I had only a very few minutes this year to stick my head in the door at Freedom Hall here at the Kentucky State Fairgrounds for the Championship Tractor Pull. But it was an exciting few minutes watching some high horsepower in action. You absolutely have to have ear plugs or else. The action ends tomorrow with championship rounds. I’ll be long gone by then.
Today I’m hunting some more interviews and will be sharing them over the next week or so.
Farm Industry News held its annual FinOvation Awards dinner here at the National Farm Machinery Show last night. A lot of the winners were on hand including our sponsor New Holland. Pictured are Gary Wojcik (left) and Mark Hooper with their award:
Tractors: High horsepower, 4WD – T9 with SmartTrax, New Holland
The T9 4WD tractor with tracks from New Holland takes the FinOvation honors in the high-horsepower 4WD category. The new SnartTrax option consists of four belted rubber tracks designed to reduce soil compaction and slippage created by these 600-plus-hp tractor. They also can provide a ride over bumps that is smoother than that of wheel tractors. While the tractor is premium-priced offering, its tracks have features to balance out the cost. One of those is its single-wheel design, which allows you to bolt the tracks onto the same axle as the tires. This design allows you to switch out wheels for tracks, depending on field conditions. Visit newholland.com/na.
You can find lists and descriptions all the winners on the Farm Industry News website.
Some recent research has uncovered some significant health benefits to maple syrup. So when attend this year’s Maple Weekend in New York, held March 16-17 and March 23-24, remember there is a little more to it then it’s simple sweet taste.
University of Rhode Island researcher Navindra Seeram has found 20 compounds in maple syrup that play an important role in our health.
“I continue to say that nature is the best chemist, and that maple syrup is becoming a champion food when it comes to the number and variety of beneficial compounds found in it,” Seeram said. “It’s important to note that in our laboratory research we found that several of these compounds possess anti-oxidant and anti-inflammatory properties, which have been shown to fight cancer, diabetes and bacterial illnesses.”
Did you know a quarter of a cup of maple syrup has more calcium than the same amount of milk or that there is more potassium in maple syrup than a banana?
More than 100 maple syrup producers across New York State open their sugarhouses to the public and share their secrets. Maple Weekend is open from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. each day where visitors can learn about tree tapping, boiling and even do some taste testing. Oh, by the way, admission is free.
A list of sugarhouses and maps can be found online at www.mapleweekend.com. Production techniques from vary from producer to producer. See state-of-the-art maple tapping one day and then traditional tapping the next.
We hear a lot about weed resistance but don’t forget about insect resistance. That’s why I visited with Adam Prestegord (not pictured), product manager for FMC’s insecticide business. We talked about Capture LFR. This product protects a seed or young seedling, even a biotech variety, before an insect can do some damage!
Farmers can use liquid Capture LFR as an at-plant insecticide to create a zone of protection. This means healthier plant stands, increased root size and ultimately greater yield. Learn more about what FMC is doing in this are in my interview with Adam at the National Farm Machinery Show.
You can listen to my interview with Adam here: Interview with Adam Prestegord
New Holland is integrating its construction business more closely with agriculture and that was on display here at the National Farm Machinery Show. One of those items on display is a mini excavator. I learned about it by visiting with Barry Newton, seen here talking with a customer.
Barry says an excavator is a great machine for moving dirt and doing clean up work such as ditch banks and tree removal. He says it’s just a handy machine to have on the farm. In my interview you’ll hear Barry talk about some other ways an excavator can be useful on the farm.
You can listen to my interview with Barry here: Interview with Barry Newton
Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack has shaken up the meat and poultry industry with his comments about how sequestration might impact agriculture during a speech to the National Ethanol Conference last week.
Answering a question about funding for a farm bill, Vilsack talked more broadly about what might happen after March 1 if Congress fails to act and sequester creates automatic budget cuts. “It is likely if sequester is triggered that in our food safety area we will have to furlough workers for a period of a couple of weeks,” Vilsack said, adding that would cause plants to shut down, supplies to decline and prices to go up for consumers.
Those comments generated reaction from the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association (NCBA) and the American Meat Institute. “(W)e are severely disappointed Secretary Vilsack has chosen to take this path of threatening to halt FSIS inspections.” said NCBA president Scott George. AMI President J. Patrick Boyle wrote to both Secretary Vilsack and President Obama stressing USDA’s legal obligations to provide meat inspection even under sequestration.
