Each year Nebraska’s farmers and ranchers come close to an accident – in the field, in livestock pens, in grain piles. Youth in rural areas are not excluded from this. To help teach youth safe on farms and rural communities, a Progressive Agriculture Safety Day was held in Geneva on May 29th, 2014 for area 2-6th grade youth. The program was coordinated by the local WIFE (Women Involved in Farm Economics ), Fillmore Central and Shickley FFA Chapters, the University of Nebraska-Lincoln Extension in Fillmore County, with several other local businesses and organizations provided funding.
Eight-two youth participated in this year’s program.
Nearly three hundred volunteer hours were spent preparing for this event! Topics taught included animal safety, weather safety, citizen safety, food safety, electrical safety, ATV safety, mower safety, roll over demonstration, water safety and tractor safety. Nearly 50 older youth and adults volunteered their time to make the event happen. Presenters were from the NE State Patrol, UNL Extension, Fillmore Central FFA, Shickley FFA, Plains Power, Nick’s Farm Store, National Weather Service, Fillmore Co. Emergency Management, Geneva Activity & Education Dept., Farm Safety For Just Kids and Extension’s Master Naturalist program. A special thanks goes to the Fillmore County Ag Society for use of excellent facilities.
One session taught youth that their reaction time isn’t quick enough to save them if they had to make a split decision in addition to other tractor safety tips.
In addition to these hands-on sessions, youth received a headgear flashlight to take home and a “goodie bag” with educational safety materials reminding them and their parents what was learned. Progressive Agriculture Safety Day was conducted through the Progressive Agriculture Foundation, so each participant and volunteer received a t-shirt from Progressive Agriculture sponsors. Special thanks to sponsors for making this event happen at low cost to the youth!
At the conclusion of the day, youth expressed that they had a great time and learned safety tips that may someday save their or someone else’s life.
Last Tuesday proved to be a challenging night for many people across the state, with no exception to many in Fillmore County. Damaging winds and hail went across the county with most of the damage occurring in the northeast portion of Fillmore County. Windows and siding knocked out of houses in Exeter and structural damage on farmsteads will no doubt keep insurance companies busy. In addition to that, crops in that portion were severely damaged to completely gone. My heart goes out to those affected by the storm and best wishes for a speedy recovery.
The University of Nebraska-Lincoln Extension has two publications that detail how to evaluate from soybean or corn damaged by hail, therefore I decided to paraphrase some of it in this week’s column. First we’ll discuss corn. Hail affects corn yields in three ways: plant stand reduction, direct damage, and leaf defoliation. Any of this damage will reduce the plant’s ability to compete with weeds, but the greatest losses are caused by defoliation. First, one must know the corn growth stage to accurately estimate the amount of defoliation. Until the V6 growth stage, losses from leaf defoliation are usually minor with most loss occurring from stand reduction. At the V6 growth stage, the growing point breaks the soil surface.
If hail damage occurred, determine the yield loss due to stand reduction. Since it is difficult to distinguish living from dead tissue immediately after a storm, assessment should be delayed 7-10 days. Then take a stand count based on row spacing, etc. to see what stands you have. One must also determine the amount of leaf area removed. To do this, establish the stage of plant growth at time of the storm, estimate percent leaf defoliation, then use appropriate tables as found in Evaluating Hail Damage to Corn to predict yield reduction from defoliation. (Information is available in the NebGuide how to do all of this) Some management that should be addressed includes additional weed management with lack of crop canopy and close observation for future disease potential.
Hail-damaged soybeans must be assessed by stand reduction, leaf defoliation, similar to corn, but also stem damage and pod damage. Again early damage and stand losses will cause the biggest losses from weeds. Again, take a stand count 7 to 10 days after the storm to determine yield loss due to stand reduction; then use a chart to determine percent yield loss. Research has shown that leaf loss during vegetative states has little effect on yield. Defoliation loss is measured only in the reproductive stages. Stem damage is further divided into stem cutoff and stems bent or broken over. To determine the amount of stem damage, count the number of nodes above the cotyledonary node present at the date of loss. Estimate number of nodes that have been cut off from the number of those on a broken portion of a stem. Plants that are bruised but still standing do not count. To determine this loss, a table is given.
