The Florida Cattle Enhancement Board provides opportunities for research projects which might not have been pursued otherwise. We sat down with Dr. Nicolas DiLorenzo with the University of Florida to learn about his research into sileage.
Dr. DiLorenzo said, “To be honest, without that, I don’t think I would have been able to get started. We probably would not even be talking about silage here. So that’s one way to show the impact of that program because it’s not the type of research that if you go to the USDA or even the seed companies, they’ll be very excited to fund. Or if they do, they may want me to try a certain variety.”
“So, I think there’s a tremendous potential to do things with the private sector. But to get started on that and to get, for instance, to test the self-feeding approach, which we did and was funded by the Cattle Enhancement Board as an attempt to reduce labor or the intake limiters, which are all technologies that are aimed at reducing labor. Those are not the type of research that you might see funded by big companies and sometimes even USDA. There are more and more, there is this push to do a lot of basic research, which is totally needed and I do actually share of that too. But this type of research that is, that it’s applied and it can be, I present this at either one of the venues that we have here, the Beef Cattle Short Course or any other meeting. And then I published it in the Florida Cattleman Journal,” said Dr. DiLorenzo.
“The amount of impact that I get out of that and the immediate application, it’s tremendous. And none of that would be possible without the Cattle Enhancement Board. So, I think it’s been one of the greatest programs that we have in the state and definitely one that sets us apart as an industry from other states. So yeah, I couldn’t say enough good things about that program and I hope they keep the running,” said Dr. DiLorenzo.
Audio Reporting by Dale Sandlin for Southeast AgNet.