Sure, it’s still the sweltering summer of 2011, but the cool days of November are just around the corner – so it is time to get that registration in for the 68th Annual Convention of the National Association of Farm Broadcasting (NAFB) November 9-11 in Kansas City, if you haven’t done so yet.
I asked National Cattlemen’s Beef Association (NCBA) President Elect J.D. Alexander some tough questions during the recent Cattle Industry Summer Conference. One such question was, “What is your favorite way to prepare your beef?” His answer – a bone in ribeye prepared on the grill. So I tried it out last night for dinner and boy was it tasty.
OK, so maybe that isn’t really a tough question but Alexander did tell me that the industry is facing some notable legislative issues such as trade issues, GIPSA rules and increasingly difficult environmental standards. So I asked him how does the industry overcome these challenges?
“The bottom line is we’ve got to work together on a state and national level to overcome these issues so we can do better what we do best and that’s producing high quality beef,” said Alexander.
Alexander replied, “I think one of the things is obviously if they’re trying to do some regulation like that they must have a sense we’re not doing it properly right now. I’ve always said as far as the environment goes, we as producers are living off the environment. We grow the crops to feed to the cattle to grow the protein that can be fed to the nation’s population. So because we make a living off the land, we’re going to take care of the land.”
He continued, “I think part of the message is we’re not getting that message out. One of the greatest stories we have is the environmental stewardship awards. We go out to regions across the country and honor producers that are doing great things with how they are preserving and saving and enhancing the environment. We had seven picked at this conference and out of them one will be a winner.”
And NCBA will continue to showcase these forward-thinking cattle producers to help better tell the industry’s story with the goal of reining in some of these regulations that could keep America’s cattle producers from producing an invaluable product.
The RCA (Rotating Cross-Arm) System from Trellis Growing Systems is turning marginal land into profits for many Midwestern farmers who have begun to plant a new cash crop – blackberries. Developed by Indiana grower Richard Barnes, the RCA System enables Midwestern growers to successfully and profitably plant blackberries by overcoming some of the traditional challenges associated with the crop.
Barnes began experimenting with blackberries about 11 years ago and like most growers had issues with different aspects of their operation. He began to do research where he spoke with the USDA who was working on developing a trellis system. After receiving their first grant in 2007, Trellis Growing Systems was born and has since received several other grants.
For the most part, blackberry varieties will not survive the winters in the Midwest. Therefore most blackberries are grown in the more temperate climates of the southern Midwest and the majority of them are coming out of California. But with the development of the RCA System, the game has changed.
“With our technology, the RCA System, we can rotate the canes down near the ground in the winter and if necessary we can cover those canes with a floating row cover,” explained Richard Barnes, creator of the technology and founder of Trellis Growing Systems. “That enables the canes to survive the winter with little to no cane damage, and what this does is open up a whole new opportunity and industry for growers in the Midwest.”
Barnes said growers using this system have been able to earn $45,000+ in revenue per acre. One reason is that per flat prices are higher in July and August when blackberries are harvested in the Midwest, between $15 to $20 per flat. When the majority of blackberries are harvested in May or June in other regions, flat prices are around $12 to $13 per flat.
Trellis Growing Systems, along with Bedford (their manufacturing partner) will be showcasing their blackberry technology during the Farm Progress Show in Decatur, Illinois August 30-September 1, 2011 in booth 575. Barnes said growers can get a personal demonstration of the RCA System anytime during the show, or they can pre-schedule an appointment to learn more by calling him at 260-241-3128. You can also get more information on their website at www.trellisgrowingsystems.com.
How about a customized “Handstand” for your iPad? I’ve been trying one out.
This is a new way to handle and hold your favorite tablet. They’re made for both the iPad and iPad 2. I’ve just started using the Handstand which is made by Hub International. Some of my first impressions include that it’s very sturdy and light weight. The strap stretches to fit your hand and helps you keep a firm grip on your iPad. I’m thinking this would be a good for those of you who may be considering using your iPad for some field scouting or to carry around in the cab of your truck or combine.
HandStand allows you to keep your hand in a comfortable position while turning the iPad for best viewing. It becomes an extension of your body as well as your mind. Hold it effortlessly, spin it portrait or landscape, display the screen to others — work, watch or play effortlessly. You’ll do more with your iPad and get more value out of your investment.
Hub International was founded in 2010 and the Handstand is their first consumer product. Founder Jaime Smith is currently president of Ritter Chemical, national distributor of high quality agrochemicals.
Maybe it’s a circulation problem, I’m not sure, but my feet are always cold. It can be 100 degrees outside and my toes can be ice cold in my flip flops. It’s a problem I’ve always had and a quite frustrating one!
The same holds true for my fingers. Maybe it’s an extremities problem.