Several states in the Midwest are getting ready to experience some crazy weather today.
I am a transplant to tornado country, and I don’t think I will ever get used to the danger associated with it. I can count on just a few fingers the number of times meteorologists have provided weather warnings days before the storm, and this is one of those cases.
The potential storm area.
While we can’t always prepare for natural disasters, there are times, like today, where we have a glimpse of what to expect. I want to visit with you on how to care for animals in severe weather.
Companion animals –
– Often loud noises can scare our companion animals, and they may be more difficult to find in a time crunch if they are hiding under a bed, in a closet, or some other small space. Our companion animals can pick up…
As lawns continue to grow, Kelly Feehan, UNL Extension Educator in Platte County reminds us that dandelions and other broadleaf weeds may be growing in lawns now, but homeowner applications of herbicides for these weeds should be avoided. The risk to non-target plants like trees, shrubs, flowers and vegetables is simply too great. At temperatures higher than 80°F, many herbicides volatize and change into a gas. The herbicide then rises or moves on air currents and damages non-target plants. At this time of year, it is best to hand-dig weeds before they go to seed and avoid herbicide applications during summer. When temperatures moderate in early September into October, this is the ideal time to apply herbicides for broadleaf weeds like dandelion, clover, ground ivy and violets. This is the most effective time for treatment because more of the herbicide is translocated into roots at this time of the season for a higher percentage of weed kill.
Kelly’s recent news article also provided answers to questions I sometimes receive so I decided to share some of the home remedies people often ask about. Sometimes people think the household products are safer and more effective than using products that have been tested, labeled and sold for such uses. Some examples are applying bleach to control diseases in lawns, watering Epsom salts into the soil around tomatoes and peppers and using Borax to kill ground ivy in lawns.
Do not apply bleach to lawns to control disease. The bleach can damage the turfgrass. If the product is a brand that has an EPA pesticide registration number, such as Chlorox; then it is against pesticide laws to use the product since it is not labeled for use on lawns.
As for Epsom salts, this product contains magnesium, which is an important nutrient for fruits and vegetables. However, most soils have plenty of magnesium and the addition of more is not needed. Increasing and maintaining soil organic matter is more beneficial.
Research has shown that Borax can control ground ivy. Borax contains boron that can be toxic to plants. Ground ivy is more sensitive to boron than grass and small amounts can kill ground ivy. However, it can cause the grass to turn brown and if over applied, create soil issues that can prevent anything, even grass, from growing in the area for years. If this option is used to control ground ivy, the lawn should only be treated with borax once each spring for two years. Use this formula. Dissolve eight ounces of a product like Twenty Mule Team Borax into four ounces of warm water, and then dilute it in 2 1/2 gallons of water. Spray this amount evenly over 1,000 square feet of lawn, no more, no less.
For more answers to your lawn care questions, I would encourage you to check out UNL’s turf website.
Growers can learn about the latest wheatvarieties and view many of them in the field at a June 12 wheat tour near Wilber. The event, sponsored by UNL Extension, will begin at 6:30 p.m. in a wheat variety plot hosted by Dennis Broz. Stephen Baenziger, UNL professor and wheat breeder, will discuss wheat variety options for southeast Nebraska and characteristics of wheat cultivars in the plot. There are 28 wheat varieties and experimentals in the plot, according to Teshome Regassa, UNL research assistant professor.
Guest speaker Ray Ward, soil scientist and owner of Ward Laboratories, Kearney, will provide the latest nutrient management information for wheat and a fresh soil pit will be dug on-site to better demonstrate soil health and soil carbon impacts of wheat in rotation with no-till farming. Stephen Wegulo, UNL extension plant pathologist, will discuss the spread of wheat diseases in southern Nebraska and the yield effects of foliar diseases of wheat and fungicide application strategies.
UNL Extension Educator Randy Pryor said many participants discover new knowledge and ideas and meet other farmers striving for high yielding wheat as part of a crop rotation scheme. Several area agribusinesses are sponsoring refreshments, including kolaches at the field site. For the directions and more information, call the Saline County Extension Office at (402) 821-2151.
