The Agronomy of Hemp and Its Uses in Forage-Animal Agriculture

Project narrative for 2025-26 Cooperative Agreement with FAPRU unit The resurgence of industrial hemp in American agriculture represents both opportunity and risk. The project addresses important agronomic questions, challenges to productivity and exploratory work for novel livestock markets. Work will be carried out under the two broad objectives as stated in Objective. The Cooperator has 13 Ph.D. level scientists (investigators) and are appropriately licensed to grow and possess hemp and its constituents. Agronomic experiments will be conducted on the Cooperator research farms. Plant pathological surveys will be carried out on both the research farm and producer farms. All animal-related research will be conducted in vitro or ex vivo due to the current status of hemp as a prohibited feed component. The subobjectives are as follows: • Investigate factors that contribute to the persistent problem of stand establishment • Quantify the economic impact of insect pests and develop best management practices for control • Evaluate hemp cultivars best suited for use in a transition zone and determine their fertility and irrigation requirements • Develop protocols for assessing seed-associated fungal pathogens • Conduct a combined metagenomic and chemical analysis of retting hemp to better understand microbial processes and community shifts for optimal retting • Determine feed value and nutritional components in hemp forage, grain, and by-products such as extracted floral material and seed cake. • Investigate the potential metabolic impacts of cannabinoids, terpenes, and isoflavones found in hemp on livestock. • Evaluate the potential for biologically active compounds naturally found in hemp to be introduced into the human food chain through animal production systems. •Develop optimized methods for hemp seed sectioning in support of imaging for better understanding the seed biology of hemp •Investigate the impact of cannabinoids on markers for inflammation in animals using an equine model Publications, presentations and stakeholder outreach will result from these activities. Other deliverables include: ? Data on cultivar performance in response to production variables that will contribute to modeling efforts and best management practices ? Data on the prevalence of insect pests and diseases associated with hemp under different cultivation systems and new mitigation strategies ? New information on how microbial communities contribute to retting and impact quality ? Nutritive and other data important for regulatory evaluation of hemp and hemp byproducts as animal feed