Birds, especially migratory, are a pest for many food and field crops especially sunflowers. Millets, especially pearl with very long upright heads, as they reach maturity are very tempting to birds searching for energy foods as they migrate often thousands of miles. *Starlings and blackbirds*: Back in the late 1970s when I was working for the South Dakota Dept. of Agriculture I fielded calls about migrating birds, notably starlings, blackbirds, and geese. Starlings and blackbirds with flocks in the thousands would sit on mature sunflower heads that were drying down for harvest. It was not unusual for birds to completely clean off the top half of the head. An adequate stand of sunflowers may have 25,000 heads per acre compared to nearby proso millet fields with 1.5 million seed heads. Loss was much more substantial on sunflowers. I will address solutions below, but as a side note, since my job in the Dept. of Ag was marketing, one fall when massive flocks of migrating starlings made worldwide news, I received a telex from a Japanese company wanting quotes on 40-foot containers (40,000 lbs.) of dressed and frozen starling breasts. It was a fleeting market beyond our interest. *Geese*: Snow, blue, Canada geese, and sandhill cranes move through the Central Plains by the thousands in spring and fall. Snow and blue geese tend to not bother crops that are often not planted when they move north in early spring and tend to feed on harvested wheat, barley, millet fields when they move south in late fall. Sandhill cranes also move through in the spring and can destroy much of a field of freshly planted corn before they continue their journey to northern Canada. Canada geese however separate in small flocks and pairs as they move north and settle where water and grains are available all summer. Canada geese, sandhill cranes, and (non-migratory) pheasants are very pesky to corn and sunflower fields shortly after planting as the birds would walk down rows of corn and sunflowers picking out the germinating seed and seedlings. At about a half-cent for each seed, and an uncompensatable stand loss can devastate yields which farmers continually seed solutions. *Solutions*: 1.) Don't plant corn or sunflowers next to sloughs (especially in the Prairie Pothole Region of the Dakotas). 2.) Timed explosive and noise devices are commercially available to scare bird pests. See Bird-X Quad Blaster® Ultrasonic Bird Deterrent Device - QB-4 <https://www.globalindustrial.com/p/bird-x-quad-blaster-174-ultrasonic-bird-repeller?msclkid=49c6a48d80cc1ae5f464c37bfddead68&utm_source=bing&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=%5BADL%5D%20%5BPLA%5D%20%5BtROAS%5D%20(Janitorial%20%26%20Facility%20Maintenance%20-%20Prime)%20-%20%7BBoost%7D&utm_term=4583383008880141&utm_content=(Janitorial%20%26%20Facility%20Maintenance%20-%20Pest%20Control)&adlclid=49c6a48d80cc1ae5f464c37bfddead68>, and 3.) Very small fields and gardens may effectively use bird scare tactics, repellents, and electronic devices. See Bird Bangers - Exempt (15mm 100 Rounds) | Wildlife Control Supplies | Product Code: NWS15MMBB <https://www.wildlifecontrolsupplies.com/animal/NWS15MMBB.html>, and BIRD-X, Outdoor Use, Orange, Visual Bird Repellers - 1DGW8|T-EYES+ - Grainger <https://www.grainger.com/product/BIRD-X-Visual-Bird-Repellers-Outdoor-1DGW8?gucid=N:N:PS:Paid:MS:CSM-2296:LC5DTN:20500731&gclid=1e535c3aa3a81a34aefe3bccdebaca8d&gclsrc=3p.ds&msclkid=1e535c3aa3a81a34aefe3bccdebaca8d>, and Amazon.com: Bird-X <https://www.amazon.com/stores/Bird-X/page/B55D26A1-3E8E-4041-9364-817E01B43711?lp_asin=B001FB6RFA&ref_=ast_bln&store_ref=bl_ast_dp_brandLogo_sto> . 4.) Repellants, like Avipel, when eaten, force birds to announce warning calls. Avipel has been commercially available for decades. See Bird Repellent Seed Corn Treatment | Increase Crop Yield | Avipel <https://avipel.com/>. Lastly, Don mentioned an article by Iowa State University that fields 40 acres or more have lower bird damage. Actually, I suggest that any field less than 40 acres may have less total loss than larger fields which can attract larger flocks over a longer migration pause. Furthermore, pearl millet fields less than 40 acres are generally not intended to be harvested for grain on a commercial and fungible basis....Gary Wietgrefe On Wed, Apr 9, 2025 at 6:02 AM <collab-request@lists.millets2023.space> wrote:
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Today's Topics:
1. Re: Grain pearl millet hybrids in North America for food? (Don Osborn)
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Message: 1 Date: Tue, 8 Apr 2025 12:14:12 -0400 From: Don Osborn <don@milletsalliance.org> To: collab@lists.millets2023.space Subject: Re: [Collab] Grain pearl millet hybrids in North America for food? Message-ID: <CA+RHibWH+N_94enFg9C0t20UrZj= W4TvhcFfVUDxK2Cy2QVitw@mail.gmail.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"
More items on grain pearl millet in North America. First on an older hybrid grain pearl millet, and second on birds:
1. Here's mention of an old grain pearl millet hybrid in the US, HGM 100. I'll reproduce below the relevant text on that and TifGrain 102 from an older USDA ARS page I came across at
https://www.ars.usda.gov/southeast-area/tifton-ga/crop-genetics-and-breeding... :
"HGM 100 was released in the early 1990s. Substantial acreage was planted and most farmers were successful, even though it was a new crop. In the time HGM 100 was grown we learned many things about harvesting and pricing. This hybrid is no longer available on the market.