Hopefully producers won’t have to irrigate too much this year, but I’d like you to consider joining a program that can not only improve your irrigation efficiency, but reduce nutrient loss and save you money! I’ve been in Extension for nearly nine years and a program I’ve been involved with that has been a very rewarding program and made a positive impact for many is the Nebraska Agricultural Water Management Network, or NAWMN.
Those wishing to participate in the program receive assistance installing equipment and education on how to read the equipment.
A couple of the tools we use are ETgages® or Atmometers which mimic crop evapotranspiration or ET and Watermark soil matrix sensors which measure soil matric potential or the energy required to remove water from the soil. These two tools have really worked well and have made irrigation management much easier than those gut feelings. The more information you have the better decisions you can make!
If you would like to participate in this dynamic program, let me know and I’d be happy to help and get you started! If you are in the NAWMN, install your ETgage soon and start the soaking/drying cycle on your Watermark sensors to be sure they work! As crops have emerged or about to emerge, its important to install your Watermark Sensors soon.
It’s also important to replace the #54 alfalfa canvas covers and wafers on a regular basis at the start of each season. For more information, go to the NAWMN website.
I have received a couple of questions on how to take stand counts and with the storm damage and recent weather conditions decided to highlight some information from UNL’s CropWatch website on Time to Dig In and Assess Need for Replanting Corn written by Roger Elmore, Extension Cropping Systems Agronomist and others. First, let’s review how to take stand counts. In short, after you know your row width (inches), there are given numbers that correspond to row width you will need to measure and count the plants in a row and multiply that by 1000 to calculate plants/acre. For example, most corn in our area is planted into 30-inch rows. The row length in feet to equal 1/1000 of an acre is 17’5” so you would measure out 17’5” in a row, count the number of corn plants in that length and multiply is by 1000. This would tell you how many plants/acre you have in that row. Do this several times in the field.
After you have your average plant populations, calculate the losses from planting to final stands. University research trials suggest 4-7% is typical, but final stands are within 1-4% of seeding rates for top managers. If your attrition losses are 10% or more, examine what happened. Elmore and others suggest considering the following: seed viability, insect such as cutworms, wireworms and white grubs, diseases, compaction and soil crusting and cold soils. One should also scout for weed management issues. Scout weeds within two weeks of corn emergence to evaluate efficacy of burn down and pre-emergence herbicides. Early emerging weeds such as marestail should be controlled early on to avoid early-season competition.
After examining these factors, one must decide if replanting is necessary. For example, if plants have emerged but have variable heights or development, even though a yield reduction is possible, it’s not necessarily a reason to replant. Plant height differences may reflect lack of uniformity in emergence timing or other issue the plant faced. Replanting may however be necessary with reduced planting populations. The most important factor in deciding whether to replant is to calculate expected yield with the current stand versus what you could potentially have if you replanted. Finally, one must estimate the replanting costs of seed, fuel, additional pesticides and labor. Also, be sure to contact your crop insurance agent, Farm Service Agency and others with an interest in your crop.
The full CropWatch article provides more information and some useful tables to help you with your consideration of replanting.
The last 48 hours have certainly brought some interesting weather to Nebraska, and surrounding states. Parts of Colorado, Wyoming, and Western Nebraska had at least a foot of snow and blowing winds, there were reports of 15 tornadoes that touched down across Nebraska alone, and Eastern Nebraska had large amounts of rain in a relatively short amount of time (anywhere from two to five inches reported so far) with loss of power for many around the Omaha metro. While Mother Nature’s fury can leave behind a mess, take us by surprise, and can be devastating – you can be a little more prepared with advance planning. Read on to see what my sister, Kellie Chichester, University of Wyoming Extension Educator and I suggest.
Whether you have 1,000 head or 5 head of livestock, you should spend time thinking and preparing a disaster plan. A disaster plan is good for people…
As I write this, we just celebrated the Centennial of Cooperative Extension yesterday. On May 8, 2014 the Smith-Lever Act was passed which was introduced by Senator Hoke Smith of Georgia and Representative A. F. Lever of South Carolina to expand the vocational, agricultural, and home demonstration programs in rural America. It was designed to disseminate information from the land grant universities to the people. One hundred years later, we are still doing this, only through different methods and delivery systems.
