhibitors and stand-off pads were not identified as useful mitigation options, given their high cost relative to de-intensification

Application of grazing land models in ecosystem management: Current status and next frontiers

Grazing land models can assess the provisioning and trade-offs among ecosystem services attributable to grazing management strategies. We reviewed 12 grazing land models used for evaluating forage and animal (meat and milk) production, soil C sequestration, greenhouse gas emission, and nitrogen leaching, under both current and projected climate conditions. Given the spatial and temporal variability that characterizes most rangelands and pastures in which animal, plant, and soil interact, none of the models currently have the capability to simulate a full suite of ecosystem services provided by grazing lands at different spatial scales and across multiple locations. A large number of model applications have focused on topics such as environmental impacts of grazing land management and sustainability of ecosystems. Additional model components are needed to address the spatial and temporal dynamics of animal foraging behavior and interactions with biophysical and ecological processes on grazing lands and their impacts on animal performance. In addition to identified knowledge gaps in simulating biophysical processes in grazing land ecosystems, our review suggests further improvements that could increase adoption of these models as decision support tools. Grazing land models need to increase user-friendliness by utilizing available big data to minimize model parameterization so that multiple models can be used to reduce simulation uncertainty. Efforts need to reduce inconsistencies among grazing land models in simulated ecosystem services and grazing management effects by carefully examining the underlying biophysical and ecological processes and their interactions in each model. Learning experiences among modelers, experimentalists, and stakeholders need to be strengthened by co-developing modeling objectives, approaches, and interpretation of simulation results

Astrobiology and the possibility of life on Earth and elsewhere…

Astrobiology is an interdisciplinary scientific field not only focused on the search of extraterrestrial life, but also on deciphering the key environmental parameters that have enabled the emergence of life on Earth. Understanding these physical and chemical parameters is fundamental knowledge necessary not only for discovering life or signs of life on other planets, but also for understanding our own terrestrial environment. Therefore, astrobiology pushes us to combine different perspectives such as the conditions on the primitive Earth, the physicochemical limits of life, exploration of habitable environments in the Solar System, and the search for signatures of life in exoplanets. Chemists, biologists, geologists, planetologists and astrophysicists are contributing extensively to this interdisciplinary research field. From 2011 to 2014, the European Space Agency (ESA) had the initiative to gather a Topical Team of interdisciplinary scientists focused on astrobiology to review the profound transformations in the field that have occurred since the beginning of the new century. The present paper is an interdisciplinary review of current research in astrobiology, covering the major advances and main outlooks in the field. The following subjects will be reviewed and most recent discoveries will be highlighted: the new understanding of planetary system formation including the specificity of the Earth among the diversity of planets, the origin of water on Earth and its unique combined properties among solvents for the emergence of life, the idea that the Earth could have been habitable during the Hadean Era, the inventory of endogenous and exogenous sources of organic matter and new concepts about how chemistry could evolve towards biological molecules and biological systems. In addition, many new findings show the remarkable potential life has for adaptation and survival in extreme environments. All those results from different fields of science are guiding our perspectives and strategies to look for life in other Solar System objects as well as beyond, in extrasolar worlds

Abstracts of the 6th FECS Conference 1998 Lectures

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