Grant: Applied Research Tools and Instruments Grants

Lakeland College is a bi-provincial (Alberta and Saskatchewan) public college. The College's livestock research facilities are ideally located in Vermilion, an Alberta town within the heartland of cow-calf beef operations. The College houses a feed efficiency test center while supporting several cutting-edge research projects, validations and demonstrations as well as unparalleled hands-on training opportunities in livestock production using the Student-Managed enterprise model. *Currently, feed cost represents up to 70% of variable costs in livestock operations. There are increasing unpredictable challenges from biotic (e.g. disease), abiotic (e.g. extreme weather conditions) and regulatory (e.g. antimicrobial use, greenhouse gas emission) risk factors. Animals with improved feed-utilization abilities can improve the bottom lines of livestock operations. Similarly, some emerging feed additives or supplements have the potential to improve livestock growth performance, health and welfare. The growing requests from producers to tap into these beneficial options have led to the need for Lakeland College to leverage existing infrastructure and animal resources (beef, dairy and sheep) towards increasing applied research capacity. *This proposal requests funding support from NSERC to purchase of six (6) units of C-Lock's SmartFeed-Pro (SFP) systems. This will enable the College to expand its scope of research in livestock feed efficiency profiling and supplementation research towards addressing the needs of the livestock, feed and technological industries. Use of these units to provide service support does not currently exist in Alberta or Saskatchewan. These autonomous systems will complement the existing infrastructure towards conducting more robust and cutting-edge research. The SFP units are portable and can be used on the College's cattle and sheep resources. Research projects conducted with these units will also provide the needed empirical support for regulatory approvals of new feeds, supplements or telemetric tools that improve animal performance and health, while enhancing the training offered to students.*