Either way, electric blankets are no good because my overall body temperature gets too high, then I can’t sleep. Socks don’t work either – my feet get claustrophobic.
Maybe what I need is this soap stone. It’s a heavy stone that was heated in the oven, wrapped in a towel then placed next to your feet in bed. This was before central heat or boiler systems and floor heat like we have now. It was also used if you were headed out on a long road trip: heat this up and put it in the car on the floorboard to stay warm.
My husband might like it too so I don’t use his legs to warm up my feet!
The Meat Industry Hall of Fame will welcome 12 new inductees, including Clarence Becker, on Nov. 1 at the Union League Club in Chicago.
EPA has awarded the Missouri State Emergency Agency $30,000 to assist with outreach, education and implementation of the Clean Air Act’s Risk Management Program.
It often appears that a major role of the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association (NCBA) is to play “defense” against all the bad policy, press and public opinion that exists. While this is a role of the organization, it is not its only function. I also learned during the Cattle Industry Summer Conference that they also focus on “offensive” tactics like spreading the good word about the nutritional benefits of beef.
I asked Scott George, a producer from Cody, Montana who is also a Vice President of NCBA about some of the defensive issues NCBA is currently engaged in.
“From the defensive portion we’re looking at some ag policy issues. Some of those are trade issues. We’ve been trying to get South Korean free trade agreement, the Panama free trade agreement and Colombian free trade agreement passed,” said George. “For nearly six years now they’ve been hanging on the fence and they have tremendous opportunity for our beef producers. If we can get those approved, we could start exporting produce to those countries that would help our producers.”
George said that according to CattleFax, it is estimated if the U.S. could open those three export markets, it would add another $25 per head for producers. Right now CattleFax estimates that exports are adding $189 in value to every fed cattle coming out of the feed lots today and if the industry could add $25 a head, George said it would help those feed yard producers as well as cow calf producers to remain profitable.
Other issues including defending the industry from the over reach of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). The EPA has decided to grant themselves the right to regulate all water in the United States, said George, which is a huge property rights issue as well as a state’s right issue because it threatens state water right laws as well as personal water right laws. “So we’ve been trying to get that reigned in,” said George. In addition they are dealing with GIPSA rules, dust regulations and fighting against policy that would require producers to monitor greenhouse gas emissions.
On the positive side, NCBA has conducted a lot of research on consumer desires and is working to educate consumers about the health benefits of beef.
Jeff Morgan, Stoller USA is standing next to his good friend and ours, Kip Cullers. Actually it’s a Kip cutout. Jeff was on the floor of InfoExpo to talk about Bio-Forge ST a new seed treatment product that he says is “farmer driven” and has taken off this year.
He says the first question he gets from ag journalists is “How’s it going for you?” The big thing is the crazy weather that has perhaps started to tone down.
At the Ag Media Summit I visited with Monty’s Plant and Soil Products and Gary Coughlin. Thanks to whoever took the photo and posted it on the Monty’s Facebook page! So I asked him, “What’s new?”
Gary says they’ve just released four new products, Corn Blend, Soybean Blend, Cotton Blend and Tobacco Blend. He says they all contain their humic materials, plant food, liquid sugar and appropriate amount of micro nutrients. They can all be applied in furrow, in the row on the seed to enhance the germination of the seed and soil around it.
The Boehringer Ingelheim Vetmedica Swine Health Seminar in North Carolina offered updates in two important swine health areas – mycoplasma hyopneumoniae and PRRS.
Dr. Erin Strait with Iowa State University talked about getting the most out of diagnostics for M. hyopneumoniae. “The biggest issue I usually see is over-interpretation of diagnostics and not understanding that those diagnostics are often skewed towards false negative,” she said. “Mycoplasma hyopneumonia in live pigs can be pretty hard to detect and the diagnostics tend to be a lagging indicator. Determining prevalence in the nursery stage can be very challenging.”
Dr. Rick Tubbs with Green River Swine Consultants is a practicing vet who serves Tosh Farms, a family-owned hog operation in Tennessee. He presented information on the impact of the modified live PRRS virus vaccine for control of PRRS in an endemically infected continuous flow finish site. He described how they ended up with a PCV2 problem which they dealt with by depopulating finisher sites, moving to a wean-to-finish operation, changing wean age and vaccinating all pigs for PCV2.
“This particular virus disease is a constantly evolving challenge and we have to adapt to meet the challenge,” Rick says. “The PCV2 vaccine is a wonderful product. It’s been one of those home runs in the industry.”
It’s time to analyze some new data about farm computer use and ownership. USDA’s National Agricultural Statistic Service has released a new report, “Farm Computer Usage and Ownership, August 2011.” Here’s the opening summary. It’s interesting to see that dialup access has dropped in half since the last report in 2009. Also note how high the percentages get as you increase the income of the farm.
