{"id":1593,"date":"2021-05-28T00:01:47","date_gmt":"2021-05-28T00:01:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.eou.edu\/mountaineer-magazine\/?p=1593"},"modified":"2021-05-28T16:53:58","modified_gmt":"2021-05-28T16:53:58","slug":"growing-up-growing-better","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.eou.edu\/mountaineer-magazine\/growing-up-growing-better\/","title":{"rendered":"Growing up, Growing better"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"
Soil science professor, Guojie Wang develops more drought-tolerant forage plants for livestock at the OSU Experiment Station in Union. <\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

From a few acres of land in rural China, Guojie Wang\u2019s parents grew nearly everything they needed to support their family of four. If they needed oil for cooking, they grew sunflowers. If they wanted to eat tofu, they grew soybeans. Without heavy equipment or high-tech analysis, they provided nutrients for their sons and enough profit to cover Wang\u2019s tuition. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

He left the farm to study ecology and then natural resource management, in hopes of improving the lives of his parents and others like them. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI graduated debt-free, but my parents\u2019 life is very hard,\u201d Wang said. \u201cWhat\u2019s the big deal if I get a degree, but my parents still have to suffer? So I study how to manage those farms with less labor or higher profit.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wang is a forage agronomist who teaches Crop and Soil Science at Oregon State University<\/a> (OSU) in La Grande. EOU houses faculty and courses from OSU\u2019s College of Agricultural Sciences on campus at EOU so students from the rural areas of the state have access to experts like Wang. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

His research, conducted at the OSU Experiment Station in Union, explores how to grow forage for livestock with less water than conventional methods. Increasing ecological restrictions on water use from local streams has strained agricultural needs in recent decades, and Wang hopes to provide a sustainable solution. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Guojie Wang<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

The Catherine Creek watershed is home to a variety of fish, Wang explained, and if any threatened or endangered species are listed, based on Endangered Species Act<\/a> landowners will have very limited access to their water sources. In-stream water flow and temperature in summer have the biggest impact on aquatic life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIn order to conserve these species, we aim to use less water for agriculture in summer, however, this region would be impossible to farm in summer without irrigation,\u201d Wang said. \u201cSo we try to use water more efficiently than before.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

He hopes to develop viable ways for agricultural producers to use less water to grow more or the same amount, or at least achieve neutrality between agriculture and conservation efforts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wang\u2019s research began in 2016, and he plans to complete the first phase of projects this year and move to the second phase next year. Although the eight trials he\u2019s run so far show significant effects, making an impact will take more than raw numbers. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAdoption for this system is not just data,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s other social and economic factors, too.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Before Wang embarked on this work, he interviewed local farmers and ranchers to identify industry needs and priorities. The results reinforced his assertion that growing forage, or feeding material, is the No. 1 cost for livestock producers in this region. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cA cow eats roughly 30 pounds of hay a day,\u201d Wang said. \u201cWe need a lot of forage, but at the same time we do not have a lot of water.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wang and fellow researchers host field tours each summer for farmers to visit the Experiment Station to see the plots and demonstrations. Last year\u2019s visitors were most concerned with the costs and effort required to implement Wang\u2019s low-water strategies. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYou cannot continue to draw water from this watershed, but producers want to keep doing what they\u2019re doing right now,\u201d Wang said. \u201cMy dad does the same thing. I hope the producers can be proactive and respect the data, and make some changes. I\u2019m trying to demonstrate this is a true alternative, not a fantasy.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wang\u2019s parents have commercialized since he moved to America. The diversity of their farm has dwindled, and they don\u2019t eat hardly any of what they grow. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI\u2019m a rural farmer\u2019s kid who is now teaching in America: I am the American Dream,\u201d Wang said. \u201cI went from a small farm in China doing everything by hand, to heavily equipped, big farms in America.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wang plans to publish the results of his five-year study in a scholarly journal after analyzing the 2021 growing season data. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

The Ground We Walk On<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe touch soil almost every day,\u201d said Crop and Soil Science Professor Goujie Wang. \u201cOut here, no matter where you work, you will touch the soil for sure.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And it\u2019s worth doing right every once in a while. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe first thing to do is feel it,\u201d Wang said. \u201cSoil is a soft, porous medium.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He talks about soil like it\u2019s his favorite pet: living and breathing and just asking to be cared for. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cSoil will present all the things plants need,\u201d he said. \u201cHuman beings don\u2019t need to add very much to the soil to support industry. Fifty years ago there were no pesticides or fertilizers, and the world still produced a high quantity and quality of food.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

He recommends even casual gardeners test their soil regularly. Think of it like a wellness check-up or a blood draw to make sure everything looks good, and proactively respond to potential problems. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cSoil is a living, soft, fertile resource\u2026 show you care by doing an annual check,\u201d Wang said. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Organic matter is the key to almost everything in soil. Add those leaves and little roots back to it to nurture a rich humus layer. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHumus is a glue to keep the soil healthy and functional,\u201d Wang said. \u201cImprove it, and the soil will do it back to you.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mostly, though, leave soil alone. It\u2019s more stable and resilient than most people give it credit for. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cSoil is a reliable natural resource for our foundation as a community and country,\u201d Wang said. \u201cThis is the energy for human beings. Of course you can destroy soil by pushing the boundary to where it breaks, but it\u2019s resilient and will come back. After a wildfire, flood or severe drought, the soil always will come back if we don\u2019t break that threshold\u2014just like the community did not break with the pandemic. We will bounce back\u2014we have the capability.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Soil Science professor utilizes the OSU Experiment Station to conduct experiments with sustainable plants for local livestock. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":525,"featured_media":1596,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[61,3],"tags":[48,106],"class_list":["post-1593","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-spring-2021","category-university-news","tag-faculty","tag-osu-ag"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eou.edu\/mountaineer-magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1593","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eou.edu\/mountaineer-magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eou.edu\/mountaineer-magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eou.edu\/mountaineer-magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/525"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eou.edu\/mountaineer-magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1593"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.eou.edu\/mountaineer-magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1593\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1606,"href":"https:\/\/www.eou.edu\/mountaineer-magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1593\/revisions\/1606"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eou.edu\/mountaineer-magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1596"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eou.edu\/mountaineer-magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1593"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eou.edu\/mountaineer-magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1593"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eou.edu\/mountaineer-magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1593"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}