We have been very busy with harvest the last couple weeks. Here are a couple pics to catch up with he happenings here. One is a picture of seed corn that is picked on the ear being unloaded at Producers Hybrids, one is of soybean harvest, one of corn harvest, one is of the data from our yield monitor that we track and one of the Producers Hybrids display at Husker Harvest Days. Producers Hybrids
It has been a very busy summer here as we have been in one of the worst droughts I have seen. We have caught a few timely rains here that other areas of the state have not. Our non-irrigated corn is just barely hanging on. We will have a crop from it, but it will be less than expected. Our irrigated fields look great and yield projections for those will most likely be record yields the way it looks now as we are way ahead on Growing Degree Units and have very minimal disease and insect pressure.
The popcorn looks good this year as do all of the soybeans also. I have included a few pictures of gravity irrigation and pictures of the crops to catch you all up with what is going on. Hope to get back to posting a little more often, but mother nature and kids activities dictate my free time this time of year.
We are thankful to have the irrigation on our farms as much of this country’s ag producers are not so fortunate!
Our corn is nearing roasting ear stage and it looks like harvest will be around two weeks early this year.
Spring work is in full swing at our farm theses days. This is probbly the earliest we have been able to get field work done that I can remember. It was a very mild winter and that in turn will present its own set of problems this year.
One of the problems we will see is that our compaction zones in the soild were not broke by the natural freeze and thaw that we usually experience. Another issue we will deal with may be heavier than normal disease and pest pressures in our crops. This is going to mean increased costs for our farm most likely and the use of fungicides and some insecticides which we have not had to use for quite a few years, at least on our conventional corn.
We do use both fungicides and insecticides on all of our popcorn acres as the popcorn plant is a much more susceptible plant than our yellow commercial corns. Popcorn in general has weak scores when it comes to plant diseases and pest like corn borer and rootworm as all of our popcorn is non-GMO. Much of our popcorn ends up in export channels and it is a requirement that it is non-GMO. It is all source verified and can be traced all the way back to individual fields it was rasied in. We also document every single thing we do in that field regarding application, and what is put on the crop regarding fertilier, chemicals, etc.
The one thing I think a lot of people do not realize is that we do this same documentation for all of our crops. It is a requirement of the federal government and we can be audited at any time for compliance. The majority of the yellow corn that we grow is GMO corn and requires little to no fungicides or insecticides as the plant has a natural resistance to most of our major concerns. On our farm we use GPS technology and computers to document everything we do with a time stamp. We can telll you exactly what time of day we were in a certain spot in the field, how fast we were traveling, amounts applied, wind direction, and its speed. This keeps us in compliance and also provides us documentation regarding potential drift, etc. should there be a concern with a neighbors field or farm.
So, spring work has begun, but so has the task of documenting all that we do to ensure a safe, abundant food source for all.
AThe term nerd 25 years ago and still today generally has a negative meaning to it, but there are a bunch of agricultualists and our supporters that have embraced the term and somewhat made it the calling card of the AgChat Foundation. I am not sure who first coined the term, but it has caught on and we embrace #AgNerd.
The AgChat Foundation is an organization dedicated to helping enable people involved in agriculture to better tell their stories through the use of social media. I serve in a volunteer capacity with the organization in setting up our conferences to help with this educational effort. I attended the first conference in August of 2011 in Chicago, IL. It was quite an experience finally meeting in person all of the individuals with whom I had advocated for agriculture with over the previous couple years. We put together our second Agvocacy conference this last August in Nashville, TN and it was a resounding success.
As I look forward this week to attending The Ag Issues 2012 event sponsored by Bayer Crop Science I reflect on where this social media journey of agvocating has taken me. I have had an opportunity to work with an amazing group of people that are interested in having a conversation with consumers and finding our common ground. These are selfless individuals interested in helping others to tell their stories and help bridge the gap that seems to exist between the producers of our food and the consumers. Last night many farmers and others in this area had a chance to listen to Anne Burkholder speak about the importance of telling this story and doing it the right way. If you have not heard of Anne, make sure to visit her blog at www.feedyardfoodie.com. I believe it opened some eyes to the divide that is out there. For too many years agriculture has sat back and let others tell our story for us. Let me tell you, it is not a pretty story. Do you consider your farm a “factory”? I certainly do not, but that is the way we are portrayed the majority of the time! Why, because the public does not know us. What they do know of us is usually second hand.
I get the chance because of this social media adventure to serve on a sustainability panel at Ag Issues 2012. The Twitter hashtag for the event in #agissues12. Please follow it on Twitter as myself and some friends I have met through #agchat will be tweeting the conference also. To follow the conference follow me at @Huskerfarm Michele Payn-Knoper at @mpaynknoper, and Jeff Vanderwerff at @agsalesman. We will be #agnerding with our smartphones, iPads, etc. for a couple days in Nashville, but there are a ton of others out there doing it every day, telling their story via Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Blogs, Pinterest, etc.
Who are you going to tell your farm story to today? Is there someone you can connect with in a positive way to start a conversation? Are you going to let someone else do it for YOU? Are we going to be part of the solution, or help create a bigger divide? Take 10 minutes a week to tell your story in some way and see what it can accomplish. Large companies employ PR and reputation management firms to handle interaction and communication with the public. As individuals in agriculture, that is just another one of the many hats we need to wear each day on our own farms! I tell my story because I want to ensure that our children are afforded the same opportunities in agriculture that I have been. Find your reason!
This is a great blog post by Chris Chinn, a farmer from Missouri. Her number one concern is the welfare of her animals!
Did You Know McDonald’s, Burger King, Wendy’s and Sonic All Support HSUS?.
Chris does a great job of explaining her family’s reasons for adopting modern pork production practices!!!
Days of the Weeks 