Thralls Retiring from Oklahoma Conservation Commission

After serving as the Executive Director of the Oklahoma Conservation Commission for the past seventeen years, Mike Thralls is retiring from the agency as of September first. A retirement reception will be held for Mike Thralls on Thursday, September 4th 1:30 - 3:30 pm at the Oklahoma Conservation Commission 2800 N. Lincoln Boulevard Oklahoma City, Okla. There will be a formal presentation at 2 pm.


I sat down with Thralls to reflect on his career with the Oklahoma Conservation Commission under three governors. He said during his tenure his agency has targeted three major areas with flood control, water quality and soil health. 


In going through a drought, Thralls said the importance of flood control is not readily recognizable. The state's flood control projects deliver $85 million dollars worth of benefits annually from a infrastructure worth $2 billion dollars. Improvements to the state's watershed infrastructure will be renovated over this next year due to funding provided through the 2014 Farm Bill. Thralls credits House Ag Chairman and Congressman Frank Lucas for his leadership in providing funding the state rehabilitate 14 high hazard dams across Oklahoma.


Protecting the state's water resources for drinking, recreation and industry has also been especially important. Thralls said Oklahoma has had considerable success in showing progress in implementing voluntary conservation practices to a particular watershed. He credited the state's monitoring system monitoring hundreds of streams annually in a rotating fashion. To date Oklahoma has taken 45 streams off the Environmental Protection Agency's impaired streams listing.

Click here to listen to my full interview or to read more about the advances in soil health and conservation.  
  

Congressman Touts Waterway Expansion Project at Port of Catoosa 

Oklahoma agriculture celebrated the importance of the state's largest inland river-ports at the Port of Catoosa. The Tulsa port is a market conduit for crop producers in Oklahoma and nearby states, as wheat and soybeans are shipped from Catoosa to export markets. The port is also a hub for fertilizer shipments that are brought into Catoosa and then trucked out to the countryside. Earlier this year Congress passed the Water Resources Reform and Development Act (WRRDA) of 2014 which will provide funding for the navigational waterway system. Expansion of the Port of Catoosa will begin this year. The expansion project could cost as much as $10 million.


I was at the Port of Catoosa Thursday and spoke with Oklahoma's Second District Congressman Markwayne Mullin. Mullin said WRRDA was an important piece of legislation for the region and for all the economies around the world that are attached to the US.  


"When we pass something as important as WRRDA which deals directly with our waterways and when you're talking about in the central part of the United States, the heartbeat of our country, where we provide a tremendous amount of food for not just to our country, but for the world around us and we're able to bring certainty to our waterway by saying we're going to do whatever it takes to keep this thing open and it shows the importance that the federal government has puts in," Mulllin said.


"Not only did we cut spending, but we cut a tremendous amount of red tape," he said. "At the same time we allowed the port to be able to invest and to have certainty in what they're going to have to work with and the ag community to have certainty knowing they're going to be able to get their products from point a to point b."   

Click Here to read or to listen to Congressman Mullin's comments about the 'Waters of the US' proposal.

Kim Anderson Talks Wheat Price Stability on This Weekend's SUNUP  

Wheat prices in Oklahoma and the southern great plains are determined more and more by the global wheat market, as US wheat market is a smaller percentage of the overall worldwide wheat production pie, especially compared to ten or fifteen years ago. Exension Grain Market Economist Dr. Kim Anderson says that with most of the world wheat harvest done for the year- wheat prices here in the state may be going mostly sideways over the next few months.


Cash wheat prices have held just above six dollars a bushel since June and the rather poor 2014 Oklahoma wheat harvest, and Anderson tells Lyndall Stout on this week's SUNUP that he sees little chance of those cash prices being pushed below that six dollar mark.


You can see their full conversation on SUNUP this weekend on OETA across the state of Oklahoma- or you can listen to Dr. Anderson's current wheat market analysis right now by clicking or tapping here to jump over to our webstory.

It includes a rundown of this weekend's SUNUP program, as assembled by the wizards of Stillwater- otherwise known as Lyndall, Austin and Dave.

Urge Congress, Secretary of Ag to Suspend COOL Regulations

The COOL Reform Coalition, of which the National Corn Growers Association is a member, asks farmers to join them in respectfully urging Congress to authorize and directing the Secretary of Agriculture to immediately suspend the Mandatory Country of Origin Labeling regulations for meat upon a final WTO adjudication of non-compliance with international trade obligations.


Such a congressional action would neither pre-judge the pending WTO litigation on this matter nor allow an on-going period of knowing violation of international trade obligations.


