Serving proudly since 1873 as the beautiful Nebraska Panhandle's first newspaper
Serving proudly since 1873 as the beautiful Nebraska Panhandle's first newspaper
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Training for private pesticide applicators whose certification will expire in 2015 will be offered on Tuesday, Jan. 20 in Sidney at the Country Inn & Suites. The training is also for people who would like to become certified as a private pesticide applicator for the first time. The training will be offered at 1 p.m. Contact the Nebraska Extension office at (308) 254-4455 for additional training locations in the Panhandle and other options for pesticide certification....
The latest results from crop and livestock research at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln’s High Plains Ag Lab near Sidney, faculty positions update and building plans will be shared with the HPAL advisory board and the public at the annual research update scheduled for Tuesday, Jan. 27. The meeting will take place from 9 a.m. until 3:30 p.m. at the Sidney Campus of Western Nebraska Community College. For questions, call the High Plains Ag Lab at (308) 254-3918. The public is welcome. Agenda topics include: • Welcome by HPAL Advisory Board chai...
No-till weed management will be one of the focus areas of the “Farming In The Margins” workshop at the Clarion Inn & Conference Center on Feb. 18 in Garden City, Kan. Some of the topics include: Randy Anderson, research agronomist at the North Central Agriculture Research Laboratory in Brookings, S.D., has been working on ecologically based pest management in cropping systems. This approach requires looking at the biological aspects of weed dynamics, diverse crop rotation effects on weed populations and using living plants as a weed sup...
I’m headed to Salina, Kan., again this year for the 19th Annual No Till On the Plains Winter Conference. This year’s conference is scheduled for Jan. 27-28. I’ve attended this conference for the past 10 years or so to attempt to educate myself more about the benefits of continuous no till crop production systems on our farm. I’ve been looking over the agenda for this year’s conference and I’m intrigued by the lineup of speakers for this year’s conference. I will be part of the speaker group as I’m teaming up with Paul Jasa, UNL extension educat...
Nebraska Extension is offering the Master Gardener Training Program to provide volunteers with research-based horticulture education, which prepares them to share their knowledge with others in the community. Training sessions start in February and are open to anyone who is interested in plants and is willing to volunteer. In exchange for the training they receive, Master Gardeners are asked to volunteer an equal amount of time back to their local communities. They work closely with Extension educators in the local office in solving problems...
I feel like we’re at important cross roads with the field pea industry here in our region. We have grown the field pea industry from a grass roots movement to what it is today. Today, we have expanded to 30,000 acres of field peas in our region with the opportunity to grow much larger. We need to continue to develop this industry that will add to the economy of our agricultural community. Field peas don’t really compete with other crops grown in our region as they mostly replace summer fallow acres in our traditional winter wheat/summer fallow...
LINCOLN, Neb. – Three Nebraskans were honored for their service and dedication to agriculture at the Nebraska Agribusiness Club's 48th annual awards banquet at Hillcrest Country Club. The 2014 honorees for Public Service to Agriculture are Don Anthony of Lexington and Stan Jensen of York. The club also recognized Brandon Hunnicutt as the New Horizon Award honoree. Anthony, president of Anthony Land Company, farms 1,300 acres of irrigated corn, soybeans, and alfalfa plus custom farming near L...
I would like to start off by wishing everyone a very Happy New Year! This is a good time to reflect on all the blessings and challenges the past year brought to us. It’s also a good time to look forward with a renewed anticipation of the events the coming year will bestow upon us. I’m often asked at this time of the year what farmers do during the winter months. I guess folks figure if there isn’t corn growing in the field there isn’t much going on in the farming community. I’ll often respond that this is the time of year when producers meet wi...
The District recently hosted a series of meetings with the Ground Water Management Advisory Committees representing each county within the District. It outlined proposed changes to the Ground Water Management’s rules and regulations. Many of these changes are housekeeping measures. But one significant change is importing the District’s Chemigation Program rules into the districtwide regulatory document. This past session, the Nebraska Legislature adopted changes to the Nebraska Chemigation Act, which provides controls to maintain ground water q...
UNL Extension will be sponsoring Crop Production Clinics at Gering and seven other locations across Nebraska in January. The Crop Production Clinics will provide valuable information to help crop producers and agribusiness professionals improve their profitability and safety. A clinic will be held on Jan. 6 at the Gering Civic Center. Other dates and locations are Jan. 7 in North Platte, Jan. 8 in Hastings, Jan. 13 in Kearney. Jan. 14 in York, Jan. 15 in Beatrice, Jan. 20 in Atkinson, Jan. 21 in Norfolk and Jan. 22 in Mead. All clinics start at...
I’d like to start off by wishing everyone a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! This is a good time of year to reflect back on last year’s growing season and give thanks for all the many blessings we have received. There are always challenges in agriculture but at the end of the year we are lucky to be able to work with Mother Nature and our natural resources on a daily basis to produce food and fiber for our livelihood. I wanted to make everyone aware of the upcoming educational events around the region that focus on no-till crop and fo...
Dr. Mitchell B. Stephenson will join the faculty at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln Panhandle Research and Extension Center next spring as a range and forage management specialist. His appointment, announced by Dr. Jack Whittier, research and extension director at the Panhandle R&E Center, is one of several recent personnel changes in the Panhandle Extension District in which faculty vacancies are being filled and positions realigned to meet clientele needs. Stephenson is scheduled to start...
