Drought and Stocking Rate Effects on Forage Yield from Western South Dakota Rangelands

The vegetation of rangelands in a large portion of western South Dakota is an overstory of cool-season grasses such as western wheatgrass and green needlegrass and an understory of warm-season grasses such as blue grama and buffalograss (Fig 1). In semi-arid environments, precipitation is the main factor that determines forage production. Many western South Dakota counties receive less than 17 inches of annual rainfall, with 75% occurring between April and October. Pastures are usually managed as large units (more than 160 acres) because fencing and water developments are costly. Regrowth is usually limited to the spring, and 90% of forage is produced by July 1 (Heitschmidt 2004). Most grazing systems are continuous season-long grazing or simple rotational grazing with less than eight pastures

Comparing Traditional and Online Instruction: Examining Developmental Coursework at an Alabama Community College

The purpose of this quantitative study was to determine the effect that course format had on student success rates and withdrawal rates at an Alabama community college from 2012 to 2014. The goal was to determine if students who were enrolled in online, hybrid, or face-to-face developmental courses were more or less likely to withdraw from those courses and to determine if those students were more or less likely to receive higher or lower grades than their counterparts. The study used archived data from the college to collect a sample that included all students who had enrolled in developmental courses at the college between 2012 and 2014 (n = 3,863). To determine the effect, if any, that course format had on student withdrawal rates from developmental classes a chi-square test was conducted that found that course format had a statistically significant effect on student withdrawal rates. To determine the effect, if any, that course format had on student success rates (student grade), a one-way ANOVA test was performed. The results of that ANOVA suggested that course format had a statistically significant effect on student success rates. At the conclusion of the research, suggestions are made for practice, as well as the implications that these results have on future policies and decision-making at the college for students who enroll in developmental education courses

MPC for Q2Q_2 Access Structures over Rings and Fields

We examine Multi-Party Computation protocols in the active-security-with-abort setting for $Q_2$ access structures over small and large finite fields $F_p$ and over rings $Z_{p^k}$. We give general protocols which work for any $Q_2$ access structure which is realised by a multiplicative Extended Span Program. We generalize a number of techniques and protocols from various papers and compare the different methodologies. In particular we examine the expected communication cost per multiplication gate when the protocols are instantiated with different access structures

Spring Drought Effects on Rangeland Forage Yield from Clayey Ecological Sites in Western South Dakota

Understanding the historical influence of seasonal precipitation, especially spring precipitation, and stocking rate on forage yield would be desirable for planning purposes. The objectives of this study were to examine the historical precipitation pattern and how it influenced forage yield on pastures that were stocked at light, moderate, and heavy stocking rates for 15 years at the Cottonwood Range and Livestock Research Station in western South Dakota. Weather data from 1909 to 2004 at the station were analyzed to determine the frequency of occurrence of below (≤75 of mean), normal, and above normal (\u3e125% of mean) spring precipitation (April, May, June). Additional data from the station provided for an examination of the relationships between weather and forage yield from pastures grazed at three stocking rates. Forage yield and precipitation data were collected from 1945 to 1960 from pastures continuously grazed from May to November at 0.25, 0.40, and 0.60 AUM/acre. Analysis of variance was used to test influence of spring precipitation (spring drought and non-spring drought) and stocking rate (light, moderate, and heavy) on forage yield. Below normal, normal, and above normal spring precipitation occurred 29, 48, and 23% of the time, respectively. Forage yield in spring drought years was 420 lb/ac less (P \u3c 0.01) than in non-spring drought years. Lightly stocked pastures had 38 and 71% more (P \u3c 0.01) forage than moderate and heavily stocked pastures. Spring droughts reduced forage yield (P \u3c 0.01) in light, moderate, and heavily stocked pastures by 20, 27, and 35%, respectively. Forage yield from lightly stocked pastures during spring droughts was similar to heavily stocked pastures in non-spring drought years. Our study indicates that spring precipitation should guide stocking rate decisions made during the growing season. Light and moderate stocking rates reduce the impact of spring drought on forage yield more than heavy stocking rates

Thermal degradation analysis and XRD characterisation of fibre-forming synthetic polypropylene containing nanoclay

