News release issued December 22, 2000, effective immediately.
For media inquiries, contact Caroline Booth Lara, Communications Specialist, (580) 224-6379.
  email: cblara@noble.org

Noble Ag Specialists Make National Presentations

Three Noble Foundation Agricultural Division specialists were among those presenting programs at the first National Conference on Grazing Lands recently in Las Vegas, Nev.

Hugh Aljoe and Matt Mattox, both forage specialists with the Ardmore-based Noble Foundation, made presentations during the three-day conference. NF forage specialist R.L. Dalrymple gave an opening talk titled "Economic Implications of a Practical, Rotational-Grazed, Low-Capital Input, Introduced Grass System."

The conference was sponsored by the Grazing Lands Conservative Initiative and National Association of Conservation Districts Grazingland and Public Lands Resources Committee. The GLCI consists of several agricultural industries and agencies, farm organizations, and conservation groups, as well as individual livestock producers. Livestock producers are a major source of input and governing body of the GLCI, which has as a major focus the mass acreage of private lands.

"One of the key thrusts of this meeting was to open people's eyes to the importance of grassland resources throughout the country," Mattox said. "They're trying to make legislators aware of the inequities in government programs and government support of grassland issues. This is one of the main reasons the GLCI was formed."

Although this was the first national conference conducted by the GLCI, those attending expect there to be more.

"This organization is still really evolving," Dalrymple said. "It was started about a decade ago by (livestock) producers to create a system to assist private grazing lands owners. The organization is strongly environmental-based.

"I thought it was a tremendous meeting. I've never been to a meeting where there was such an amalgamous combination of people present."

Aljoe agreed. "That was one of the great things about this conference - there was a great mix of producers, agencies, educators and others - all aspects of the forage and animal agriculture industry were represented."

About 850 people attended the early-December conference.

Aljoe's presentation, "Limit Grazing Winter Pasture by Mature Cattle as a Means of Providing Supplementary Protein," dealt with using winter pastures as protein supplement, looking at crude protein intake relative to specific grazing intervals.

Mattox presented "Evaluation of Methods Used to Predict Supplemental Feeding Needs for Cattle." The talk covered several ways to assess animal performance and their supplemental needs, and determining which methods were most economical and most accurate in performance.

Dalrymple's talk dealt with using rotational grazing to control unnecessary inputs and costs in order to achieve "better profitability and good grazier quality of life."

Also attending the conference from the NF Agricultural Division were Clay Wright, Evan Whitley, Russ Gentry, and Tim Stokes.

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Photo: Matt Mattox (left) and Hugh Aljoe with posters presented at the GLCI conference

The Samuel Roberts Noble Foundation, headquartered in Ardmore, Okla., is a non-profit organization conducting agricultural, forage biotechnological, and plant biology research; providing grants to numerous non-profit charitable, educational and health organizations; and assisting farmers and ranchers through educational and consultative agricultural programs.

To learn more, check out the Noble Foundation Web site at http://www.noble.org.

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