Mission

The mission of the Environmental Management Research Unit is to develop information and tools to assist livestock producers in making management decisions with respect to production facilities thermal environment and judicious management of livestock manure.  Products and information developed within these projects will result in improved animal care and performance without compromising environmental quality.

Environmental Management Research Program 

The Environmental Management Research Unit is focused on providing information for livestock production with respect to climatic and management stress and management of livestock manure without environmental degradation.  The livestock stress program relies on the development of methods to quantify the impact of stress on livestock performance and well-being.  Facilities and equipment are designed and developed to manage livestock in production-like settings so that representative response measures can be applied to industry conditions.  Where climatic control is needed, environmental chambers provide accurate temperature and humidity settings and intensive animal measures.  However, animal numbers are limited and research results are generally extended to a typical production facility for extensive measures.  The central Nebraska  setting provides stressful summertime conditions for cattle production. 

The manure management research program is focused on a control space concept, with all inputs and outputs measured.  The large animal population provides the opportunity to include animal production inputs of feed, environmental factors, facility features and animal growth into the balance.  The same production-like settings useful for stress evaluation, provide industry representative conditions for evaluation of manure handling practices.  The feedlot surface impacts the fate of nutrient transformations that lead to potential air, land and water contamination.  Management of that surface directly affects each of those potential contamination vectors and provides opportunities to evaluate odor, runoff, groundwater, and surface water concerns.  The surrounding crop production fields, provides ample land to apply manures and evaluate short term and long term consequences. 

The researchers and support staff provide a team approach to scientific evaluation of each focus area with ample experience in production practices.  Furthermore, interaction with producers provides valuable input for program direction.

FACILITIES AND RESOURCES

The Environmental Management Research Unit has access to chemistry labs (equipped with a Hewlett-Packard GC/MS, Leco CN-2000 carbon/nitrogen analyzer, Technicon autoanalyzer, Coy anaerobic chamber),  the environmental laboratory (climatic controlled chambers and calorimeters), and specially equipped feedlot facilities to study shade and feedlot surface effects.  Additional swine, sheep and cattle housed facilities are available for short term studies involving either livestock stress or manure management issues.  Crop production fields provide further opportunities to test management options including rates of manure loading, long term effects of manure application, cover crops to manage potential winter nutrient losses and alternative methods of controlling precipitation runoff from feedlots.

The animal population includes 7,000 breeding age cattle, 720 litters of swine each year and 4,000 breeding age sheep.  Each species has a wide and well defined genetic subsets with access to DNA samples of each animal.  The EMRU interacts closely with all other USMARC Research Units capable of forming comprehensive research teams.