In 2014, we celebrate the Smith-Lever Act, which established the Cooperative Extension Service, a unique educational partnership between the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the nation’s land-grant universities that extends research-based knowledge through a state-by-state network of extension educators.
All of this got me wondering what was extension like in Fillmore County
Snow storm from 1918 proved to make extension work difficult!
in the beginning so I looked at our archives and found some interesting information. The first reports I found were from 1918 with the first county agricultural agent being J.L. Thomas. Some of the projects he worked on were wheat smut control, soybean inoculation, poultry judging, hog cholera control and black leg control. April 1, 1918 was when the “Fillmore County Farm Bureau” (now known as Fillmore County Extension Board) began active work in Fillmore County.
An excerpt had the following:
“The county board of supervisors assigned to J.L. Thomas a large well lighted, well heated and well ventilated, as well as a well located room on the first floor of the court house, for his office. The farm bureau board at the time Mr. Thomas was selected made arrangements with him to employ his wife, Mary E. Hall Thomas, on half time as office assistant. At the first meeting of the board held on Monday night, April 8th, 1918 the agent was instructed to purchase needed office supplies and equipment.” Some of the emergency projects assigned to him were “testing of seed corn and finding a substitute for sugar which included, keeping of bees, catching of all new swarms, production of sugar cane, location of sorghum mills in the county and making and use of sorghum.”
Thinking back to what was happening in 1918, World War I ended in November 1918. When the U.S. entered WWI, food had become a weapon and no other country produced more food than the U.S. In order to have enough food to feed the allies, Americans were urged to conserve food and eliminate waste, thus the importance of finding sugar substitutes, etc. Also, life on most farms consisted of no electricity or indoor plumbing. Each family member had chores such as milking cows, harnessing horses, gathering eggs, etc. Farm families looked forward to the fun of school programs, trips to town, church gatherings and other social events.
Extension demonstration showing the use of tractors in farming.
In the 1918 narrative it describes that work began at a very busy time of year (planting) and continued until October when it was planned to hold meetings for the community, but at that time the Spanish Influenza caused public schools to be closed and all public gatherings be postponed for five weeks. Organizational work was one of the first things to occupy the county agent in the next year. Some of the first youth programs focused on pig, chicken and garden projects. Canning teams and a war bread team were organized.
Also interesting in the narrative was that “the domestic science department of the Milligan school canned ten bushels of peaches and three bushels of tomatoes and did not lose a quart of the peaches or tomatoes.” It was a dry year as many members appeared to have lost their gardens completely and the pig projects didn’t do as well as some died and some youth were too busy with work in the fields. “Fifty dollars in prizes was given to the project members by the County Fair Board. Six pigs, one calf, one crate of chicks and some garden products were entered by club members.”
As I found some of these interesting points, trying to imagine what it would have been like in 1918 intrigues me. Thinking of how much more travel time across the county was required to reach people and the difficulty of getting things organized and promoted compared to the ease of the Internet we now take for granted. While there were definitely many challenges, extension managed to overcome them, just as our current extension system evolves with new delivery modes and remains strongly committed to “the people”. For 100 years, the Smith-Lever Act has stimulated innovative research and vital educational programs for youth and adults through progressive information delivery systems that improved lives and shaped a nation.
On May 8, Land-Grant Universities will be celebrating the 100th Birthday of Extension — 2014 marks the 100th anniversary of the Smith-Lever Act!
Before I tell you about the Smith-Lever Act, let me backtrack a minute and tell you about the Morrill Act. The Morrill Act (named after Vermont Congressman Justin Morrill) was signed into place on July 2, 1862 by President Abraham Lincoln. It was officially titled “An Act Donating Public Lands to the Several States and Territories which may provide Colleges for the Benefit of Agriculture and the Mechanic Arts.” The Morrill Act provided each state with 30,000 acres of federal land for each member in their Congressional delegation. The land was then sold by the states and the proceeds were used to fund public colleges that focused on agriculture and mechanical arts. Sixty-nine colleges were funded by these land grants (aka Land-Grant Universities (great map at this…
Views from VanDeWalle 