Thomas Guggenberger

AREC Raumberg-Gumpenstein · Department of Economy and Ressource management

With the project presented, running from 2015-2018, nutritional value, phenology and the development dynamics of 16 alpine pastures in or close to the national park Gesäuse (Styria, Austria) are studied. With a comparison, based on data from the years 1993-1996, of ripening stages and development of raw fibre content of forage harvested together wi...

A further increasing competition between animal feed and human food supply is expected in the future. In this regard, especially beef production is discussed critically. In the present study, the net food production and the arable land occupation of different beef cattle systems were studied. The data were taken from results of a published beef cat...

The high variability of environmental impacts among farms is a challenge for the mitigation of the environmental impact of agriculture. Often, the difference between farms of the same type is larger than differences between means of farm types. In this paper, we studied in detail how individual groups of input data contribute to various environment...

In Austria 70% of all dairy farms are located in grassland areas. Although grassland-based milk production is dominating, concentrate and N fertiliser are used in varying amounts to increase farm milk output. These agricultural inputs are purchased externally or produced internally on the own arable farm area. In a case study, we analysed how the c...

Warme Sommer führen bei Almfutter in vergleichbarer Höhenlage zu einer schnelleren Reife des Futters um zwei bis drei Wochen. Dieser Unterschied bedeutet aus phänologischer Sicht eine deutliche Beschleunigung um mindestens ein Stadium zum gleichen Zeitpunkt. Das entspricht bei den üblichen Auftriebszeiten nicht mehr dem Entwicklungsstadium Ähren/Ri...

In Central Europe, need for restoration arises frequently due to agricultural abandonment, defined as complete withdrawal of agricultural management, changing the perception of the environment as a cultural landscape over time. More recently, tourism became a major user of the landscape and economic force throughout the Alps, securing directly or i...

O objetivo do presente experimento foi medir continuamente valores de pH e temperatura em vacas leiteiras usando uma unidade interna de transmissão de dados sem fio. Valores de pH retículo-ruminais foram medidos automaticamente a cada 600 segundos por um período de 50 dias em três vacas leiteiras Holandesas, no pós-parto recente. Valores de pH retí...

This contribution wants to showcase a project from the Austrian Alps, in which needs of farmers for an economic sustainable production system together with needs for conservation of a traditional alpine landscape were combined and resulted in the creation of a best practice model in the frame of a LEADER+ project (Guggenberger et al., 2014). This w...

Für die Renaturierung von verbuschten Weiden kann das Verfahren der " gezielten Beweidung " angewendet werden. Dabei werden Schafe auf vorher ausgesuchten, verbuschten Flächen entweder gekoppelt oder durch einen Schäfer geführt, um durch hohen kurzzeitigen Weidedruck Zwergsträucher schädigen und Platz für wertvolle Futtergräser zu schaffen und dies...

Die Bewegungsgeschwindigkeit von 19 Weideschafen in den österreichischen Alpen wurde mit GPS-Halsbändern erfasst und auf ihre Einfl ussfaktoren untersucht. Für die Tagesmittelwerte konnte ein statistisches Modell mit hohem Erklärungsgrad erstellt werden. Die mittlere Geschwindigkeit von 110,9 Meter pro Stunde wird in absteigender Reihenfolge von de...

FarmClim aims at contributing to a more considerate use of nitrogen in Austrian agriculture. The transdisciplinary research project attempts to tackle the “science-policy gap” by using a participatory approach, that is, stakeholders influence the research process as much as the scientists strive for the implementation of their ideas. This paper des...

In einer Forschungskooperation zwischen der Schweiz und Österreich wird im Rahmen des Forschungsprojektes FarmLife die Ökobilanzierungsmethode SALCA in ihrem Anwendungsbereich erweitert und an österreichische Bedingungen angepasst. Das erarbeitete Ökobilanzierungskonzept wurde gemeinsam mit der breiten Unterstützung durch die nationale Forschungsge...

Ventilation systems in animal husbandry have to fulfil manifold different tasks such as removing stale air, noxious gases and dust, bringing in fresh air without drafts and cooling down room temperature. All of this is essential for and has great influence on maintaining the health status and welfare of livestock. In the pig fattening industry one...

The aim of the present study was the continuous measurement of ruminal pH in grazing dairy cows to monitor the diets effects on ruminal pH value. A novel indwelling pH-measurement and data transmitting system was given to 6 multiparous cows orally. Ruminal pH was measured every 600 sec over a 40 d period. After barn feeding and changeover to pastur...

Local actors at community level often thrive for energy autarky to decrease the dependence on imported energy resources. We assess the potentials and trade-offs between benefits and costs of increasing levels of energy autarky for a small rural region of around 21,000 inhabitants in Austria. We use a novel modeling approach which couples a regional...

For continuous measurement of pH-value in the reticulorumen, a novel bolus-shaped, sensor measuring unit was used. Shape and size of the sensor allow oral placement of the system in adult cattle. The resulting data (10-minute measuring interval) were saved in a unit (A/D-converter, memory chip) and sent to an external receiver via ISM-band (433 MHz...

The occurrence of transferable diseases in wild animals generally reflects the causative agent’s distribution. The influence of climate change on the prevalence of pathogenic organisms is either exerted directly by causative agents with an increased survival rate as related to higher average annual temperatures, or indirectly because vectors (e.g....

