vox_mundi wrote:Perennial wheat is an ecologist’s dream. Soon it may be what’s for dinner.The grain is Kernza, a new breed of wheat. Unlike the usual varieties, it is perennial, which means it grows back in subsequent years rather than being sown each spring. That matters because over time, the plant develops a deep, dense root system that helps to build healthy soil and to keep carbon in the soil, a counter to climate change. No wonder perennial grains have long been the holy grail for a certain set of agroecologists (visionaries or eco-weenies, depending on your perspective).
The commercial availability of Kernza is something of a dream come true for the academics who have long evangelized perennial grains. Here in the United States, its main proponents are at the Kansas-based Land Institute, where it was developed. Co-founder Wes Jackson first became an advocate of perennial crops in the 1970s after noting a difference between the soils on agricultural lands and those in the native tallgrass prairies.
Over the years, the Land Institute has worked to develop a variety of perennials: rice, which is now being tested in China; sunflowers, for oil; and sorghum. Kernza was spearheaded by plant geneticist Lee DeHaan, who as a child in the early 1980s became captivated by Jackson’s vision and joined the Land Institute in 2001. The plant is a strain of intermediate wheatgrass, a distant cousin of what we know as wheat. (The name, which is trademarked by the Land Institute, is entirely invented, a combination of “kern” from kernel and “za” from Konza, the Native American word from which Kansas was derived.)
From an environmental perspective, Kernza does all the things that annual wheat does not. It sends a cloud of roots as deep as 10 feet into the ground. That underground network holds soil in place, which prevents erosion, and can quickly absorb water and nutrients. According to one study, second-year Kernza reduced soil moisture, and it reduced nitrate leaching by 86 percent or more compared with annual wheat. (Nitrate, a soluble form of nitrogen, can poison groundwater and is one of the chemicals responsible for creating the Gulf of Mexico’s dead zones, low-oxygen areas where fish and other marine life cannot survive.)Left to its own devices, intermediate wheatgrass funnels energy into its roots and leaves, rather than its seed, which is the part we eat. So DeHaan has worked hard to coax Kernza to create a larger one. Over the last six years, DeHaan has doubled the size of the seed. But it is still only one-quarter the size of a conventional wheat berry. Kernza also has less gluten — the levels are akin to what you might find in barley flour — and that makes it a challenging ingredient for bread, which is how many of us consume much of our wheat.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thinopyrum_intermedium
Land Institute: Kernza® Grain: Toward a Perennial AgricultureGot Kernza®? Want Kernza®?
If you are a farmer interested in growing Kernza or a baker, miller, brewer, or chef interested in purchasing Kernza seed or flour, please contact Plovgh.
Plovgh (pronounced “plow”) contracts with The Land Institute to help match Kernza consumers with farmers so our scientists can focus on research. All farmers growing Kernza® enter into a license agreement for use of the Kernza® trademark in the sale of the grain.
Progress is being made in turning Kernza into a real crop grown by real farmers instead of just research institutions.
Kernza Update
On a splendid May day, Valentin Picasso is visiting tests of a crop called kernza at the Arlington Agricultural Research Station north of Madison. As a perennial, kernza must survive the winter, and that is what the assistant professor of agronomy at University of Wisconsin–Madison is checking.
Developing kernza is part of a vision to shift an agricultural economy reliant on “till-plant-harvest and repeat,” toward a one-time tilling and planting, followed by harvesting forage and grain for years or decades. The forage – hay — can be baled or fed directly to cattle in the spring and fall.
Annual crops require annual tillage, which often leaves the soil bare all winter and into the spring. Although no-tillage techniques and cover crops can provide some soil cover, perennial crops and forages are the ultimate long-term solution to soil erosion, Picasso says. Once planted, perennial kernza covers soil year-round without the cost of further tillage.
At more than 300 small plots at Arlington, Picasso is testing kernza with variables such as planting dates, seed varieties, and the effect of leguminous companion crops like alfalfa.
Kernza, generically intermediate wheat grass, was developed by the Land Institute, a Kansas environmental non-profit that trademarked the brand “kernza.” Those who sell seeds under that name must pay royalties; seeds of the same crop, sold as intermediate wheatgrass, are exempt from royalty.
An auspicious plan
The interest in intermediate wheatgrass, and other perennials like silphium and lupine, reflects a small-scale effort to reverse what Picasso wryly calls “a little mistake at the dawn of agriculture 10,000 years ago.” The decision to domesticate annual plants instead of perennials can leave bare soil prone to erosion and allow soil and nutrients to run off in the rain, causing water pollution.
To date, kernza breeders at the Land Institute and the University of Minnesota have used time-tested approaches such as selecting and replanting the largest seeds, to turn an idea into a crop. No genetic modification technologies are used.
Although the grain yield of the new crop cannot compete with corn or soybeans, its yield has tripled in just 10 years, Picasso says, to a maximum of 900 pounds of grain per acre in Wisconsin fields.
“Kernza is only in the fourth cycle of selection, and we have been selecting the major crops for at least 5,000 years,” he says. “In another 10 years, we expect to see a much higher yield that will look more like a traditional crop, with the advantage of being perennial.”
Kernza leaves and stems have a high nutritive value for cattle, especially in spring and fall, which makes it more valuable to farmers as a dual-purpose (grain and forage) crop.
Picasso is working on several research questions about the new crop:
Forage quality and production;
Companion crops: Most of Picasso’s kernza plots live amidst alfalfa or another legume, to further shelter the soil, supply nitrogen to the kernza, and avoid a monoculture friendly to pathogens and insects.
Grain production: Even though kernza survives at least 20 years, grain production tapers off quickly after the first year or two. Picasso is looking for a strategy to sustain the yield.
Kernza does not flower and set seed the first year, because it needs to endure winter before flowering, but that could change in a crop that is still genetically malleable. While leaving the farm, Picasso points out where he gathered seeds from a hundred-odd plants that, strangely, did produce grain the same year they were planted. He is planting these unusual seeds in a new experiment aimed at developing a crop that can produce grain even before a winter.
Forages are extremely valuable, but their economic contribution is difficult to measure, Picasso says. The total value of marketed hay and related products in Wisconsin was $816 million in 2017, according to the National Agricultural Statistics Service, “but that does not come close to the full value of forages, as this is only forage that is sold. Most forages are grown and fed on the same farm, and therefore not counted.”
Forages supply dairy, beef feed
A comprehensive estimate of the value of forages would consider that at least half of dairy and beef feed comes from hay such as alfalfa. In reality, Picasso says, “If you want to estimate the value, you should also add the economic value of clean water, and maintaining soil and biodiversity.”
Although Picasso says the kernza project is “in the infancy of research,” he adds that, “Wisconsin’s climate and soil are ideal, and the research benefits from a strong tradition of agricultural research.”
At field days at the Lancaster and Arlington Research Stations, Picasso adds, “farmers are really excited about kernza. There’s already some on-farm research, which I think will grow in the near future. We still have dairy farmers who know how to grow and graze crops, who know how to produce forage and grain, and are open-minded about trying new things.”