USDA and NASA Expand Partnership to Better Predict Wildfires, Monitor Drought from Space

U.S. Agriculture Deputy Secretary Krysta Harden and NASA Deputy Administrator Dava Newman Thursday announced an expanded partnership between the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) designed to better protect America's working lands, predict and prevent natural disasters, and inspire young people to pursue careers in science, technology, engineering, mathematics and agriculture.


"Space is a unique laboratory that can be a gateway to solving some of the greatest agricultural challenges of our time," Harden said. "This partnership is a powerful opportunity for USDA and NASA to yield new tools and techniques to help farmers and ranchers as they deal with the ongoing impacts of climate change and drought. Perhaps most importantly, this partnership will expose more young people to the power of science and innovation to solve some of the world's most pressing challenges."


"There are many areas where NASA and USDA have overlapping interests," Newman said. "We can now better coordinate and build on the resources of both NASA and the USDA to help learn more about our planet's vital resources and inspire the next generation to become better stewards of our planet."

Among other things, the agreement will expand cooperation on space-borne remote sensing efforts to gather soil moisture data. One potential outcome of the expanded partnership between USDA and NASA could be using satellite data to create a series of soil moisture maps for California that could be used to improve weather and water availability forecasting and provide a drought early-warning system to producers, particularly in California.


Under the new agreement, USDA now has expanded access to data from NASA satellites that will help Forest Service fire fighters and first responders better detect wildfires and predict their behavior. USDA and the Department of the Interior have spent nearly $1.5 billion annually over the past decade on wildfire suppression, but this new technology has the potential to stop wildfires before they start, saving money, land, and even lives.  Click here to read more about this new partnership.
 

Scientists Find New Research Models to Study Food Crops

Farmers often are required to apply nitrogen fertilizers to their crops to maintain quality and improve yields. Worldwide, farmers used more than 100 million tons of nitrogen in 2011, according to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization. In the same year, the U.S. alone produced and imported more than $37 billion in nitrogen. Now, researchers at the University of Missouri are working toward less reliance on nitrogen in plants, which could help decrease costs for farmers, develop heartier plants, eliminate runoff in water supplies and provide food for a growing global population.


Fernanda Amaral, an MU postdoctoral fellow and researcher in the Bond Life Sciences Center, found that less dependence on nitrogen could start with a simple type of grass, Setaria viridis, and its relationship with naturally occurring bacteria.


"Biological nitrogen fixation-where bacteria fix atmospheric nitrogen and convert it to ammonium-provides a free way for plants to assimilate and metabolize nitrogen," Amaral said. "Farmers have long known that legumes like soybeans fix nitrogen because of the symbiosis between the plant and bacteria in the soil. Normally, plants develop nodules on their roots. However, since grass plants that produce food, such as corn, rice and sugarcane, don't form these specialized structures, that relationship has been trickier to explore in these plants. Therefore, we needed a plant model to help us study how nitrogen fixation naturally happens."

 

Click here to read more.   

Center for Rural Affairs Gives Federal Crop Insurance a Failing Grade

The Center for Rural Affairs releases a report card and white paper evaluating the performance of federally subsidized crop insurance programs.


"The time has come for crop insurance reforms that emphasize conserving soil and water, put real limits on subsidies to the nation's largest farms, and ensures these subsidies are transparent to taxpayers," Traci Bruckner, Senior Policy Analyst at the Center for Rural Affairs. 


On June 3, 2015, the Center for Rural Affairs launched their Crop Insurance Reform Initiative (www.cfra.org/crop-insurance-reform) to address long-standing concerns about federal farm programs and crop insurance subsidies. Bruckner has been evaluating the current state of and functionality of federally subsidized crop insurance programs has been a first-order priority since the very beginning.  Click here to read more about the real concerns with the current crop insurance program.
 

Curt Pate Recommends Producers Train Their Cattle for Effective Stockmanship

Livestock producers will train their horses to be ridden or their dogs to herd livestock or for hunting. One leading expert said producers also need to think about training their cattle. Curt Pate of Wyoming was in Stillwater in April. He was training folks about effective stockmanship. In this best of edition of the Beef Buzz, he shares one of the ways to achieve effective stockmanship is to develop that relationship with livestock by helping them understand their expectations. Pate said that is the key in the whole process of training animals.


"So, the thought and concept for horses and dogs is always the better trained they are, the better they work, but we don't think about training our cattle, the most important things we have for making us money, we don't think about training them to go up a chute, on a truck, how to stand calmly in a pen, how to be sorted," Pate said. "If we can train them to do those things or get ready to do them, then this abuse stuff and the cattle handling it all becomes a nonissue, now we are looking at a performance."