Composed of a diverse group of associations and companies, the COOL Reform Coalition represents U.S. food, agriculture and manufacturing industries, advocating for U.S. compliance with WTO obligations. Mandatory Country of Origin Labeling rules require most retailers to provide country of origin labeling for fresh fruits and vegetables, fish, shellfish, peanuts, pecans, macadamia nuts, ginseng, meat and poultry. The rules are required by the 2002 farm bill, as amended by the 2009 farm bill.


U.S. corn farmers have a vested interest, as corn products are included on the retaliatory list already outlined by Canada and will likely be included in any list produced by Mexico. Inclusion in the retaliatory lists has the potential to impact trade demand, thus harming the economic well-being of the U.S. corn industry.


Click here to read the rest of the article or click here to make your voice heard.
  

OSU Researching Water Consumption In Cattle

Water is a valuable resource and Oklahoma State University will be looking at ways the cattle industry can reduce it water demands. OSU recently received a million dollar research grant from the US Department of Agriculture's National Institute of Food and Agriculture to look at water utilization by beef cattle. I interviewed lead researcher Dr. Megan Rolf, animal science assistant professor with OSU's Division of Agriculture about the research project. 


The cattle industry has worked for decades on feed usage and feed intake, but research on water usage has been limited. Rolf said there was a research project back in the 1950s and 60s that collected individual animal water intake on small number of animals. Recently there has been some recent work on water consumption of animals in large feedlots, but that has been based on group of animals.


"One of the unique things about our study that has been enabled by the Instatech facility that we've got out at the Willard Sparks beef research center is that we can actually collect individual animal water intake on a really large number of animals," Rolf said.


The OSU research project is focused on natural resource usage in terms of feed efficiency, water-use efficiency and water as a economically important use. Rolf said they have found the animal that drank the most drank about three times as much water on a daily average as the animal that drank the least.  


Click here to listen to my interview with Rolf or read how this project may shape cattle selection in the future.  
 

Peterson Announces Enrollment for Dairy Margin Protection Program

House Agriculture Committee Ranking Member Collin Peterson today announced that the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) will open enrollment for the dairy Margin Protection Program on September 2. The new program was authorized by the 2014 Farm Bill and aims to address volatility in the dairy marketplace, providing dairy farmers with a safety net when margins, the difference between milk prices and feed, fall below the farmer's coverage level.


"The Margin Protection Program is significant reform, creating a strong safety net that will help dairy farmers better manage their risk," Peterson said. "Reforming dairy programs was a top farm bill priority for me, and I'm pleased to see USDA moving ahead with implementation. Dairy farmers should visit the website and their local FSA offices, to learn more and enroll in the new program."


Shortly after dairy prices collapsed in 2008, Peterson began working with dairy farmers across the country to develop a new safety net that would address the realities of today's dairy industry. These conversations formed the basis of the farm bill's Margin Protection Program.

Click here to learn more about the Dairy Margin Protection Program.  

This N That- Labor Day Cometh, In The Field Reminder and Jody's Farm Program Templates 

The Labor Day weekend is upon us- and I wanted to remind you that the markets will be taking a break like many of us this coming Monday for this last holiday of summer.

Ag futures will be closing at their normal times this afternoon and will not be reopening until Monday evening for the grain futures and Tuesday morning for the Livestock futures.

And- those Monday livestock markets that we normally report on will be off as well.

Government offices are closed for Labor Day- Banks are closed and service related businesses likely won't be around in the office, either.

Enjoy the holiday with family and friends- we will NOT have an Email on Monday morning- but will return bright and early on Tuesday with more agricultural news you can use.

Our radio reports that are heard on great radio stations across the region  will be available as normal on most of the stations we work with.

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We will have an In the Field guest as usual this holiday weekend- Mike Schulte of the Oklahoma Wheat Commission is slated to join us on KWTV, News9 at 6:40 AM Saturday morning.  We will be talking about the start of the 2015 planting season as we turn the calendar on Monday over to September.  

We will also have an audio conversation that we will be sharing with you from Mike later today on our website- and we will point to it on our Tuesday morning email- after the holiday.

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Dr. Jody Campiche and other members of the OSU Ag Economics Department at OSU have put together a Farm Bill page together on the world wide web- pulling together into one place links to fact sheets, news releases, webinars and most recently, several decision making tools to help wheat producers consider which farm program safety net will make the most sense for their operation.

Dr. Campiche has three current tools that compare the SCO, PLC and ARC programs that farmers will be considering for the 2015 crop year- that's the wheat crop we are getting ready to plant.  

She has a separate decision tool for farms in Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas.

You can go here to jump over to the OSU Farm Bill page.