Over­coming borders with Miscanthus

Roaring into life the harvester drives into the last of Roland Schaumberger’s lush miscanthus crop, which is some­times over four meters high, chop­ping it into small pieces and depositing the mate­rial into the loading wagon, driven along­side. Roland and his wife Elke Gültner are very satis­fied as the chopper eats its way through the light brown lignin-containing crop.

The miscanthus is super light and the wagon is quickly filled, even though the whole thing only weighs five tons. Culti­vating a total of 800ha of arable land in the north­western corner of the Czech Republic, five years ago Roland planted the first rhizomes (thick­ened stems from which roots and shoots grow) of the miscanthus (lat. miscanthus x gigan­teus), also known as Chinese silver grass.

The miscanthus is impres­sive – lush in growth, imposing in size and peren­nial – it looks rather like the better-known but much smaller water reed, espe­cially after a long winter when the leaves have died off completely and only the thick stems, which are not hollow, stretch upwards. Grown for its fiberous biomass, this year the yield of Roland’s miscanthus’ is between 11 and 14t/ha.

Weather extremes in spring

And the 59-year-old knows exactly what he is talking about, who with his team now culti­vates 250ha of this promising raw mate­rial. “We harvested for the first time in 2022,” he says. “We are now in the third year and are still as enthu­si­astic about the plant and its harvest.”

This year’s season was initially not very promising, with the whole winter being extremely wet. This weather pattern did not change through March and April, and to make matters worse, there was a sudden heavy snow­fall in mid-April, which caused some parts of the crop to break in the stems under the weight. Fortu­nately, the snow melted quite quickly, and the crop was not completely flat­tened, which would have other­wise made harvest incred­ibly diffi­cult.

The harvest, which usually takes place at the end of March at the earliest, was delayed until the first days of May, falling on a sunny public holiday with many people out for long bike rides through the beau­tiful Czech low moun­tain range. But not Schaum­berger & Co, from morning until late at night, Roland and his team were busy with the harvest.

Harvester oper­ator Stefan Erthner recalls chop­ping the crop long after sunset, with the interim storage facility already full to the brim, and the harvesting team having to unload their fibre loads in front of the town hall. The pile swelled in height and width, and as rain was already fore­cast for the next day, everyone involved had to temporarily cover the fluffy mate­rial with a tarpaulin shortly before midnight. Not an easy task; those who climbed up the pile almost sank into the mass.

Handling of the harvested crop

A hinder­ance at harvest, but a quality of the crop, is miscanthus’ capacity to absorb around 400 times its own weight in mois­ture – already capi­talised on with Roland’s crop used to make cat litter and bedding mate­rial for horses, which also benefit from its hypoal­ler­genic-like quality. However, a new market he would like to explore is horti­cul­ture.

Miscanthus is consid­ered by many to be a strong contender as a peat substi­tute. “Thanks to its extremely high-water reten­tion capacity, and low weight, it is a real alter­na­tive to peat – which will no longer be allowed in amateur horti­cul­ture in just a few years,” explains Georg Völk­ering, an exper­i­mental tech­ni­cian at the Univer­sity of Bonn’s Faculty of Agriculture’s Insti­tute of Crop Sciences and Resource Conser­va­tion (INRES).  

Although an esti­mated 5,000ha of miscanthus have already been planted, the big break­through is yet to come, as the soil industry has not yet moved to this renew­able raw mate­rial, despite many discus­sions and good inten­tions. Regard­less of its use in potting soil, Völk­ering says that the tall-growing reed also has a remark­able climate protec­tion effect. “One tonne of dry matter binds 1.5 tons of carbon dioxide (CO₂), which could generate addi­tional income in a func­tioning certifi­cate trade,” he empha­sises.

The perma­nent crop serves well

In addi­tion, the mini­mally inva­sive perma­nent crop can also play a major role in flood protec­tion. Partic­u­larly useful on the edges of fields and on river­banks, it slows down flooding through humus forma­tion in the soils, deep rooting and high water absorp­tion – protecting the soil and land­scape from erosion. This is also evident at a field research site in Bengen, Germany, where farmer Gerd Möhren has been culti­vating miscanthus for years. On his farm, scien­tists from the Univer­sity of Bonn have been able to prove that the plant helps to reduce the risk of flooding.

While miscanthus is not grown in water, it still copes very well with annual precip­i­ta­tions of up to 800 millime­tres. Inci­den­tally, that is approx­i­mately the amount of rain­fall that occurs on the Schaum­bergers’ land. And the mighty plant is not partic­u­larly picky when it comes to soil condi­tions and quality. “It adapts to sandy soils, but also to heavier clay soils,” explains Roland, standing among blos­soming apple trees at the edge of a plot that slopes down to the shore of Amerika lake.

“You have to under­stand the plant, for it to fulfil your expec­ta­tions,” he continues. “This hill­side loca­tion suits the miscanthus; it can tolerate high rain­fall but dislikes standing in water, which can kill the crop. “It also requires very little nitrogen and is easy to grow – it is also resis­tant to fungi and viruses. The only crop that should not be planted before it is maize; the corn borer (a maize pest) also likes to nibble on the tender rhizomes of the miscanthus.”

Pioneering success with Miscanthus

The pioneering success that the Schaum­bergers have expe­ri­enced with miscanthus has given them lasting inspi­ra­tion. In the future, they want to expand their growing area, ideally by prop­a­gating their own rhizomes, which they have so far had to import from Austria. But it is not only the grass crop that is part of the renew­able frac­tion of their enter­prise; they have been culti­vating hemp just as success­fully for many years. In addi­tion to its use as a natural fibre, Elke Gültner and Roland Schaum­berger and his brother André have devel­oped an impres­sively wide range of inno­v­a­tive prod­ucts in recent years – finding end users through tradi­tional retail outlets and an online shop. Tea, oils, syrups, nuts, skin creams, and even sparkling wine with hemp notes are avail­able.

The diver­si­fi­ca­tion of the Schaumberger’s enter­prise was not without risk and required large invest­ments. To be able to manage this as a family-run agri­cul­tural busi­ness at all, the family founded the Agronaro coop­er­a­tive in 2010. The Agronaro has grown from six members to 1,500 members and has invested around 30 million euros since its foun­da­tion. The members consciously choose renew­able energy for their invest­ments and reap solid returns. And while André takes care of both the coop­er­a­tive and inno­v­a­tive prod­ucts, and new markets at the Agronaro head­quar­ters in Cheb (Eger), the young, moti­vated team around Elke and Roland focuses on sustain­able regrowth in the heart of Europe, true to their motto ‘We like crossing borders’.