Farmer Handbook reporting the outcome of participatory research findings

Summary

In this series of 12 technical leaflets we are presenting a selection of results and recommendations of the work undertaking in SOLID aimed at those working in the organic and low-input dairy industries. An overall introduction provides a short overview of the SOLID project and the work on innovation through stakeholder engagement (WP1). The results presented in the technical notes are derived from the participatory research but also from more traditional scientific experiments carried out as part of the SOLID project. The technical notes cover three thematic areas which we believe are particularly important for organic and low-input farming: Five notes are related to the feeding of ruminants with forage based diets and home-grown feeds, three notes relate to breed choice and animal management for health and welfare and well four notes cover wider issues of the environment and economics of organic and low-input.