"TifGrain 102 represents a new generation of pearl millet hybrids for grain. This hybrid is shorter, earlier maturing, and has slightly larger grain and greater ease of combining. In addition, it has resistance to southern and peanut root knot nematodes and better rust resistance. Hybrid seed was available to farmers on a limited basis beginning in 2002. This new hybrid can produce high quality grain without irrigation in Georgia and throughout the southern Coastal Plain and into the Great Plains states."
It would be interesting to know of other pearl millet varieties in North America grown for grain. beyond these two and CGPMH-90.
2. Birds are a risk for grain pearl millet in the field, given the very exposed seeds of the cattail-like panicum. Heard of farmers trying it in Colorado recently, but encountering this issue. Also came across mention specifically of blackbirds "feasting" on it in an old Georgia outdoors forum https://forum.gon.com/threads/pearl-millet.524742/ . An Iowa State University extension page noted the case of birds cleaning off all seed from small plots of pearl millet in Missouri https://www.extension.iastate.edu/alternativeag/pearl-millet
However, predation by birds is obviously not a showstopper in regions where pearl millet is a major crop, so what's happening? Curiously, in West Africa, I didn't come across a great deal of discussion of birds and pearl millet (or for that matter, sorghum, which is also tall and with differently exposed seeds). Some farmers thought trees in/near fields would facilitate bird activity, yet some trees are favored in fields (notably the "reverse season" Acacia albida). I did occasionally see measures to keep birds out of some plots, including gardens (strung up tape from old cassette tapes back in the day, used to spook some birds).
That same ISU extension page cited above suggests that in fields of pearl millet over 40 acres, loss to birds is "typically less than 5-10%." I suppose the logic is that birds are not locusts, but what are acceptable loss levels (of any grain)?
ISU again suggests that keeping pearl millet away from treelines might reduce potential loss from birds (see above mention of farmers in West Africa). A University of Georgia extension brief on TifGrain 102 suggests "planting in May so fields can be harvested before migratory birds pass through in September and October."
https://www.ars.usda.gov/ARSUserFiles/60481000/Pearlmilletforgrain,RevisedGA... . So attention to types of birds in a locality and patterns of behavior that may include migratory species would seem to be essential parts of addressing this potential issue.
Anyway, those are some thoughts.
Don
DO, EL, MI, US NAMA
On Sat, Apr 5, 2025 at 1:04?PM Don Osborn <don@milletsalliance.org> wrote:
Should have caught this earlier, but I just cross-indexed the pearl millet grain source used in the Cheung et al's experimentation with pearl millet flour in breads/1 /2 with the University of Georgia's hybrid feed grain variety, TifGrain 102, which was developed at Tifton, Georgia./3
Dr. Cheung and her colleagues sourced grain of this variety from Kansas State University. I don't recall hearing / reading about its being used for food before.
So, there are a few questions: * How good are the grains from TifGrain 102 for culinary uses? Not suggesting any problem, but how would it compare with common varieties in countries where pearl millet is a staple? * How would it compare in multiple respects with CGPMH-90, a grain pearl millet variety developed by AERC in Ontario?/4 * How many grain pearl millet varieties are currently available in North America?
For the latter question, I'll write Melanie Harrison of USDA in Griffin, Georgia, in hopes she'll be able to help.
Don Osborn, PhD (East Lansing, MI, US) North American Millets Alliance
Notes: 1. https://www.mdpi.com/2304-8158/14/5/871 2. I posted to Collab about this a few days ago: https://lists.millets2023.space/pipermail/collab/2025-April/000781.html 3.
https://extension.uga.edu/publications/detail.html?number=B1216&title=pearl-...
4. https://www.aerc.ca/product/canadian-grain-pearl-millet-hybrid-90/