Use of Specialty Commodity Crop as Alternative on Land Used for and/or Considered for Biofuel Crops to Aid and Maximize Habitat Value for Grassland Dependent Bird Species

The goal will be to monitor fields, planted at different seeding rates of spelt, to determine bird use and breeding. An additional goal will be to monitor the yield of these fields to determine if certain seeding rates, although beneficial to breeding birds, may not be economically beneficial to producers to consider in their rotation. An analysis of the production cost/income of spelt as an alternate crop to production/income of warm season grasses (WSG) that are used for biofuels will be performed.