NEF's new planting system speeds up miscanthus development

Energy crop developer New Energy Farms says it has developed a new system for establishing miscanthus that takes one-third the time of previous planting methods.

Paul Carver, NEF co-founder and CEO, who holds a PhD in miscanthus physiology and has been working with the crop for more than 15 years, said he believes the company can address the challenges that have been hindering the expansion of energy crops during the past decade. Of those barriers, establishment costs has been one of the most significant. “Grants and BCAP [Biomass Crop Assistance Program] won’t always be around—they are intended to start the market, not keep it going forever—so we’re very focused on providing systems that allow people to plant crops effectively without grant support,” Carver said. “It needs to end up being half the cost of what it is today.”

Carver said the new system, which he describes a second-generation method of planting energy crops, has three components. The first is a bulked up miscanthus breed that can reproduce rapidly. “The second part is development of uniform propagules that you can auto-drill with no hand labor,” Carver said.

Read full article here: http://biomassmagazine.com/articles/5957/nefs-new-planting-system-speeds-up-miscanthus-development/

Link to November issue of BioMass Magazine.

The glories of the fall garden

As the summer days begin to wane and the approach of the fall season upon us, it is time to shift attention and begin to consider the glories of the fall garden. Master gardener Gloria Kupferman, in her recent article of the same title, highlights a few of her favorite late summer and fall flowering plants that the season presents. This includes the following plants: Dahlia, Nicotiana, Eupatorium, Hibiscus, Acidanthera, and Canna, among others. Ms. Kupferman also suggests tall grasses such as Miscanthus and Calamagrostis as spectular backdrop options. Her full article can be found at this link.