Biological Products Coming Up Big for Agriculture

Carrie Muehling

The biological segment of agriculture is really beginning to take off, and that was evident at the 2018 Commodity Classic in Anaheim.

“When I look at ag in general and I look at the nutrient requirements as we kind of expand our knowledge on how we feed these crops, it’s going to be vitally important for us to look at these new technologies in the biological industry to advance yields and quality while kind of keeping that eye on the environmental aspects of nutrients, and so how efficient we can be with nutrients is going to play big in how these things interact in our cropping situations,” said Jordan Martin, Pennsylvania regional sales manager with Timac Agro.

Timac Agro offers a broad range of products including granular fertilizer with marine sea calcium, homogenized fertilizer granular, liquid water-soluble fertilizer, foliar water-soluble fertilizer, and two main classes of biostimulants (ground and foliar). The company’s newest product, Fertiactyl ST, is a seed treatment using an active ingredient that is a root and plant biostimulant to reduce stress in adverse growing conditions. Available for the 2018 growing season, the product targets corn, soybean and small grains growers.

2018 Commodity Classic Photo Album

Listen to Chuck’s interview here: Interview with Timac Agro

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Precision Ag Bytes 3/14

Carrie Muehling

  • Albaugh, LLC, Colorado Wheat Research Foundation, Inc. and Limagrain Cereal Seeds, LLC have announced the EPA registration of Aggressor herbicide, the exclusive-use herbicide for CoAXium Wheat Production System. Aggressor herbicide will provide growers with a new mode of action to address tough-to- control winter annual grassy weeds, including feral rye, Group 2 or ALS resistant biotypes of downy brome grass and jointed goatgrass.
  • The updated Iowa Monarch Conservation Strategy seeks to establish approximately 480,000 to 830,000 acres of monarch habitat by 2038. The strategy — developed by the Iowa Monarch Conservation Consortium — guides the implementation and documentation of a voluntary, statewide conservation effort based on the best available science. The consortium is a group of 40 organizations, including agricultural and conservation associations, agribusiness and utility companies, universities and county, state and federal agencies.
  • The Soil Health Partnership preparing for another round of soil sampling, a critical part of identifying, testing and measuring farm management practices that improve sustainability through soil health. An initiative of the National Corn Growers Association, the program’s goal is to quantify the benefits of these practices–like growing cover crops in the off-season and reducing tillage—from an economic standpoint, showing farmers how healthy soil benefits their bottom line.
  • The American Farm Bureau Foundation for Agriculture has announced participants selected for On the Farm STEM professional development events in Fort Worth, Texas; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; and Portland, Oregon. The training is designed to bring science to life for participants with the help of American beef cattle ranchers, researchers, nutritionists and veterinarians.
  • The Agricultural Drainage Management Coalition Member Companies and Dr. Dan Jaynes with the National Laboratory for Agricultural & The Environment collaborated to quantify the effectiveness of installing saturated buffers on buffers enrolled in the conservation reserve program to reduce nutrient loading from tile drainage waters. To view the full research report and find additional information and videos pertaining to saturated buffer systems, visit www.saturatedbufferstrips.com.
  • IoF2020 project stakeholders have demonstrated a proof of concept focusing on interoperability and compatibility between farm machines, sensors and software. The IoF2020 group uses the ADAPT Framework focusing on interoperability and compatibility between farm machines, sensors and software. ADAPT is an open source software toolkit from AgGateway, based on a universal data compatibility model that uses plug-ins to enable translation between different proprietary data formats.
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Aptimmune Vaccines Gaining Popularity

Carrie Muehling

Aptimmune is looking to grow its presence in the swine vaccine market with the success of Barricade for porcine reproductive & respiratory syndrome (PRRS).

“It’s kind of an exciting time because we launched the product over a year ago and we’ve got customers that are using the product, evaluating it in a number of trials,” said Steve Berger, director of development for Aptimmune. “We’re excited about this next phase. As the vaccine is taken up in the market, the demand is increasing and putting more pressure on the manufacturing operations, which are good problems to have. We’re looking forward to the next growth phase of Aptimmune.”

Berger said the company has just added an influenza vaccine to the portfolio and is working on a combination PRRS/flu product. Aptimmune is also working toward federal licensing, which would allow the sale of product formulations across the country instead of state by state.

2018 Aptimmune Scientific Symposium Photo Album

Listen to Chuck’s interview with Steve here: Interview with Steve Berger, Aptimmune

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John Deere ExactApply™ Retrofit Kits Now Available

Carrie Muehling

John Deere is giving farmers the opportunity to bring existing sprayers up to speed with ExactApply technology through retrofit kits now available from local dealers. Application quality is vital to a grower’s success, according to Doug Felter, product marketing manager for application equipment with John Deere.

“Being able to change nozzles on the go is something that is exclusive to John Deere,” said Felter. “Being able to use the front nozzle, eventually switch to maybe a larger nozzle as we go faster, or even use both of those nozzles in tandem, opening up a lot wider range of application.”