DSL was the most common method of accessing the Internet, with 38 percent of U.S. farms using it, up from 36 percent in 2009. Dialup access dropped from 23 percent in 2009 to 12 percent in 2011. Satellite and wireless were each reported as the primary Internet access methods on 15 and 20 percent of those U.S. farms with Internet access, respectively. Cable was reported as the primary access method on 11 percent of the farms, the same level as 2009.
A total of 62 percent of U.S. farms now have Internet access, compared with 59 percent in 2009. Sixty-five percent of farms have access to a computer in 2011, up 1 percentage point from 2009. The proportion of U.S. farms owning or leasing a computer in 2011, at 63 percent, was up 2 percentage points from 2009. Farms using computers for their farm business remained virtually stable at 37 percent in 2011 compared to 36 percent in 2009. (more…)
“Hog Economics in the Biofuels Era” was the topic of a presentation by Purdue University economist Dr. Chris Hurt at the Boehringer Ingelheim Vetmedica Swine Health Seminar in North Carolina.
Dr. Hurt says government policies like biofuels and even food stamps were built upon a “psychology of surplus” to increase prices. “We continue to see a psychology of surplus in our policy from Washington, when it turns out we are in a period of shortage of basic food ingredients,” he said.
Hurt says that corn for ethanol has been a demand shock for the market since 2005, but another big demand shock has been soybeans to China. “If you put it on acres of land, back in 2005 we were using about 16 million acres for those two demands,” he said. “By the time we got to the 2010 crop, that was 46 million acres – almost a tripling of the acreage.”
The hog industry has finally reduced herds enough to adjust to the higher feed prices, which has increased consumer prices for pork and that has led to stagnated growth for domestic consumption. However, Hurt says exports are increasing tremendously and now make up 20% of production, with big demand coming from Mexico and China in particular.
USDA resource soil scientist Frank Gibbs likes to dig in the dirt a lot. He is a certified professional soil scientist and classifier and chairs the Ohio Soil Scientist Certification Board for the Soil Science Society of America. When it comes to soil, he really knows his stuff and he has a great perspective on how lucky we are in this country to have such productive land.
Watch his entertaining and informative presentation on the soil pit he dug on Dean Farms:
Nobody talks common sense about animal welfare better than Dr. Temple Grandin of Colorado State University.
If you are in the livestock industry, unless you live in a cave, you have heard of Dr. Grandin. In fact, a decent portion of the general public now knows this amazing woman, thanks to the HBO movie starring Claire Danes which celebrates Temple’s triumph over autism. That movie and her best-selling books have allowed her to get out and talk to the general public about animal welfare issues, something she considers to be very important for the livestock industry to do.
Temple spoke this morning to the Boehringer Ingelheim Vetmedica Swine Health Seminar in North Carolina. One of her suggestions about handling pigs humanely and effectively is to walk the pens. “Pigs are visual animals,” she explains. “Walk the pens and teach them to follow you.”
ANIMART, Inc. announces the recent addition of Renee Sternhagen as client services representative of the dairy and livestock division which provides animal health products, supplies and solutions to producers.
The American Meat Science Association in cooperation with the National Pork Board will host AMSA PORK 101 Sept. 20-22, 2011, at Iowa State University in Ames.
Kathy Rancour, accounting manager for Christiansen Land and Cattle Company, based in Kimball, SD, was elected to serve as the president of the Farm Financial Standards Council.
Growers Transplanting, Inc. launched its website as the company celebrates 30 years of industry success.
Participants on this week’s he 2011 CTIC Conservation In Action Tour in Ohio heard a clear case for cover crops from farmer Allen Dean in Williams County.
“For several years now we’ve been watching our watersheds when we get these large rainfall events and it’s been interesting to see where we have some type of cover crop, water coming off those watersheds is virtually clean – you could actually drink the water, it’s so clean,” Allen said. He demonstrated the difference to the tour group with jars of water collected off fields after recent rains. He’s holding the jar with water from his fields.
Dean Farms grows wheat and non-GMO soybeans on 1900 acres where they plant a variety of cover crops, including annual rye, cereal rye, clover and radishes. “We’ve been using radishes for 4-5 years now,” he said. “They’re called a daikon radish and the advantage of radishes is they’ll actually open up the soil, they’ll drill down deep into the soil, they have a long tap root and a lot of ladder roots.” When winter comes, the radishes die and start decomposing and come spring “the soil is clean as far as any type of residue.”
I thought this was a cool story to share from the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally. These bikers are huge supporters of our military men and women and it showed.
