NCI Video Production | April Update

The Northern Crops Institute video production story continues here. Welcome back to another monthly update. Corn was the hot video topic last month, and that trend continued into the first part of April, along with another common commodity: wheat. Read on!

The Corn Trials Continue:

In case you missed it, last month’s video blog contained information on the trials being conducted to compare corn from Brazil, Argentina, Ukraine, and the United States. In March, the NCI was busy rounding out the Ukrainian corn for the milling/pelleting portion of the study. This month, the South Dakota State University (SDSU) swine squad kept the ball rolling with the Ukrainian feed for the pig portion of the study.

To read more about the corn trials, read here:

https://www.northern-crops.com/whats-new/nci-video-production-update-mar2022

The first study of the growth and digestibility pig trials are nearly complete at SDSU. Nursery pigs fed with US corn diets were superior in energy usage and growth rate to those fed with diets of corn from Argentina, Brazil, and Ukraine.

At SDSU, two types of hog tests were conducted: growth trials and digestibility trials. The growth trials showed that nursery pigs fed US corn saw faster and higher weight gain than those fed with corn diets from Argentina or Brazil. SDSU is currently working on the last variable of this trial, the Ukrainian corn.

The second hog test was in regard to digestibility. When looking at the gross, digestible, and metabolizable energy, US corn had the highest amount of energy. Similarly, when looking at amino acids and protein, the US corn proved more digestible.

The NCI communications team sent a lone videographer down to SDSU in Brookings, SD, this month to capture the action. Inside the Animal Science Complex, the pigs were in the process of being weighed for the growth trials.

For a recap on the two pig trials being conducted, watch the video preview below featuring Dr. Bob Thaler, a distinguished professor and swine specialist at SDSU.

US Wheat Video:

If you’ve been following the blog, you know that NCI hosted a team from US Wheat Associates for a segment of their Core Competency Training tour. The two days they spent at NCI required lots of video capturing.

The communications team worked together to interview multiple US Wheat training participants on their experience from their time in Fargo. US Wheat’s VP of Global Technical Services, Mark Fowler, as well as NCI’s Program Manager, Brian Sorenson also commented on the events.

The cameras captured the action once again during the interactive SRC demonstration. “You learn by doing,” commented Mark Fowler as he expressed his satisfaction with the success of the hands-on learning experience.

Be sure to check out the final video, coming soon to NCI’s YouTube page:

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCwjPN4ec8YJokWBIM8GV8Ng 

Miscellaneous:

We started with corn, now we’ll end back on corn. Last month, NCI was a proud partner with the US Grains Council, National Corn Growers Association, and Minnesota and North Dakota Corn Councils for a Corn Trade School.

To read about this past event, visit:
https://www.northern-crops.com/whats-new/nci-helps-host-regional-trade-school

Keep in tune with NCI’s YouTube channel, where the complete playlist will be available for viewing. Additionally, check in next mid-month for another NCI video update blog.

VIDEO PREVIEW: Bob Thaler, SDSU Swine Specialist gives an overview of the corn feed value trials with pigs. Growth and digestibility trials for this study took place at South Dakota State University.