It’s nearly dusk as Hunter Doyle checks his last field. He’s walking slowly, chest-deep among rows of dark green crops on a farm in the picturesque Rocky Mountain high country near the town of Kremmling, Colorado. He likes what he sees. “It’s just beautiful,” he says. “We only watered this once but look how high it’s jumped up.”
Doyle, who is the Intermountain Agronomy Specialist for The Land Institute, is monitoring a test field of Kernza®, a perennial crop that’s generating buzz among farmers and ranchers throughout the West. As climate change grips the region, alternatives like Kernza® offer a tantalizing hope: a crop with the potential to deliver economic returns, withstand drought and use less water.
“People know we have to change,” Doyle says, “but they need realistic options that will work on a big scale in their fields.” Delivering those options—and proof of their viability—is the goal of the Intermountain West Alternative Forages Research Project, which funds Doyle’s work. The project is run by a suite of partners—including The Land Institute, The Nature Conservancy, Colorado State University, Trout Unlimited, American Rivers and Reeder Creek Ranch.
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At sites throughout the Upper Colorado River Basin, this team is analyzing the large-scale growth potential of more water-friendly forage crops, or crops used for cattle feed. Their findings—and a widespread shift to crops that use less of the Colorado River—could be a game changer for a system teetering on the brink of disaster.
A Reckoning for the River—And All of Us
“This isn’t just about farmers and ranchers,” says Aaron Derwingson, who’s working with Doyle on the Alternative Forage Project and manages water work for The Nature Conservancy’s Colorado River Program.
Quote: Aaron Derwingson
Everyone who cares about water security for people and nature in the Colorado River Basin should also care about agricultural producers and helping them find ways to adapt.
He means more than 40 million of us—in seven states and two countries.
As the Colorado River system buckles under increasing pressures from overuse and historic heat and drought, its critical importance has come into sharp and painful focus. The flows of the Colorado are the source of drinking water, food production and energy for communities and major cities throughout the western U.S. and northern Mexico. It’s the lifeblood for hundreds of native species. Too big to fail? That phrase does not apply in the era of climate change.
Seeds of Change
Alternative crops might offer one refreshingly straightforward and impactful solution. “When you look at water consumption,” Derwingson explains, “traditional forage crops are an opportunity for innovation.” According to a recent study published in Communications Earth & Environment, nearly half of the water drawn from the Colorado River is being used to irrigate crops like alfalfa and grass hay to feed beef and dairy cattle—supplying meat, milk, cheese, yogurt and more to millions of us. It’s easy to see why alfalfa has been prized by western agricultural producers for more than a century: it’s nutritious, it tolerates many different climates and it has a high yield. These qualities, Derwingson notes, are what we need to find in a less thirsty crop. And there are already promising contenders.
Kernza®, which is a perennial intermediate wheatgrass, and sainfoin, which is a legume, both have the potential to use substantially less water than alfalfa, yet they are still nutrient-rich and offer a high yield. Developed and studied by The Land Institute, Kernza® and sainfoin have also already been used by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Conservation Reserve Program for improving natural resource management. All good signs, Derwingson points out, but key questions remain—especially around the practical, large-scale growth of these alternative crops in the Colorado River Basin, where drought and heat are intensifying. That’s why new, collaborative research in this region is vital.
The Intermountain West Alternative Forages Research project team is now running field tests at seven farms and two research stations in western Colorado, southeast Utah and southwest New Mexico. They’re raising and monitoring fields of Kernza® and sainfoin to determine whether these crops can effectively be grown in a variety of climates and field conditions in the Upper Colorado Basin while providing more drought resilience. Now entering their second year of research, the team is assembling a suite of comprehensive baseline data to understand how much water Kernza® and sainfoin require in each location. Those are revealing numbers they can compare against the water-saving potential of other alternative crops or solutions proposed for the Colorado River Basin.
The Real Test: Rancher Buy-In
Doyle, who spends his long days driving between test plots of Kernza® and sainfoin in western Colorado—from Cortez to Steamboat—stresses there’s a lot more to his work than water and crop data collection. “A lot of my job is outreach and building relationships in these rural communities,” he says. “The ranchers are excited and curious, and some are also skeptical. They’re business owners and they want to adapt and use less water, but they can’t afford to fail.”
Doyle says that’s the beauty of the Alternative Forages project. “I tell ag producers: let us take the risk, and let us struggle and learn out here, and then we can tell you what’s really possible in your own fields.” Derwingson underlines this point: “We want to assess the reality of whether farmers and ranchers in the Upper Colorado Basin would or could actually switch to these crops.” To that end, the research team’s seven test sites include Doyle’s fields as well as the fields of several farmers and ranchers in western Colorado who have volunteered to help with the research. Traditionally alfalfa and grass hay growers, these producers have now planted Kernza® and sainfoin, and they are gathering real-world experience on switching to these alternative crops, including best practices and pitfalls to avoid.
