Growing up on a corn and soybean farm in Illinois is really what led Nick Fassler to his role at BASF Crop Protection in helping farmers keep their crops healthier.
“We raised about 1200 acres of corn and soybeans,” Nick told me during an interview at Commodity Classic, noting that he got his undergrad degree from Western Illinois and got a Masters in Crop Science from the University of Illinois. “The chemical protection business really intrigued me and encouraged me to go into graduate school.”
Nick started with BASF right out of graduate school eight years ago and is now Technical Market Manager, primarily responsible for row crop fungicides with corn and soybeans – mainly Headline and Headine AMP. “Our pipeline and the amount of products we’ve been launching in the last several years has kept us busy,” he says, adding that it’s rewarding for him to educate growers about those new products to bring value to their farm and help them be more productive.
Nick expects 2012 to be an interesting year for insect and disease pressure. “We have a lot of early season seedling diseases that seed treatments provide protection from, but with the foliar fungicides we’re primarily looking at those reproductive stages, July-August-September time frame,” he said, encouraging growers to take preventative action and do active scouting throughout the season.
Listen to my interview with Nick Fassler here: Nick Fassler with BASF
This week I get back on the agriblogging highway to the 2012 Animal Agriculture Alliance Stakeholders Summit. My coverage will be made possible again this year by the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association and the United Soybean Board. The theme is Real Farmers Real Food: Celebrating Tradition and Technology and I’ll be conducting interviews to share with you.
We have a full lineup of speakers who will help us learn effective communication strategies for how to deal with all that’s going on in this sector of the agribusiness industry today. We’ll hear lessons learned in Europe and from media representatives here in the United States. You can find an agenda here (pdf). My coverage starts on Wednesday.
BTW. You can tweet or follow along on Twitter using the conference hashtag which is #AAA12.
Our first BASF Production Poll is in the can and it was no surprise to find that growers are overwhelmingly optimistic about the 2012 growing season.
According to the poll:
65% of farmers think things are looking up this year.
29% say it’s about the same
Just 6% think this year will be worse and that winter did their fields no favors
With planting now well underway and ahead of normal, we are definitely hearing that weed resistance is a major concern this year – all over the country now. Each year the problem is getting more challenging, so we want to know – how are you controlling resistant weed on your farm this year?
When I was growing up, my mom had a job working at the high school and every morning she’d leave me with my day’s “to do” list of chores. This included dusting (which was my absolute least favorite), vacuuming, organizing, taking trash out, sweeping, watering plants … you see the trend. They were pretty mindless jobs that kept a 12-year-old out of trouble for most of the day and I didn’t mind because I could listen to music and be in my own little world. And, I always felt like my life had purpose because mom put ME in charge of making lunch for my dad. I was so proud that he no longer had to eat grilled cheese sandwiches.
*Note: There’s nothing wrong with grilled cheese sandwiches, in fact, I love them. But dad would butter some bread, put it in the toaster, slap on a slice of cheese and then microwave it. Talk about mushy, soggy sandwiches!! He had it all wrong.
Now that I’m older, I wish my dad would’ve included me in more farm chores so I could’ve learned about the in’s and out’s of agriculture; but he was of the thought that it wasn’t safe to have girls on the farm or around the big equipment. Nonetheless, the chores I had kept me occupied without the television on, and even when I got in trouble for just dusting around the knick-knacks instead of removing all of them and THEN dusting, that was my purpose those few summers until I got a job.
Things were a little different for my grandfather when he was a boy. Listen to his story about some of HIS boyhood chores.
Listen to Grandpa explainUntil we walk again …
While Cindy and Chuck are traveling around the country bringing you real agricultural news, I’m chillin on this beautiful day in my corn watch. Yes, you heard me right, I have an environmentally friendly watch that is partly made from corn.
Sprout Watches manufactures a line of eco-friendly watches that contain corn resin and bamboo. The watches come in multiple colors, but I chose white because of its neat design on the watch face. Each color watch has a different earth themed design to go along with its earth themed materials.