For some animal rights activists, it won't matter how livestock producers handle their stock as they dislike it all. As Pate looks to engage in a conversation with an activist, he goes into the situation by evaluating their behavior, similar to reading cattle.

We are featuring Pate on this best of edition of the Beef Buzz, as heard on great radio stations across the southern great plains. Click or tap here to listen to this feature. 
  

Oklahoma is a "Good Match" for National Horse and Cattle Shows

The smile on Eric Zimmermann's 8-year-old face nearly matched the curve of the brim of his cowboy hat as he thought about the question. Zimmermann, who is legally blind, was asked Thursday what he likes most about his Pony Of the Americas mare named Too Blonde To Boogie.


The Lithia, Fla., youth replied, "She sees for me."


Zimmermann's story is a sample of what two national shows - the 2015 National Junior Angus Show and the 2015 Pony of the Americas Club National Congress - have brought this week to the Built Ford Tough Livestock Complex at Expo Square in Tulsa. There are countless stories of hard work and support.


The National Junior Angus Show, attracted a near-record number of Angus cattle with 1,200 head being shown. Overall, 35 states are represented by more than 750 exhibitors.


The POAC National Congress featured more than 3,400 entries, up from 2,800 last year. This year's show has included about 305 ponies compared to 245 at last year's show.

 

Click here to read more about what brings shows and exhibitors to Oklahoma.  

ONE NOTE- we welcome Bryan Painter who joined the Oklahoma Department of Agriculture just this last week- and we look forward to seeing his articles about things going on in the world of ODAFF in the days to come. In a past life- Bryan was one of the very best writers that the Daily Oklahoman has had in recent memory- and their loss is our gain in the agricultural community. 

Award winning broadcast journalist Jerry Bohnen has spent years learning and understanding how to cover the energy business here in the southern plains-  Click here to subscribe to his daily update of top Energy News.

Long Range Plan for Beef Industry Freshened Up- Calls for 2% Increase in Beef Demand Annually for Next Five Years

During the 2015 Cattle Industry Summer Conference in Denver this past week, 16 beef industry leaders representing every link in the beef value chain presented a plan for meeting aggressive goals to strengthen the beef industry from 2016-2020. The Beef Industry Long Range Plan Task Force has been meeting since December, 2014. Oklahoma was represented on the Task Force by Auction Barn Owner Tim Starks of Cherokee, Oklahoma.


"While the beef industry has faced many challenges, the future holds tremendous promise for the industry," according to Don Schiefelbein, owner/operator of Schiefelbein Farms and task force co-chair. "The task force took a research-based approach to not only determine where the industry is and how we got here, but also at the trends and issues potentially impacting the beef community so that we can be most successful moving forward."


The task force defined the mission of the U.S. beef industry as, "a beef community dedicated to growing beef demand by producing and marketing the safest, healthiest, most delicious beef that satisfies the desires of an increasing global population while responsibly managing our livestock and natural resources."


In addition, the task force agreed the single most important strategic objective the industry should pursue is increasing beef demand and established a specific objective to "increase the wholesale beef demand index by 2 percent annually over the next five years."

Four key areas were identified by the Task force- you can read more about them by clicking or tapping here.

Legendary 6666 Ranch Named Regional Environmental Stewardship Award Winner

The renowned 6666 Ranch in Guthrie, Texas, was honored with one of seven regional Environmental Stewardship Award Program (ESAP) awards. The honorees, announced during the 2015 Cattle Industry Summer Conference, were recognized for their outstanding stewardship practices. This year's regional winners will compete for the national award, which will be announced during the 25th anniversary celebration in January 2016.


 The 6666 Ranch operates with 51 pastures encompassing more than 138,000 acres of rangeland. Management units vary from a few hundred acres to nearly 16,000 acres. The continuous grazing system reduces labor costs. Cattle are rotated in and out of various herds depending on age, quality and production.


 "Now that the area has received some beneficial rains, the cattle are coming back. Under the leadership of the owner Mrs. Anne Marion, the goal at 6666 Ranch is to return the land to the way it was back in the 1870s, to a condition that is conducive to a thriving cattle herd and abundant wildlife," said ranch manager Joe Leathers.


The 6666 Ranch, which has been owned by the same family since it was founded in the mid-1800s, was nominated by Texas Section, Society for Range Management and Texas and Southwestern Cattle Raisers Association (TSCRA) after receiving the joint Outstanding Rangeland Stewardship Award in 2014.  Click here to read more about the 6666 Ranch and their stewardship efforts.