1. Kansas State University
  2. »Division of Communications and Marketing
  3. »K-State Today
  4. »Team receives grant to continue study of teff as alternative forage

K-State Today

June 23, 2016

Team receives grant to continue study of teff as alternative forage

Submitted by Sarah Hancock

A group of K-State researchers who are studying teff grass as a dryland forage crop for water-limited areas in Kansas received a $70,000 grant from the Kansas Board of Regents' Experimental Program to Stimulate Competitive Research, or EPSCoR, funding.

Project goals and objectives include determining the agronomic characteristics of teff as an alternative forage, determining teff's water use efficiency and productivity under drought conditions, assessing nutritive value at different stages for dairy cattle diets compared with other forages commonly used in dairy systems, and developing preliminary models to predict the sustainability and resilience of dairy systems based on alternative forages.

The research team comprises Doohong Min, department of agronomy; Barry Bradford, department of animal sciences and industry; and Mykel Taylor, department of agricultural economics in the College of Agriculture, and John Harrington, department of geography in the College of Arts & Sciences. The group was previously awarded a $9,700 team development award through the Water Seed Grant Program offered by the Office of the Vice President for Research.