Felter said John Deere also offers nozzles that pulse up to three times faster than the industry standard. ExactApply retrofit kits are available for all R4030, R4038 and R4045 Sprayers manufactured since these models were introduced and that are equipped with stainless-steel plumbing and steel booms, no matter the boom size. Kits include new ExactApply nozzle bodies, new electrical boom harnessing to power and control the nozzles, and a higher capacity alternator for the machine to provide for the added electrical power demands.

Listen to Jamie’s interview with Doug here: Interview with Doug Felter, John Deere

John Deere at 2018 Commodity Classic Photo Album

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Aptimmune Shares Barricade Vaccine Field Data

Carrie Muehling

In the year since Aptimmune launched the Barricade vaccine to fight porcine reproductive & respiratory syndrome (PRRS), the company has been gathering field data from 30 different veterinarians in 12 different states.

“We’ve been able to see a 50 percent reduction in mortality across the board, so it’s been very rewarding,” said Dr. Jessica Seate, professional service veterinarian for Aptimmune. “In addition, we’ve also seen we can improve the number of pigs that are culled or rejected. We’ve also got improvements in antibiotic treatment programs.”

Seate said the data also looked at average daily gain and there are improvements there, as well. The company shared those results at the 2018 Aptimmune Scientific Symposium in San Diego.

2018 Aptimmune Scientific Symposium Photo Album

Listen to Chuck’s interview with Dr. Jessica Seate here: Interview with Dr. Jessica Seate, Aptimmune

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SMART Farmer and Food Evolution

Cindy Zimmerman

In this episode of the SMART Farmer podcast, we hear from an Academy Award nominated director who produced a documentary film that explores the debate about genetically modified organisms – better known as GMOs.

The film is called Food Evolution and Scott Hamilton Kennedy attended the recent Commodity Classic in California to talk about how he came to tell this story, with a goal to promote a more science-based conversation about food, and not to advance any particular agenda.

Kennedy calls Food Evolution, “a fully independent investigation into the topic of GMOs every step of the way, interviewing experts on both sides of the aisle and including all points of view. Some say our film is “pro-GMO” but we would counter we are simply “pro-Science” because currently every major scientific institution and all the data and peer-reviewed science tells us, as a process, it is as safe, if not safer, than any other seed breeding technique available.”

When the U.S. Farmers and Ranchers Alliance (USFRA) found out about Food Evolution last year, they were so impressed with the message they contacted Kennedy and licensed the film to help promote it to consumer audiences.

Download or listen to this podcast here:
SMART Farmer Podcast with Scott Hamilton Kennedy

If you have not yet subscribed to the SMART Farmer podcast and this is brand new to you, you can do it today and binge listen to all 24 podcasts produced to date. Also, SMART Farmer is now on TuneIn.

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Learn more about USFRA and SMART Farm

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Ethanol Interests Shout Opposition to RIN Price Cap

Cindy Zimmerman

As concerns began to grow late last week that the Trump Administration was leaning toward a cap on prices for Renewable Identification Numbers (RINs) to appease oil refinery interests, biofuel interests went into high gear to get the word out about how that action would devastate the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS).

A White House meeting was reportedly set for today (March 12), and then abruptly canceled, but that did not stop a rally that was set up at the farm of Bill Couser in Nevada, Iowa with just 24 hours notice. The main attraction at the rally was two industry representatives who were part of a meeting with President Trump on March 1 – fuel retailer Charlie Good and ethanol producer Rick Schwarck.

Good and Schwarck described an “intense” meeting which included other biofuel representatives, oil refiner interests, Iowa Senators Grassley and Ernst, Senator Cruz of Texas and several cabinet members. The first part of the discussion revolved around allowing 15% ethanol blends to be sold year-round by treating it the same as E10.

“If you allow us to sell (E15) year-round, nationwide, we’ll flood the market with RINs and price will take care of itself, and (the president) understood that,” said Good, noting that everyone in the room agreed that was a good idea.

“For 80 percent of the meeting, everybody agreed that it was good, good, good,” said Schwarck. But towards the end of the meeting, oil interests got more “vocal” and “abrupt” and “really ramped it up on us.”

Good says he got in the last word as he was leaving the room. “I said Mr. President…if you cap the RINs, it will gut the biofuels industry. And he said, I gotta have a deal, Charlie. And I said if you gotta have a deal, cap them at a buck 50,” said Good. “He’s a businessman and he wants to make a deal.”

Rick and Charlie talk about meeting with the president here: Rick Schwarck and Charlie Good comments

Interview with Schwarck: Interview with Rick Schwarck, Absolute Energy

Good, owner of Good & Quick in Nevada, Iowa is one of several retailers who spoke for the American Coalition for Ethanol (ACE) to explain how the RIN system helps them keep prices down for higher ethanol blends:
Charlie Good comments on how RIN system works for retailers


Audio, Corn, Ethanol, RFA, Video

Bayer Fighting SCN, SDS with ILeVO

Carrie Muehling

As soybean cyst nematode (SCN) continues to evolve, growers need new tools to fight against yield loss in their fields.