Several Nebraska Extension staff from the Panhandle District have received statewide or national recognition for their accomplishments. The Broadband Planning Team, which includes Extension Educator Connie Hancock of Sidney, received the Institute of Agriculture and Natural Resources 2014 Omtvedt Innovation Award for its efforts to improve the speed of internet service to rural Nebraska. Broadband is a foundation for economic growth, job creation, global competitiveness and a better way of life. Broadband adoption and Internet use in some...
The changing beef industry will be the focus of Nebraska Extension’s annual “Ranching for Profitability” meetings in January at eight sites around Nebraska: O’Neill, Ainsworth, Broken Bow, Grand Island, Brady, Mullen, Valentine and Kimball. Last year was one for the record books. Many sale barns broke record cattle prices. Mother Nature was unpredictable. Input prices also continued to creep upward, and forage was no exception. Cattle producers may have questions about what to do next in 2015. The meeting agendas will include these speaker...
I recently attended a workshop on the new farm bill. The workshop was hosted by UNL Extension and our local FSA office. I truly appreciate the effort by these organizations to attempt to educate local producers on the decisions producers will need to make concerning the new farm bill. It was obvious to me after attending the workshop and visiting with other producers that this is an extremely complicated farm bill. There are several options producers can choose from and it doesn’t appear there are any clear cut options that will be the best. I...
The South Platte Natural Resources District board of directors closed out its final meeting of 2014 by bidding farewell to a pair of retiring long term members. Directors Paul Hutchison and Tom Biggs attended their last meeting as part of a board that established most of the District's water management rules and regulations during their tenures. Both were board members when LB 962, the Nebraska Ground Water Management and Protection Act, was passed by the Nebraska Legislature. The resulting...
Last week, I had a producer call to visit about weed control in continuous no-till crop production systems. The conversation started with what herbicides we use to produce our crops. I explained to the producer that herbicide selection is very important, but not the whole story when it comes to controlling problematic weeds. I’ve always felt that the place to start with good weed control is with solid management strategies. Implement good management practices on your farm and use herbicides to control the weeds your management strategies may h...
With Thanksgiving just past and Christmas rapidly approaching, this is an appropriated time to be thankful for the gift of the natural resources that provide for our livelihood, enjoyment and very survival. Nebraska is all too often considered a state best flown over, or driven through as quickly as possible. But those who take the time to slow down in our state and take a look around can discover what we already know. That even our parched “desert” region is teaming with life. As with the state’s other NRDs, part of our management respo...
Early registration runs through Dec. 1 for the New Crops Technology Conference scheduled for Thursday, Dec. 4, at Sidney. The conference, sponsored by Nebraska Extension, will focus on the challenges of bringing new crops to market for western Nebraska. It begins with registration at 8:30 a.m. at Western Nebraska Community College’s Sidney campus. Conference speakers will share information about marketing and economics and research on production under limited irrigation of proso millet, sunflower, pea, fenugreek and biofuel. The conference w...
I would like to start off by wishing everyone a very Happy Thanksgiving. We’ve all got a lot to be thankful for. Last week I wrote about how we drilled our edible bean crop this year in 7.5-inch rows with an air seeder. Prior to this year we had been planting our beans in 15-inch rows with a planter. I wanted to share with you some observations I made during the growing season and some changes we plan to make next year. Let’s start by looking at the edible beans in our cropping rotation. We have been planting our edible beans in a crop rot...
We drilled our edible bean crop this year rather than planting them with a planter as we’ve done for the last several years. I think we learned a few lessons from this year’s bean crop that I would like to share with you. Let’s start by taking a look at how we planted this year. We had drilled edible beans several years ago and had good success. We planted that bean crop into winter wheat stubble. This first experiment worked well with two exceptions. We didn’t feel we had as good of a plant stand as we would have liked, and we had to load th...
The Nebraska Association of Resources Districts submitted formal comments today on behalf of the 23 Natural Resources Districts across the state in opposition to the proposed changes to the Waters of the United States rule that would significantly expand federal regulatory authority by the EPA and U.S. Corp of Engineers over Nebraska citizens. While NARD supports efforts to protect water quality and quantity in Nebraska, and has a proven track record of cooperation with local residents and other agencies to do so, we believe the proposed rule...
Last week, we looked at two of the rotations Dwayne Beck uses on his dry land acres at the Dakota Lakes Research Farm, Pierre, S.D. The first rotation is a simple rotation of cool season grass, warm season grass, and cool season broadleaf. A lot of continuous no till crop producers use this rotation on their farms. We use this rotation of our farm with a rotation of winter wheat, corn, and field pea, then back to winter wheat and repeated. This rotation utilizes two thirds high residue crops which produce enough carbon to the system to...
In September, the District Board of Directors approved the current annual operating budget of $2,959,361. These are the funds the District uses for operating expenses and projects and programs for its current fiscal year, which runs from July 1, 2014, to June 30, 2015. Of that budget, only 44 percent, or $1,312,448, of the funding needed is derived from new property tax, or about 2.5 percent of your total tax bill. Our overall tax asking figure is 5.6777 cents per $100 in valuation, or $56.77 for a $100,000 home. For perspective if you buy,...
I wanted to take a look at the dry land crop rotations designed for the Dakota Lakes Research farm. Dr. Dwayne Beck has given careful consideration to the rotations in place at the research farm. I think looking at his rotations may give helpful insight to designing rotations for my farm. Designing the proper crop rotation for your farm is the single most important consideration to successful no-till crop production in my opinion. Beck has many publications that address the concepts for planning a good rotation for your individual farm. I...