But back to the corn resin. It’s used as a component of the plastic, rather than using petroleum-based products. Nice, right? Sprout promotes the technology on its website and notes that corn resin pellets sequester far less fossil fuel and emits much less greenhouse gases. In addition, the watches are biodegradable and will not leach toxins into the ground. If you want to learn more, they have some neat graphics to demonstrate the process from stalk to watch.
So why am I sharing this story with you? Because it is another example of what our corn farmers across the country are bringing us today and a glimpse of what they will be helping to bring to use in the future – a myriad of products that are petroleum free.
GROWMARK’s gold-standard internship program is over 50 years old and it keeps growing because they are using all of the latest social media tools to reach students about the potential for career opportunities within the vast cooperative system.
“Social media has allowed us to continue to enhance our traditional recruiting efforts,” says University Relations Manager Ashley McClintock. “We utilize Facebook, Twitter and Linkedin to connect with individuals who may not have met otherwise and it allows us to stay in touch when we’re not on campus.”
Ashley says they also use social media to inform students about career fairs and other events. “We’ve also handed out cards that show the event so students can partake in conversation and even win prizes,” she said.
The 12-week GROWMARK internship program allows students to get hands-on experience in various areas. “This is a win-win for the students and GROWMARK as it allows the students an opportunity to clarify their career goals and gives us a chance to see if they could have a successful career with the company,” Ashley says. The 53rd annual GROWMARK internship program will kick off May 20 with 51 students representing 21 universities across North America, working in a number of different areas.
Listen to my interview with Ashley here: GROWMARK's Ashley McClintock
Another social media tool GROWMARK uses to recruit is YouTube. Take a look at the video below about the internship program.
In deciding not to pursue controversial youth labor regulations for agriculture, the Obama administration said it would work with rural stakeholders for safety education, specifically mentioning organizations such as the Farm Bureau, the NFU, FFA, and 4-H. But the livestock industry has been just as involved in the issue, if not more so, according to Congressman Denny Rehberg (R-MT).
“I just want to thank the National Cattlemen for their involvement in bringing the issue to the attention of the American people in the national media,” Cong. Rehberg said in a telephone press conference today with National Cattlemen’s Beef Association (NCBA) president J.D. Alexander of Nebraska. “I want to thank the Obama Administration for withdrawing this regulation because it didn’t make sense.”
However, the congressman quoted Ronald Reagan – “trust but verify” – and said he will be working to ensure the regulation is not brought back by some other means. “I have every intention as chairman of the Department of Labor’s budget to have a rider in my legislation that says no money will be spent on the implementation, promulgation or enforcement of (this regulation), just to make sure,” he said.
Listen to the press conference with Cong. Rehberg and J.D. here: NCBA Youth Labor Reg Call
My personal thrill at the New Holland Mega Media event this week was test driving a CR8080 combine. Never drove anything like it before and it was so easy!
You may not realize it, but New Holland is kind of a big deal in combines. “New Holland was the first company to launch a rotary combine in the market,” Combine Market Manager Nigel Mackenzie told us. “That was back in 1975 with the TR70. That combine was built and designed in Nebraska and the latest evolution, the CR models, are still built there.”
The CR Combine was actually voted “Machine of the Year” last year at Agritechnica. “A lot of new features introduced on the model year 12 machines, primarily driven by greater fuel efficiency and emissions regulations,” Nigel says. “It was really great to be recognized by a group of journalists in Agritechnica for what we’ve done.”
One of the coolest features that I experienced driving the combine was the IntelliView IV color touchscreen display that monitors all combine functions and allows you to see a wide variety of performance information at a glance from up to three camera inputs, with direct USB connectivity for data collection.
Nigel says New Holland has six rotary combine models and three conventional models – he tells us all about it in this interview – Nigel Mackenzie Interview
Watch me drive the combine – thinking of switching careers to become a custom harvester!!! Well, actually I did run over a cone – but it was my first time. Thanks to Lucas Sjostrom of Hoard’s Dairyman for shooting the video and photos for me.