Flammability of synthetic fibres is significantly worse than that of bulk polymers because of the high surface area to volume ratio and the low tolerance to high filler loadings in the fibre production process. Introducing nanocomposite structures has the potential to enhance the char formation at relatively low loadings of nanoparticulate fillers and hence can reduce the flammability of synthetic polymers and fibres. This paper reports thermal degradation analysis results in conjunction with TG analysis under different atmospheres and further studies of X-ray diffraction characterisation of fibre-forming polypropylene containing selected dispersed nanoclays. The concentrations of hydrocarbons, carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide released during the TG analysis have been monitored and analysed by using a combined electrochemical infrared analyser. The intensity changes of the crystallinity peaks and nanoclay peaks in the polymer and composites are discussed

Estimated South Dakota Land Use Change from 2006 to 2012

Grasslands play a key role in providing wildlife habitat and recreation, as well as in range and pasture livestock production systems by producing high quality animal protein for human consumption. Croplands provide high quality grains for human consumption, coarse grains for ethanol production, and along with forages, feed for confined livestock production systems. These livestock systems also produce high quality animal protein for human consumption. Both land use systems play important roles in a wide range of societal issues facing South Dakota including economic productivity and development, water quality and quantity, health of rural communities, urban development, and additional aspects of quality-of-life long associated with the state. The purpose of this study was to estimate land use changes in South Dakota from 2006 to 2012. Estimates of land use changes were calculated based on proportions of visually observed land use using high resolution imagery (\u3c 2-m resolution) at the same 14,400 sampling points in the years 2006 and 2012. Between 2006 and 2012, the estimated grassland losses were 1,837,100 acres (±21,100). Grassland losses resulted in increased acres devoted to cropland (1,439,500 acres ±15,600), roads + buildings (nonagricultural purposes, 27,400 acres ±110), wetlands + forest (habitat, 126,800 acres ±690), and open water (243,300 acres ±860). The consequences of changes in land use in South Dakota may impact a wide range of stakeholder and interest groups, as well as society in general

Scooby: Improved Multi-Party Homomorphic Secret Sharing Based on FHE

We present new constructions of multi-party homomorphic secret sharing (HSS) based on a new primitive that we call homomorphic encryption with decryption to shares (HEDS). Our first construction, which we call Scooby, is based on many popular fully homomorphic encryption (FHE) schemes with a linear decryption property. Scooby achieves an $n$-party HSS for general circuits with complexity $O(|F| + \log n)$, as opposed to $O(n^2 \cdot |F|)$ for the prior best construction based on multi-key FHE. Scooby can be based on (ring)-LWE with a super-polynomial modulus-to-noise ratio. In our second construction, Scrappy, assuming any generic FHE plus HSS for NC1-circuits, we obtain a HEDS scheme which does not require a super-polynomial modulus. While these schemes all require FHE, in another instantiation, Shaggy, we show how in some cases it is possible to obtain multi-party HSS without FHE, for a small number of parties and constant-degree polynomials. Finally, we show that our Scooby scheme can be adapted to use multi-key fully homomorphic encryption, giving more efficient spooky encryption and setup-free HSS. This latter scheme, Casper, if concretely instantiated with a B/FV-style multi-key FHE scheme, for functions $F$ which do not require bootstrapping, gives an HSS complexity of $O(n \cdot |F| + n^2 \cdot \log n)$

Forecasting Forage Yield on Clayey Ecological Sites in Western South Dakota using Weather Data

The ability to forecast annual forage yield from weather data would be useful for making appropriate adjustments to stocking rates in order to achieve or maintain desired plant communities. Our objective was to determine the relationship between weather variables and annual forage yield from three distinct plant communities on clayey ecological sites in western South Dakota. Forage yield and weather data were collected from 1945 through 1960 at the Cottonwood Range and Livestock Research Station, in western South Dakota. Pastures stocked at 0.25, 0.40, and 0.60 AUM/acre from 1942 to 1960 developed into western wheatgrass-dominated, western wheatgrass-shortgrass co-dominated, and shortgrass dominated plant communities, respectively. Forage data were compiled from previously reported data and raw data. Spring (April-June) precipitation, the last calendar day that the minimum temperature was 30oF or below, and previous year’s spring precipitation were best predictors (R2 = 0.81) of forage yield in western wheatgrass dominated plant communities. Spring precipitation and the last calendar day that the minimum temperature was 30oF or below were best predictors (R2 = 0.69) of forage yield in western wheatgrass-shortgrass co-dominated plant communities. Spring precipitation was the best predictor (R2 = 0.52) of forage yield in shortgrass dominated plant communities. In western South Dakota, managers of these plant communities can make reliable estimates of annual forage yield by the end of June using precipitation and temperature measurements