One farmer who volunteered to join the project is Paul Bruchez, who raises cattle with his father and brother on a ranch near Kremmling and irrigates with water from the Colorado mainstem and small tributaries. “My family’s been in agriculture for five generations. We’re very proud food growers,” he says. “When we started this Kremmling operation in 2000, we thought it would be bliss. Instead, by 2002, we started to see very different flows on the river—drought conditions that impacted our family in a number of ways. We knew we needed to be better prepared.”
Quote: Paul Bruchez
We’re in the perfect place to study the water consumption of high-altitude perennials. Pretty much all of us have water rights tied to smaller tributaries and everybody has felt the burn of years where we don’t have enough water. People are definitely interested.
Doyle, who’s growing his project test fields nearby for the Land Institute, is working with Bruchez and the other farmers in the study, and he compares notes with them on what he’s seeing on the ground. “There’s a lot of variability and nuances. It’s like piecing together a puzzle. We’re trying to figure out what’s working and replicate that, and then figure what’s not working, and how to avoid it,” Doyle says. Eventually, the project team hopes to create a practical guide for how producers can successfully establish and manage these alternative crops in their existing hayfield and pastures. For his part, Bruchez takes the current unknowns in stride: “Agriculture is all about innovation. The reality is that we can always figure out ways to improve things—and we should.”
Seeking Multi-State Impact
The reliance on alfalfa as a forage crop—and the water it demands—isn’t just a Colorado issue. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, in 2018, roughly 1.47 million acres of land throughout the Upper Basin were irrigated—and grass, hay and alfalfa crops accounted for nearly 90%. That’s why the Alternative Forages Project team is running test fields in Utah and New Mexico as well, so scientists and ranchers can study the crops in different soils and climate conditions.
Matt Redd, who directs The Nature Conservancy’s Canyonlands Research Center program at the Dugout Ranch, is working with the Alternative Forages Project team to test crops in the desert high country near Canyonlands National Park in Utah. “We planted last fall and the Kernza® came up well,” says Redd. “These initial results are exciting. The next step is to see how it does as forage for the cattle—and how well it grows back after cutting or grazing.” Redd, who’s studying a variety of water-wise sustainable ranching strategies at the Dugout, thinks producers in his arid region are eager for new solutions.
Dugout Ranch
Scientists and ranchers are studying the crops in the different soils and climate conditions of desert high country.
Quote: Matt Redd
There’s a lot of interest in finding a crop or livestock that is better adapted to this environment and climate that we’re living in now. If Kernza® becomes more mainstream, I think producers here would incorporate it into their fields.
Redd’s enthusiasm is echoed by Wendel Hann, a rancher and owner of Gila River Ranch, who planted Kernza® for the Alternative Forages Project team at The Nature Conservancy’s Gila River preserve in southwest New Mexico. “In the hayfield where I planted Kernza® last fall, the organic material in the soil has increased and more carbon is being stored than previously,” says Hann. “The large seed heads are definitely good grain food for birds and other small mammals. I baled the Kernza® and am feeding it to my animals, and their hooves are helping stomp the seed into the ground. I’m excited to plant more acres next year since it’s been so productive and survived water stress so well.”
Derwingson said that the initial results and reviews coming in from the diverse test sites have the project team encouraged—but also cautious. In the end, Derwingson stresses, no matter how much water savings these crops might offer, they also have to address bigger questions of useability, profit and marketability. “We know there’s interest and there will be early adopters,” he says, “but we need to figure out how to take these crops mainstream and at a large scale. Producers grow certain crops for a reason, and we need to figure out what it will take for them to switch—we need to understand what these alternative crops could replace in the marketplace and where they fit in the economy.”
Gila River Preserve
A Solution Within Reach
Those are the questions the Intermountain West Alternative Forages team hopes to tackle as the project enters its next phase. In the years ahead, they’ll further expand their test sites, grow more robust and dense stands of these alternative crops with multiple harvests, and increase their engagement with ag producers throughout the upper Colorado River Basin. They’ll also establish deficit irrigation treatment test plots, which means the team will withhold water at certain times throughout the year to assess the crops’ response and document how well they bounce back.
Change, no matter how well-informed, is difficult. The road ahead will not be without bumps. But Derwingson is optimistic because in the Colorado River crisis, these alternative crops offer something elusive right now: a solution that is not as costly and complex as many others on the table.
“Urgency and pressure is increasing,” he says. “I see interest growing because what we’re suggesting would not be as disruptive. We already grow a lot of forage crops. We don’t have to create an entirely new market or supply chain or infrastructure. If we can gather the right information to make the use of these alternatives clear and easy, then this could be a win-win-win situation for everyone.”
Back at the farm in Kremmling, Doyle climbs into his truck just as the sun slips behind the snowy peaks of the Rockies. Tomorrow he’ll drive to his next test field in the town of Fruita to check its progress. “A lot of these ranchers have been doing this for generations,” Doyle says. “And as the river crisis deepens, we’re seeing that being taken away.” He looks out at the Kernza® field, rippling faintly now in the evening breeze. “To me, it feels really good to see all these scientists, conservationists and recreators working alongside the farmers and ranchers to find a way forward. The bottom-line is that we all care about our water resources, and we’re all trying to do better.”