Subacute rumen acidosis (SARA) of ruminants is an important factor in terms of animal health, especially in high yielding cattle. In order to find an accurate method to determine the ruminal pH-value, three methods using eight rumen cannulated cattle were compared. An indwelling measuring unit (sensor) was used for continuous measurement of the rum...

In this paper a methodology for both a qualitative and quantitative assessment of suitability and potential of grazing areas based on GIS (Geographical information Systems) is presented. in the past, the use of Alpine pastures during summer was an economical resource for farmers, which became neglected due to intensification of agriculture after Wo...

In a two factorial experiment 108 multiparous cows (41 Holstein, 36 Simmental, 31 Brown Swiss) were randomly assigned to three levels of crude protein (XP14, XP16 and XP18) and three protein concentrate groups differing in ruminal degradability of crude protein (UDPn, UDPm, UDPh) in the beginning of lactation (21 st-105 th lactation day). The hay a...

An indwelling system for monitoring reticulo-ruminal pH and temperature was assembled. Data were sampled and stored in a memory chip and could be read out via radio transmission to an external receiver. The indwelling system can be administered orally, but to service the measuring units, feeding experiments and measurements were conducted using 5 r...

Introduction Wild animal habitats are greatly influenced by geographical location, structure, climate, fauna and flora and may extend deep into human settlement areas, depending on animal species. While this may be in accordance with ecological requirements, it also poses the danger of animal-human disease transmission. This research project aims a...

In an experiment in Raumberg-Gumpenstein with 32 dairy cows the topic supplementary feeding to pasture was treated. The different supplementary feeding (four experimental groups) brought both a signifi cant effect on feed intake and nutrient supply as well as on performance of milk. In full pasture group a share of 55.5 % pasture forage (= 2,600 kg...

In the past, the use of Alpine pastures during summer was an economical resource for farmers, which became neglected due to intensification of agriculture after World War II. Nowadays Alpine pastures are becoming important again, mainly because of new demand for typical, local products, but also because the extensive management on alpine pastures c...

In the experiment weaned bulls (m) and heifers (w) of the breed Simmental x Simmental (FF), Simmental x Charolais (FC) and Simmental x Limousin (FL) from suck1er cows were fattened with grass silage as forage and two concentrate levels (1 and 2). In level 1 the concentrate amount increased during the fattening period from 2.6kg DM to 3.5kg DM per a...

In a two-factorial experiment 120 Simmental bulls were fed with different amounts of energy and crude protein during the fattening period of 158 to 648 kg of LW. The supply of energy differed in three levels (E1, E2, E3) varying by different amounts of concentrate (E1 1.3 kg DM; E2 2.5 kg DM, E3 increasing amount during fattening period of 2,6 to 3...

In a two-factorial experiment 120 Simmental bulls were fed with different amounts of energy and crude protein during the fattening period of 158 to 648 kg of LW. The supply of energy differed in three levels (E1, E2, E3) varying by different amounts of concentrate (E1 1.3 kg DM; E2 2.5 kg DM, E3 increasing amount during fattening period of 2.6 to 3...

In the present paper the results of an investigation on 30 dairy farms in mountainous grassland regions in Austria are presented. From these farms 11 were managed organically and 19 conventionally. Feed intake, milk yield and nutrient supply as well as nutrient excretion data concerning the dairy cows were collected. Due to the ecological principle...

In two 3 factorial experiments with 6 ruminally fistulated cattle and 12 dairy cows the effects of particle size (H, K, L) and DM content of grass silage (T35, TS0) at different concentrate levels (K25, K55) on feed intake, digestibility and ruminal fermentation patterns were examined. The different particle lengths of grass silage were achieved by...

The effect of ration, sex and slaughter weight was examined using 81 Simmental cattle. According to the experimental design different animal categories (heifers, steers and bulls) were compared at different feeding intensities (high, low, extensive) using grass or corn silage as forage. With heifers and steers, each of the three feeding intensities...

In a grassland farm at BAL Gumpenstein, organic (BE) and conventional farming (KE) were compared in an inter-disciplinary experiment lasting 11 years. The experimental groups differed in the treatment of slurry (aeration and addition of rock-meal in BE), the level of fertilization (147 kg/ha mineral N in KE in addition to slurry), in the method of...

In a grassland farm at BAL Gumpenstein, organic (BE) and conventional farming (KE) were compared in an interdisciplinary experiment lasting 11 years. The experimental groups differed in the treatment of slurry (aeration and addition of rock-meal in BE), the level of fertilization (146 kg/ha mineral N in KE in addition to slurry), in the method of w...

In order to characterize organic and conventional farming, a grassland farm with mowing pasture was divided into an organic (BE) and conventional (KE) experimental unit (forage and slurry were stored separately, cows were housed separately, Figure 1-2). The experimental groups differed in the treatment of slurry (aeration in BE), the level of ferti...

A feeding trial with 96 Simmental heifers was carried out to determine the influence of feeding intensity and slaughter weight on the fattening and slaughter performance. They were under uniform management using two different feeding intensities. The diet of group KF0 consisted of forage only (grass silage ad libitum and 1 kg hay). In group KF2 2 k...