The Traveling Wall by AVTT was on display at the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally. This wall contains names of those who have lost their life in service to our country, defending our freedom. I met Charlie Weatherly and John Barron both of whom work for AVTT and travel with the exhibit. Outside of the interview with them which you can listen to below John told me that he’s been using ethanol mixed fuel in his motorcycle for years and has never had any problems with it. I had to make sure I asked since my coverage of the rally, mostly on Domestic Fuel, is sponsored by the Renewable Fuels Association.
AVTT (www.avtt.org) is a veteran-owned project that travels the USA to provide a forum for communities to HONOR-RESPECT-REMEMBER all who have sacrificed their lives for our country’s freedom. In so doing, AVTT also honors all Veterans and those currently serving, by letting them know they will never be forgotten. AVTT is funded through sponsorship fees, donations, and sale of merchandise at events. Donations to support AVTT’s mission are qualified charitable tax deductions through The Traveling Wall Foundation, a 501 (c)(3) charitable organization.
I’ve seen them used as decorations on the front porch, or as bar stools in the shop, or flower planters … but in the early days, these cream cans were actually used for agricultural purposes. It’s just that – a 5-gallon cream can that folks used to set at the end of the driveway and once a week, a truck would come pick them up to take them to the creamery where butter and cheese were made.
The cream would rise to the top of the can during its fateful ride and any spill or leak from the can was costly to the farmer.
Some reports I’ve read say the first bulk storage tanks came into existence in the late 1930s.
Either way, I can’t imagine setting a can of milk at the end of my driveway in the 110-degree heat we’ve been having.
Al Bensch, vice president of northern operations for The Andersons Plant Nutrient Group, spoke on one of the three tour buses as we drove past much of the company’s Maumee, Ohio operations. “We have 27 locations in the fertilizer business – Ohio, Michigan, Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin, Minnesota and Florida,” Al said. “We handled last year a little over two million tons of fertilizer.”
The diversified company, which was started in the late 1940′s by Harold Anderson, has various business divisions in addition to plant nutrients, including the grain and ethanol, railcar leasing and repair, turf products production, and consumer retailing industries.
We made a very brief stop at the Anderson family compound where we heard from the Plant Nutrient Group president Denny Addis about the Andersons’ commitment to agriculture and the environment. “Production agriculture and care for the environment are not mutually exclusive, they need to work in harmony together,” he told me in an interview. “We’ve got to continue to find more ways to produce more fiber, more food, more energy for the world at the same time make sure we care for the environment.”
I’m betting there are a few Toby Keith fans out there in the AgWired community so I thought I’d share a photo from his performance at the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally at the Buffalo Chip Campground. After a long day of working with the Renewable Fuels Association on their sponsorship of the rally it’s really nice to kick back and enjoy some good music. I’ve got more photos online, including opening act Poison and from Monday’s bands. Tonight’s feature is Gregg Allman and I plan to be there.
In this week's program Chuck talks with David Armano, Global Innovation and Integration.
David conducted a presentation on delivering expert opinion via social media to an audience at the start of International Poultry Expo week. He's got some great information about who consumers trust and how you can use today's consumer behavior to help communicate your message.
Sure, it’s still the sweltering summer of 2011, but the cool days of November are just around the corner – so it is time to get that registration in for the 68th Annual Convention of the National Association of Farm Broadcasting (NAFB) November 9-11 in Kansas City, if you haven’t done so yet. 
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Dr. Rick Tubbs with Green River Swine Consultants is a practicing vet who serves Tosh Farms, a family-owned hog operation in Tennessee. He presented information on the impact of the modified live PRRS virus vaccine for control of PRRS in an endemically infected continuous flow finish site. He described how they ended up with a PCV2 problem which they dealt with by depopulating finisher sites, moving to a wean-to-finish operation, changing wean age and vaccinating all pigs for PCV2.
“Hog Economics in the Biofuels Era” was the topic of a presentation by Purdue University economist Dr. Chris Hurt at the 
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Nobody talks common sense about animal welfare better than Dr. Temple Grandin of Colorado State University.
Temple spoke this morning to the 
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Al Bensch, vice president of northern operations for The Andersons Plant Nutrient Group, spoke on one of the three tour buses as we drove past much of the company’s Maumee, Ohio operations. “We have 27 locations in the fertilizer business – Ohio, Michigan, Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin, Minnesota and Florida,” Al said. “We handled last year a little over two million tons of fertilizer.”
We made a very brief stop at the Anderson family compound where we heard from the Plant Nutrient Group president Denny Addis about the Andersons’ commitment to agriculture and the environment. “Production agriculture and care for the environment are not mutually exclusive, they need to work in harmony together,” he told me in an interview. “We’ve got to continue to find more ways to produce more fiber, more food, more energy for the world at the same time make sure we care for the environment.”
In this week's program Chuck talks with David Armano, Global Innovation and Integration.
