SIOUX CITY, Iowa (AP) – Iowa cattle and hog producers are working to comply with new state rules that are designed to keep animal waste from polluting nearby waterways. The Sioux City Journal reports Craig Moss and his family created new concrete drainage systems with grates to ensure rain can leave their feedlot without carrying manure with it.

Moss says his family wants to make sure that fresh water flows around the feedlot and dirty water from the feedlot is directed through terraces into a field. The new clean water rules increased state inspections and oversight of large feedlots. The state adopted the rules last year to satisfy the Environmental Protection Agency’s concerns about lax enforcement.

Officials with the Iowa Department of Natural Resources (DNR) say customers who have snowmobiles, all-terrain vehicles (ATVs), off-road utility vehicles (ORVs), or off road motorcycles (ORMs) registered with the DNR, will need to renew their registrations by December 31st. Registrations can be renewed by any county recorder office or on the DNR’s website at www.iowadnr.gov. User permits can be purchased at any location where hunting licenses are sold including the Iowa DNR website. After December 31 customers can still renew their registration but they will pay a $5 penalty.

Resident Snowmobiles

Iowa residents are required to have and display a current Iowa DNR registration and user permit on their snowmobile in order to lawfully operate on any public land or public ice in Iowa.

Nonresident Snowmobiles

Nonresident snowmobilers are required to have and display a current registration from their home state and display a current Iowa DNR user permit. If a nonresident resides in a state that does not require or offer snowmobile registration, the only requirement is to display an Iowa DNR user permit.

Resident Off-Highway Vehicles

Iowa residents must have and display a current Iowa DNR registration on their ATV, ORV, or ORM to operate on any designated public land or ice in Iowa. Residents are not required to display an Iowa DNR user permit.

Nonresident Off-Highway Vehicles

Non-residents are required to have their machines registered in their home state and display an Iowa DNR user permit.

w/ Max Dirks

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Harlan, IA – Farmers and landowners will learn about the new programs authorized by the Agricultural Act of 2014 (commonly referred to as the Farm Bill) at an informational meeting conducted by Iowa State University Extension and Outreach and local USDA Farm Service Agency staff members. A meeting will be held on December 16th at Harlan High School Auditorium.
The Farm Bill – Program Overview meetings will focus on the Price Loss Coverage (PLC) and Agricultural Risk Coverage (ARC) that will be administered by USDA Farm Service Agency, and the Supplemental Coverage Option (SCO) administered by USDA Risk Management Agency through federal crop insurance providers.

“We are prepared to discuss decisions farmers and landowners will need to make in the coming months as they consider all their options,” said NAME, farm management specialist with ISU Extension and Outreach. “We’ll cover the timeline for when decisions need to be made along with information about our online Farm Bill decision tools.”

The main topics that will be covered during the meetings are:
· Base reallocation
· Yield updating
· Price Loss Coverage (PLC)
· Ag Risk Coverage (ARC)
· Implications of PLC and ARC on participation in the Supplemental Coverage Option (SCO)
· Dairy Margin Protection Program (MPP)
· Noninsured Crop Disaster Assistance Program (NAP)

Attend a local meeting December 16, 2014 at 6:30-8:00p.m, Harlan High School Auditorium, in Harlan, IA. Pre-Register 48 hours in advance is required. Call the Shelby County Extension and Outreach Office. No registration fee.  To register, please contact the Shelby County Extension Office at 712-755-3104 or email Oloff@iastate.edu

Farm Bill meetings for the fall and winter months continue to be added to the ISU Extension and Outreach Statewide Calendar. For the other meeting locations and dates visit the Ag Decision Maker Farm Bill website at www.extension.iastate.edu/agdm/info/farmbill.html or contact your county extension office. The Ag Decision Maker website also contains useful links and resources related to Farm Bill decision making.

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) – Iowa Gov. Terry Branstad is brushing off entertainer Cher’s criticism about hog crates. Cher posted a message on Twitter Tuesday asking why Iowa farmers “torture pigs” in narrow gestation crates, and calling New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie a “bully” for his stance on the issue.

Christie recently vetoed legislation outlawing gestation crates in New Jersey. New Jersey has few hogs, but some argue that Christie is influenced by the early voting status of Iowa, a state that raises more than 20 million hogs annually. Christie is weighing a bid for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination.

Branstad has dismissed that characterization. On Wednesday he responded to Cher, saying, “They know a lot about pig production out there in Hollywood.”

Hunters planning to be in the timber for Saturday’s opening day of the first shotgun deer season should consider buying their license soon to avoid waiting in line at the license sales counter. Officials with the Iowa DNR say fewer than half of the expected 70,000 hunters have purchased their deer license as of Wednesday morning. A weekend weather forecast with temperatures favorable for hunting could lead to additional hunters choosing to go during the first shotgun season rather than second.

“Good weather usually means more people will be hunting and staying in the field longer which can lead to higher success rates,” said Willie Suchy, wildlife research supervisor for the Iowa Department of Natural Resources.

Successful hunters are reminded to report their deer harvest by midnight the day after the deer is recovered. For hunters with Internet access, the online harvest reporting is the easiest way to register the deer. Hunters can report their deer online at www.iowadnr.gov, by calling the toll free reporting number 1-800-771-4692, or at any license vendor.

Accurately reporting the harvest is an important part of Iowa’s deer management program and plays a vital role in managing deer populations and future hunting opportunities. Reporting the harvest is required by law. Hunters will be checked for compliance.

w/ Kate Olson

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WATERLOO, Iowa (AP) – The John Deere Tractor & Engine Museum is opening in Waterloo, offering a glimpse at the company and how it’s become ingrained in the community. Waterloo is home to John Deere’s largest manufacturing complex. The city’s partnership with the company is a theme of the museum, featuring stories about key people who guided John Deere in its early years in Waterloo.

Museum curator Joshua Waddle tells the Waterloo-Cedar Falls Courier that some might not know that the manufacturer’s arrival caused concern among many Waterloo residents in 1918.  He says that’s because another company, Waterloo Gasoline Traction Engine Co., had employed about 1,000 of the city’s 35,000 residents. Many worried another competitor would cause them to lose their jobs.

WASHINGTON (AP) – The Supreme Court won’t hear an appeal from an Iowa grain company over a class-action lawsuit brought by nearby residents. The justices on Monday let stand an Iowa Supreme Court ruling that said residents could bring a nuisance lawsuit against Grain Processing Corp., which operates a corn processing plant in Muscatine.

The lawsuit accuses the company of routinely blanketing homes with soot and harmful chemicals. A lower court threw out the case, but the state supreme court said claims of nuisance, negligence and trespass are not barred by the federal Clean Air Act or related state rules governing air emissions.

Environmental groups backed the lawsuit, but business groups said regulation of air pollution should be left to state and federal agencies and not judges on a case-by-case basis.

SIOUX CITY, Iowa (AP) – Rail delays have been a problem for farmers throughout much of the Great Plains this year, but they’ve been less of an issue in Iowa, Nebraska and South Dakota. Grain elevators around Sioux City say their rail shipments of grain this year have been mostly on time, and they’re cautiously optimistic about handling the big 2014 harvest over the next few months.

Don Truhe, general manager for the Southeast Farmers Elevator Coop, says his cooperative has been lucky to get all of its trains on time this year. It helps that a significant portion of the grain grown in the region is used by feedlots or biofuel plants.

In recent reports to the Surface Transportation Board, BNSF, Union Pacific and Canadian National railroads said they are making significant progress.