Serving all of Eastern Laramie County since 1908
Serving all of Eastern Laramie County since 1908
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The past couple of weeks I attended No till On the Plains winter conference and the Colorado Conservation Tillage Association’s High Plains No-till Conference. I enjoyed both conferences and felt each had a lot to offer. After getting home and taking some time to think about what I learned, it dawned on me that nobody told me anything about how to farm. Not one speaker told me how deep to plant my corn, what herbicides to use, or what crops to plant. I still left both conferences with k...
One of the pleasures of traveling to the various winter conference meetings and summer field days I attend is getting introduced to some real innovative producers and researchers who strive to really make a difference in modern production agriculture. Last week I visited about our tour to Dakota Lakes Research Farm near Pierre, S. D. and the Burleigh County Soil Conservation District, in Bismarck, N.D. Dr. Dwayne Beck, farm manager for Dakota Lakes and Jay Furher, head of the Burleigh County...
I am currently the chairman of the Panhandle No till Partnership. I wanted to share with you more about our partnership, our educational opportunities, and an exciting new project that I think the producers in our region will find very interesting. The Panhandle No till Partnership members include the Upper Niobrara White, South Platte and North Platte Natural Resources Districts, representatives from the local offices of the Natural Resource and Conservation Service, Panhandle Resource... Full story
Have you ever watched one of those scary movies where the bad guy sneaks into a house? The homeowners hear the floorboards squeak. Something goes bump as the intruder runs into furniture? And the homeowners find something ugly in their home. I have snuck into my mom’s house after curfew a few times, but that is another story. Fortunately she didn’t meet me with a ball bat. This weekend the Smith house had an intruder of the sweetest kind. My oldest son, Norman, surprised us with a visit. The... Full story
On the 3rd and 4th of February, 2015 I’ll be attending the 27th Annual High Plains No-till Conference. The conference is hosted by the Colorado Conservation Tillage Association and is held each year at the Community Center in Burlington, Colorado. I’ve spoken at this conference in the past and have attended the conference over the past several years. This year I will get to just sit back, listen, and learn from some excellent speakers lined up to present at this year’s conference. I enjoy this c... Full story
I’m headed to Salina, Kansas again this year for the 19th Annual No Till On the Plains Winter Conference. This year’s conference is scheduled for Jan. 27 and 28, 2015. 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 speake...
I feel like we are 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 grown 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 which 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 a...
I would like to start off by wishing everyone a very Happy New Year! This is a good time to reflect back 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 this coming year will bestow upon us. I’m often asked this time of 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 t...
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 a...
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...
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 t...
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 c...
One of the reasons we drilled our edible beans in 7.5 inch rows this year was to aid in direct harvest of the edible bean crop. Our thought was to plant the beans in narrower rows which would force the architecture of the beans even more upright. We felt the beans would respond by setting the pods higher on the plant. This would allow us to more easily slide under the low setting pods with our cutter bar on our flex head. We have a 925 John Deere flex head equipped with a Crary wind reel. We...
Top stewards have been recognized for their continuing efforts in three areas by the South Platte Natural Resources District. Sprenger Farms of Sidney, Steve Schumacher from Dalton and Kimball area ranchers Doug and Theresa Keller received awards for their farming, tree planting and grassland achievements. The awards were presented at a ceremony and reception prior to the District’s November board meeting. Conservation Farm Sprenger Farms, run by Randy and son Marc Sprenger has a long history of land stewardship and conservation ethic. Their c...
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 hav...
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 sta...
Last week we looked at two of the rotations Dr. 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...
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. Dr. Dwayne Beck has many publications that address the concepts...
The final stop on our tour at the Dakota Lakes Research Farm in Pierre, S.D., was a look at the dry land portion of the farm. I’ve always felt dry land farming is much more interesting than irrigated farming. The ability to irrigate can mask some deficiencies in cropping rotation and soil health. On dry land acres, there is much less room for error. Proper management of crop rotations is critical to the success of a continuous no-till cropping system. Lack of carbon inputs, lack of sufficient r...
Dakota Lakes Research Farm is located 16 miles east of Pierre, S.D. On our tour, we had the privilege of spending a morning with Dr. Dwayne Beck, who operates the farm. If you aren’t familiar with Beck, he has devoted his career to educating producers about the many benefits of no-till crop production. I’ve known Dwayne for more than 20 years and have traveled with him and attended numerous no-till crop production meetings with him. Dwayne has spoken several times at our Panhandle No-till Par...
The Menoken Farm is located outside Bismarck, N.D. This is a farm owned and operated by the Burleigh County Soil Conservation District. The Menoken Farm is a 150-acre educational farm dedicated to restoring the health of the soils on the farm. The Menoken Farm is a farm every producer involved in production agriculture should visit. The Burleigh County Soil Conservation District team is moving this farm toward sustainability by eliminating fungicides, insecticides, GMOs and commercial...
I’ve been thinking about the value of water and what this resource means to our communities. I suspect if we didn’t have this valuable resource our landscape would look quite a bit different than what we are now accustom to seeing. Since we have tapped into this resource we have experienced significant economic growth in our agricultural community, primarily with center pivot irrigation. So what is the economic value of the water? If we look at the economic benefit to producers we could fig...
Our final stop on our field tour of farms and ranches in Burleigh County, North Dakota was a visit to the Black Leg Ranch. The Black Leg ranch is owned and operated by Jerry Doan and his family. Jerry greeted us in his farm yard and visited with us about his operation and his commitment to agriculture. It was obvious from listening to Jerry that he has a real passion for the agricultural community. Jerry has worked with numerous associations and university research members over the years to...
I’d like to continue visiting about our tour of the Burleigh County Soil District near Bismarck, North Dakota that a group of producers from our region went on a few weeks ago. I find the approach the producers in this region are taking to improve soil health is something we can all learn from. These producers are taking the steps down the path towards improving the health of the soil they have on their farms and ranches. After enjoying a lunch at the Menoken Soil Health Research farm south o...
Last week I talked about our soil health tour to North and South Dakota. We looked at all aspects of high quality no-till crop production and grazing practices implemented on farm and ranch lands in the region. Everyone on our tour came away with a greater appreciation for the work these individuals are doing to improve the health of the soil they work with on their farms and ranches. We started our tour in Burleigh County, N. D. with Jay Furher and his Burleigh County Soil Conservation team...