“Nearly all of the SCN-resistant varieties out there have the same source of resistance. And over time, the SCN is actually adapting to that source of resistance, so it’s no longer quite as effective as it used to be,” said Melissa Chu, product manager with Bayer. “So active management of SCN is a really critical recommendation to maximize yield potential for growers, and one of the ways to do that can be a seed treatment such as ILeVO.”

Early season protection is key when dealing with SCN, as well as sudden death syndrome (SDS), another primary yield robber in soybeans fields.

“ILeVO is a great solution and protects from those early season damages that can occur from SCN as well as other nematodes, and SDS,” said Jeremiah Mullock, product development manager with Bayer. “SDS is a root rot pathogen, so ILeVO protects that root rot from occurring early in the season, providing that yield potential. Later in the season, SDS symptoms can occur, but because we’re protecting from that root rot, that yield protection is still there.”

Trials of ILeVO have shown an average yield boost of 4.5 bushels per acre in affected soybean fields.

Bayer at 2018 Commodity Classic Photo Album

Listen to Jamie’s interview with Melissa Chu here: Interview with Melissa Chu, Bayer CropScience

Listen to Jamie’s interview with Jeremiah Mullock here: Interview with Jeremiah Mullock, Bayer

 

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Animal Ag Bites 3/12

Carrie Muehling

  • U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Sonny Perdue has announced the appointment of 11 members and 10 alternates to serve on the American Egg Board. More information about the board is available on the American Egg Board website.
  • Under an export certificate recently negotiated between the two countries, the United States now can ship pork to Paraguay. While the South American country is a modest consumer of pork, there is potential for U.S. pork export growth to its nearly 6.9 million people, who have a per capita income greater than, for example, the Philippines and Vietnam, two large pork-consuming nations.
  • The National Cattlemen’s Beef Association will present a webinar entitled: The 4’s of Crossbreeding: Simple, Structured, Successful, and Sustainable on Thursday, March 22, 2018 at 7 p.m. CT. Click here to register.

  • The World Dairy Expo Board of Directors, Commercial Exhibitor Committee and Dairy Cattle Exhibitor Committee conducted annual meetings on March 5 and 6 at the Alliant Energy Center, Madison, Wis. These groups of business professionals, dairy producers and Expo exhibitors set new initiatives for the 2018 World Dairy Expo, October 2 through 6, in addition to welcoming new members during their respective meetings.
  • The American Quarter Horse Association elected a new Executive Committee at the 2018 AQHA Convention in Jacksonville, Florida. Read more convention coverage at www.aqha.com/convention.
  • The Angus Journal is seeking a new editor as it restructures its current editorial team. The editor will take on the day-to-day management of the print and digital components of the Angus Journal, as well as provide editorial support for other publications of Angus Media as time allows. The new editor will report to the president of Angus Media and have direct management of the editorial team, including a main role in selecting several new team members. For more information or to apply for this new position, visit the careers section of angus.org, or email careers@angus.org.
  • World Dairy Expo is pleased to announce the recipients of the 2018 Expo Recognition Awards to be formally presented at the 52nd annual event in October. The 2018 honorees are as follows: Dairy Woman of the Year – Jeanette Sheehan, Sheeknoll Farms, Rochester, Minnesota; Dairyman of the Year – Pete Kappelman, Meadow Brook Dairy Farms, LLC, Two Rivers, Wisconsin; Industry Person of the Year – Dr. Dan Hornickel and Dr. Chris Keim, Sunshine Genetics, Inc., Whitewater, Wisconsin; and International Person of the Year – Alastair Pearson, World Wide Sires China Co. Ltd, Beijing, China.
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    Bayer Makes Contribution to American Heart Association

    Carrie Muehling

    Bayer contributed over $5,000 to the American Heart Association based on 2017 sales of LibertyLink soybeans. It was a record year for LibertyLink soybeans, planted on more than 17 million acres in 2017. Weed control is the top reason farmers are planting LibertyLink.

    “We’ve seen tremendous success with Liberty in terms of growers controlling their key driver weeds,” said David Tanner, Liberty product manager at Bayer. “This is continued on the success that growers have had with Liberty in the past. We saw excellent results last year with performance, rating grower surveys. We know that when Liberty is applied according to a full program approach, which is what we really recommend, we get over 98 percent control. Really exceptional control that we’ve seen across soybeans, corn, cotton, as well as canola.”

    Growers also chose the LibertyLink system because of overall yield and ease of use.

    Bayer at 2018 Commodity Classic Photo Album

    Listen to Jamie’s interview with Jody Wynia and David Tanner here: Interview with Jody Wynia & David Tanner, Bayer

     

    Photos, video, and audio interviews from Bayer at Commodity Classic Bayer sponsor logo

     

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