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CLICK HERE for the latest market quotes from the Iowa Agribusiness Network!
CLICK HERE for the latest market quotes from the Brownfield Ag News Network!
(Radio Iowa) — The beauty of autumn is about to come alive with the change of colors on Iowa’s trees. Joe Herring, an Iowa D-N-R forester from Iowa Falls, says the fall leaf show is already starting. “If you see some really bright red colors, if you’re in a forest area on vines that are growing up trees, those are woodbine,” Herring says. “Along the roadsides, we’re seeing nice red colors in the sumac bushes as well as some dogwoods.”
Some trees in far northern Iowa are beginning to show reds and oranges, but the majority of the state is still in the early stages. Herring says, “Across the landscape, you can see the gradual change from the deeper forest green color to more of a lime green and some yellows showing up from some cottonwood and ash and walnut and elm right now.” Herring predicts the color show won’t really peak in Iowa for at least another week, likely closer to October 19th. “That’s a little later than I normally would predict,” he says, “but I think with the late start to the growing season that some of these trees will hang on just a little bit longer than normal.”
The Iowa DNR website offers a weekly fall color report: https://www.iowadnr.gov/Conservation/Forestry/Fall-Color
New officers for the Washington G.E.M. 4H Club were installed at their meeting on Sunday, October 6th. Following the meeting all 4H club members were invited to enjoy Fall Fest held on the Cass County Fairgrounds. This week is National 4H week and anyone who is interested in joining 4H is encouraged to contact the Iowa State Extension Office at 712-243-1132.
Pictured: Lola Comes: President, Claire Comes: Secretary, Grant Petty: Reporter, Madelyn Anderson: Treasurer, Lauren Comes: Historian and Jake Oathoudt: Vice President. (Melanie Petty/photo)
WINTERSET, Iowa (AP) — A south-central Iowa county has imposed a moratorium on new wind turbine installations. Madison County supervisors voted 2-1 on Tuesday to adopt the moratorium, which will run through October 2020 unless superseded by a new ordinance. The moratorium also applies to new solar energy installations. It won’t affect a 52-turbine wind farm already under development in Madison County. The supervisors say that during the moratorium they’ll develop an ordinance to guide construction of renewable energy projects.
The county health board passed a resolution in August calling for wind turbines to sit at least 1.5 miles from homes. Such a setback would be five times greater than MidAmerican Energy has proposed for its most recent wind farm project. The county supervisors have taken no action on the health board recommendation.
(Radio Iowa) The Iowa Department of Natural Resources will host five meetings across the state to discuss the proposed waterfowl season and zone structures for 2021-2025. D-N-R spokesman Mick Klemsrude says the meetings are part of an ongoing process. He says the U-S Fish and Wildlife Service allows states to take a look at the zones every five years to see if they need to make some changes. There are currently three zones in the state. “We have the Missouri River Zone in far western Iowa — and then a north zone and a south zone,” Klemesrude says. “You get different season depending on the number of zones that you have — so that is one of the considerations.”
He says they had discussions with small groups of hunter and sent out surveys as part of the review to come up with the best solution for the state. He says they look at a lot of the migration data and harvest data and then come up with a proposal. He says the meetings will get input from hunters. “We could have changes to our proposals based on those comments, and then we’ll go in front of our Natural Resources Commission and propose that. And once we have a final version, that will go back out for comment, the official public comment,” Klemesrude says.
The first meeting will be held October 14th at Three Mile Lake Lodge near Afton. October 15th at the Washington County Conservation Office education center near Ainsworth, October 16th at the Oelwein Community Center,October 22nd at the Story County Conservation Center near Ames and on October 23rd at the Alta Community Center. All meetings will be held from 6:00 until 8:00 p-m. The Commission is expected to make a final decision in April 2020.
(Radio Iowa) — The latest U-S-D-A crop report out Monday showed there were less than two days suitable for fieldwork last week — which didn’t help farmers catch up on the harvest. The report says three percent of corn has been harvested — which is two weeks behind average. Five percent of soybeans have been harvested, and that’s 12 days behind average.