Secretary Vilsack responded that taking inspectors off the job would be a last resort, but is a very real possibility. “Unfortunately, unless Congress acts to prevent sequestration, FSIS will have no choice but to furlough its employees in order stay within the budget Congress has given it,” Vilsack wrote. “Because we understand that furloughing our food safety inspectors would not be good for our consumers, the economy, the meat and poultry industry, or our workforce, we view such furloughs as the last option we would implement to achieve the necessary sequestration cut.”
Listen to Vilsack at ethanol conference comment about sequester impacts on ag: Vilsack on sequester at NEC
The National Cattlemen’s Beef Association is hard at work advocating for beef producers year-round, but during the Cattle Industry Convention they get to hear with cattlemen and women from across the country.
During this year’s event I talked with Colin Woodall, Vice President of Government Affairs for NCBA. To start off our chat I asked him about some of the 2012 successes they are proud to share.
“There are a couple of great successes. One of the top successes was the fact we were able to get the exemption amounts for the death tax put into permanent law. That was a huge victory for the cattle industry because for several years every two years we would have to defend our position. To be able to have our $5 million exemption per person and our $10 million per couple in permanent law is just great for the entire industry. We were also able to shut down the EPA efforts to regulate ag dust. Another great win. So those are two of the really big ones that we had and then just last week we were victorious in getting more beef access into Japan.”
Coming down the pipeline for 2013, Colin shared that they are still working on the Farm Bill, but it is slow moving. They are also battling activist groups trying to remove the use of antibiotics, dealing with immigration and border control, as well as the continue fight with the EPA.
Listen to my complete interview with the Colin: Interview with Colin Woodall
You can find photos from the event here:Cattle Industry Convention & NCBA Trade Show Photo Album
I have a neighbor up the road who has a giving heart. When we first moved in and got a stand of grass established, she’s the one who added color by bringing down about 15 5-gallon buckets full of a variety of flowers she’d dug up and transplanted from around their farm. When we added the landscaping around the front sidewalk, she brought down even more color. Color that other people have paid good money for!
I went to try to return the favor this weekend and you know the type – you try to do a good deed and end up leaving with more things than what you came with. You return a bowl, they send you home with lunch for the next day, some vegetable seeds for your garden and an invitation for dinner the next week!
Last week she had neck surgery (had plates fused together), but when I stopped by to drop off some books for her, the longer I stood there talking, the more likely I knew she’d be to find something to send home. So here are the goodies – a carton of home-grown eggs.
They’re brown, but don’t think anything of that. They all taste the same!
And at the end, she dropped in an invitation for my son to go visit the hen house some evening.
Sometimes I wish she’d just let me return the favor!
Until we walk again …
Ever wondered about the fruits of your labor? Soybean growers from around the country had the opportunity to see all the different products made from soybeans during the Farmers Las Vegas Tour (or should we say BioVegas tour) where they visited the Rebel Oil Fuel Terminal, the Biodiesel of Las Vegas plant, and the SYNLawn showroom, where where soybeans are used in the backings of carpets and artificial grass. The tour took place during the National Biodiesel Board (NBB) Conference & Expo in Vegas.
While en route to the locations, I visited with two soybean farmers. Dan Brandt is with the Minnesota Soybean Growers Association (MSGA). He and his wife farm 650 acres, half soybeans and half corn near Yoda, MN. As co-chair of domestic marketing for MSGA he works closely with the National Biodiesel Board and the United Soybean Board to enhance and develop programs to increase the use of biodiesel and other products made from soybeans.
Listen to my interview with Dan here: Working Together to Enhance Biodiesel
I also spoke with Lewis Bainbridge who is with the United Soybean Board and is a soybean grower near Ethan, South Dakota. As a farmer and livestock producer he has been involved and supportive of biodiesel for a very long time and the state of South Dakota was actually one of the first states to get the NBB going. He said he enjoyed the clip that highlighted the past 20 years, and in the early 90s there was a kickoff event in South Dakota and Bainbridge was there. This he said, was how he got started using biodiesel.
You can hear more about the collaborative efforts of the soybean groups in my interview with Lewis: Soybean Groups Collaborate for Success
Check out the pictures of the tour in the 2013 National Biodiesel Conference Photo Album
