Sophie Kuijper Dickson, LJI Journalist

A conversation amongst farmers questioning the request they adapt their practices to protect threatened grassland birds dominated a presentation about climate-friendly agricultural practices given at the Little Red Wagon Winery last Wednesday evening.

The event, co-organized by the Pontiac and Gatineau chambers of commerce, saw cattle farmers from across the Outaouais pack the venue to hear from agronomist Nathalie Côté on best practices for reducing methane gas produced by their animals and for supporting on-farm biodiversity.

Côté, herself a cattle producer who works with Les Producteurs de bovins du Québec, highlighted that 10 per cent of greenhouse gas emissions (GHGs) in Quebec are produced by the agricultural industry.

“We have some responsibility in the agricultural sector to take steps to reduce our GHGs,” she said to the crowd, making the case that the reduction of emissions from agricultural practices is a convenient consequence of increasing on-farm efficiency, and framing her presentation in terms of the latter.

She discussed various techniques for increasing farm efficiency so as to produce more meat in less time, with fewer inputs, including ways to optimize feed to reduce methane produced by the animal and tips for improving livestock efficiency through genetics and strategic culling.

It’s thanks to practices like these and others that Canada’s beef industry has been able to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 15 per cent between 2014 and 2021, according to a 2024 report published by the Canadian Roundtable for Sustainable Beef. The roundtable figures the industry is responsible for 2.4 per cent of Canada’s total greenhouse gas emissions, and has committed to reducing this contribution by a third before 2030.

But it was when Côté’s presentation turned to discussing some of the ways in which farmers can support biodiversity on their agricultural land that attendees started asking questions, the first of which came from Clarendon farmer Ron Hodgins.

“When did these wild birds become so important? [ . . . ] What is the purpose of a Bobolink?” he asked, following several slides highlighting precautions being taken by Quebec farmers to limit disturbance of the Eastern Meadowlark and the Bobolink, grassland birds which for over a decade have been considered “threatened” by Environment Canada, only one stop short of “endangered”.

Governments and conservation groups are concerned for these birds’ survival, as increased agricultural activity in their nesting grounds over the last half century has caused a decrease in their populations.

An Environment Canada report published in 2019 found that since 1970, the population of grassland birds has decreased 67 per cent.

Farmers are being encouraged to modify hay production practices during the weeks the bird is nesting in their hayfields between April and July, a period that usually, and inconveniently, coincides with the most effective time to harvest their hay.

The precautions shared by Côté included slowing mowing speed to 10 kilometres an hour or less, or mowing a hayfield from its center to its perimeter, rather than the reverse, so the birds are able to get out of the way.

“Before 2020, I never talked about birds to my producers,” Côté said, in answer to Hodgins’ question, adding she saw governments start paying more attention to biodiversity efforts in the last five or so years.

At the 2022 United Nations Biodiversity Conference in Montreal, 200 countries committed to protecting 30 per cent of their country’s land and freshwater ecosystems by the year 2030. Quebec’s Ministry of Environment committed to this target a year earlier.

“All those new orientations of the government gets us aware that [ . . . ] our production can do more for biodiversity. So it’s a positive thing for our production,” Côté emphasized.

But Hodgins expressed what he found to be a contradiction between the first part of her presentation, which encouraged practices such as cutting hay early to optimize its nutritional content, and the second part, which encouraged delaying hay cutting to protect grassland birds.

“We’re slowing down our haycutting procedure so they can fly out of the field. Well that’s not saving the environment and methane, and we’re burning more fuel to get that crop off,” he said. “One hand’s not working with the other.”

‘Everybody’s got to do a little bit’

For Victor Drury, who runs a 295-head cow-calf production with his father in La Pêche, supporting on-farm biodiversity is not his priority, but neither is it at odds with his regular production methods.

He works with the Alternative Land Use Services (ALUS) program, which pays him for every acre he sets aside to use for grazing or hay later in the season.

“They’ll pay you for the reduced quality of your hay, if you’re cutting it for hay, or the later pasture, if it’s not as vegetative,” Drury explained, noting setting aside certain land fits well within the rotational grazing he already practices.

“That just happens to promote biodiversity. Now, that’s not my goal. My goal is to raise cattle and feed my family,” he said. “The advantage of doing this particular program is it doesn’t cost me anything, and I happen to be doing this other benefit that people seem to think is valuable.”

Blake Draper is the MRC des Collines-de-l’Outaouais representative for Les Producteurs de bovins du Québec. He also works with ALUS to protect certain parts of his land.

“As far as what I’m doing, I’m just allowing [the birds] a little more room to work, And, birds eat insects,” he pointed out, following Côté’s presentation. “I figure everybody’s got to do a little bit.”

Stanley Christensen is a cattle farmer from Lac-Sainte-Marie in the Gatineau Valley, and also the Outaouais-Laurentides representative for Les Producteurs de bovins du Québec.

During the conversation about why farmers should care to change their practices in favour of supporting biodiversity, he said he believes making efforts to do so is critical to maintaining the trust of the general public that farmers are, as they have always been, caretakers of the land.

“We’ve got to find ways of averaging things out and showing that we are good citizens, we are taking care of the environment, and that we are of benefit to all of Canadian society by using things like this,” Christensen said.

“So I push as hard as I can to try to develop these programs, and find a way to benefit producers. And if we do get compensation per acre, that’s part of it, but the first thing is to convince society that we’re doing a good job taking care of the future of Canada.”