Iowa State University Extension and Outreach Crops Specialist for northwest Iowa, Joel DeJong, says those farmers that were able to plant early have seen some good things. “Some of the early reports from the soybean harvest actually were fairly decent yields– so I have hope that maybe that will continue moving forward,” DeJong says. “But, we are starting about three weeks later than normal. It would be nice to get rain out of our forecast for a little while and get some sunshine and maybe a little breeze so we can get them dry so we can get that work done.”
He says not everything is negative. “The crop itself is actually hanging in there pretty well. They soybeans are pretty mature, so we are just waiting for them to dry. A lot of the corn that’s planted before the first of June has actually reached maturity or is close to maturity now,” De Jong says. He says getting the crop to maturity is only part of the issue. “The problem we still have is that when the corn crop just hits maturity it is still 32 to 32 plus percent moisture. We need some dry down time and we don’t that get much dry down time once we get past the month of October,” he says. “We would like to see the month of October be above normal if we get any chance for that to occur.”
De Jong says there have been some diseases that have hit too. He says there has been a lot of white mold that has shown up late and that could make the yield zero in parts of fields.. DeJong says there’s been appraisals of 40 to 70 bushels and acre. The corn has also had some issue and he says there have been appraisals of 108 bushels per acre and then there’s been appraisals up into 200. De Jong says the conditions vary widely across the nine counties he covers. He says a late frost would help with a lot of the issues. DeJong says the normal frost date for this region is October 10th. He says much of the area’s corn still needs additional time to mature and a light frost may not hurt the crop, but for late planted corn, an early frost could negatively affect crop yields.
DeJong says it is very likely many farmers will need to resort to using artificial drying methods in order to store their corn, which only adds to the cost of the crop.
ATLANTIC—Officials with the Iowa DNR said Monday (Today), that following a producer’s report on Oct. 4th, DNR staff investigated a manure spill about seven miles northwest of Atlantic.
DNR staff found that an unknown amount of manure had overflowed a pit at the Dennis Kuehl hog operation prior to their site visit Friday afternoon. The manure flowed into an underground tile line, then into an unnamed tributary to Camp Creek.
DNR staff did not see any fish in the stream. The producer is moving the animals to prevent further overflows. He plans to pump out and land apply manure from the pit. DNR will monitor cleanup and consider appropriate enforcement action.
The Iowa Dept. of Natural Resources said today (Monday), ruby-throated Hummingbirds are headed south for the winter. Hummingbird migration in Iowa usually lasts from late August to early October. This year, hummingbirds are still being reported throughout the state in the second week of October. Many of the birds we’re seeing now bred north of Iowa and are working their way to their wintering areas in Mexico and Central America. So, when is the right time to take down hummingbird feeders? And can feeding them stop the hummers from migrating when they should?
View an animated map of their migration here: https://ebird.org/science/status-and-trends/rthhum/abundance-map-weekly?utm_medium=email&utm_source=govdelivery
Hummingbirds, like other species, need to build up body fat in order to make their large migration flights, so refueling locations like backyard feeders are important. One of the triggers for birds to migrate is day length, and regardless of food availability they will migrate as the days grow shorter. The best thing to do is to keep hummingbird feeders up for at least 10 days after you see your last hummingbird to make sure and provide food for any migrating stragglers.
DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — The union representing workers at pork processing plants has sued the federal government to challenge new rules finalized in September that allow companies to set line speeds and turn more food safety tasks over to company employees. The United Food and Commercial Workers International Union and local unions in Minnesota, Iowa and Kansas have joined with nonprofit consumer advocacy group Public Citizen to file the lawsuit in federal court in Minnesota.
The lawsuit alleges that the new rules announced in September by the U.S. Department of Agriculture violate the Administrative Procedure Act because it is not backed by reasoned decision-making and should be set aside. A USDA spokeswoman says the agency does not comment on pending litigation.
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