(Radio Iowa) – The northwest Iowa event billed as the world’s largest county fair starts on Saturday. This is Jerome Hertel’s first year as manager of the Clay County Fair in Spencer. “This fair is pretty much similar, I guess, to the Alaska State Fair where I came from,” Hertel says. “It’s a 501c non-profit fair, which is like much like the Alaska State Fair; about the same attendance — 300,000 people; about the same number of buildings.”

Hertel’s first day on the job in Spencer was April 17th. Hertel says once the fair starts this weekend, it will give him a chance to learn about the fair’s culture. “Who are the people that attend this fair? What are those traditions that are here at the Clay County Fair?” Hertel asks. “This fair is a resource for the community. It’s a reflection of the community, so what is it reflecting, you know, in the community and what’s its position in the community?” Hertel says he’s not looking to make any big changes.

“This fair’s not broke, so if it’s not broke, don’t fix it,” Hertel says. “It’s got a great reputation in the industry as being the world’s greatest county fair, so I just want to continue that tradition.” Hertel says the staff and volunteers are paddling like crazy to get done before opening day.

The Clay County Fair starts this Saturday, the 9th, and ends on Sunday, September 17th. Hertel was general manager of the Alaska State Fair for nine years — and he grew up in Parker, South Dakota, across the street from the oldest county fair in South Dakota.

Shelby, Iowa – Iowa farm history will be showcased September 9 and 10 at Carstens Farm during the 41st Annual Carstens Farm Days. This farm show showcases threshing, sawmill operations, crafters and vendors, a quilt show and of course, tractors. The Farm Days show has something for everyone throughout the weekend.

Horse, steam and gas power: Come see steam engines powering antique threshing machines, antique cars, trucks and machinery, a parade, crafts, and entertainment.  Over two hundred restored antique tractors will be on display.  The original Carstens farm buildings will be open for tours. The buildings will be alive with demonstrations that will bring back memories for older visitors and teach valuable history lessons to young people.

Food for all: A Friday evening pulled pork sandwich dinner will be hosted by the Friends of the Shelby Stone Arch Trail Committee. Proceeds of the Friday evening dinner will go to the trail committee.  The dinner will be served from 5:00 – 7:30 pm.  All good days begin with a good breakfast and to start Farm Days off right, a great breakfast is planned at 6:30 a.m. both Saturday and Sunday. Snacks and lunch options provided by the Hodges Smokehouse Catering of Minden will be available. Various non-profit local groups will be offering refreshments and delicious desserts all weekend.  Homemade ice cream will be in plentiful supply during Farm Days. Serving Benny’s Ice Cream will be Carstens board member Ben Ausdemore and his wife Katie. This is a treat visitors won’t want to miss!

On Saturday beginning at 5:30 p.m. enjoy Staley’s Chicken for a delicious dinner at the farm. The dinner will be $15 for adults and $10 for kids age 8 and under. Dinner proceeds will go toward on-going maintenance at Carstens 1880 Farmstead.

Farmall Tractors and Equipment To Be Featured: Farmall equipment of all types will be featured during Farm Days.  Farmall tractor and implement owners are invited to bring their exhibits to display throughout the weekend.  Horsepower-testing, sawmill operations and field demonstrations will occupy tractor exhibitors all day. Over 250 pieces of vintage equipment were on display during the 2022 Farm Days show. Visitors will enjoy watching most of the restored tractors as they go through the parade each afternoon at 2 p.m.

Quilt Show: A colorful display of quilts, wall hangings, wearable art and other types of quilting projects will be featured in the special event building at the farm. Many talented quilters from around the area will allow their works of art to be displayed for all to enjoy. Even if you have never displayed a quilt before, consider joining the fun and bringing a quilt to display.  Exhibitors are asked to deliver their quilts on Friday, September 8. For details about the quilt show or to inquire about adding your quilt to the collection, please call Jan Hursey at 712-544-2662.

Crafts, plants and treats galore: In case visitors run out of vintage tractors and other pieces of equipment to look at, there will be over fifty crafters and vendors on hand. A wide array of crafts, plants, vintage and antique items will be available.  From unique wooden creations to home raised honey, there will be something for everyone.

A very healthy crop of farm-grown potatoes will also be available for purchase. Proceeds from the sale of potatoes will help make improvements to the farmstead.

Sunday Worship: On Sunday morning a non-denominational worship service will take place at 9:00 a.m. on the lawn in front of the Carstens home. Worship will be led by the United Lutheran Church, Shelby. Everyone is welcome to join in the worship service.

Admission:   Admission is $10 per day for everyone nine years and older.

Carstens 1880 Farmstead, Inc., a non-profit group of local volunteers, oversees an 80-acre working farm museum exhibit located between Minden and Shelby, Iowa in Pottawattamie County.  The farmstead is the home of Carstens Farm Days, which is held the first weekend after Labor Day each September.  It is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.  For more information visit the web site: www.carstensfarm.com

(Atlantic, Iowa) – Summer gardens are flourishing, and many gardeners are looking to preserve some of their bounty to enjoy later in the year. One preservation method that is growing in popularity is fermenting. Cass County Extension invites you to learn all the basics of small batch fermentation and making sauerkraut at a food preservation workshop on Thursday evening, September 14, 2023, from 6-8 PM. The workshop is offered at the Cass County Community Center in Atlantic, and is part of ISU Extension and Outreach’s Preserve the Taste of Summer program. Leah Brooke, a Human Sciences Specialist in Food and Health with ISU Extension and Outreach, will lead the hands-on workshop.

Participants will:

Learn the history of fermentation
Become familiar with a variety of fermented vegetables
Learn how to do small batch fermentation in a mason jar
Learn about potential fermentation problems
Take home and enjoy a jar of sauerkraut to finish fermenting at home

“These workshops are fun and helpful for beginning food preservers as well as experienced individuals who ferment foods,” said Leah Brooke. “We provide the most up-to-date science and guidelines for vegetable fermentation.”

Participants can register for the workshop at: https://go.iastate.edu/H5DPJT

Cost is $20.00 for the two-hour workshop. Need-based scholarships are available during the confidential, online registration process.

To learn more or to ask questions, contact Leah Brooke, Human Sciences Specialist in Food and Health at lbrooke@iastate.edu or (712) 623-2592 or contact Kate Olson at the Cass County Extension Office at keolson@iastate.edu or (712) 243-1132. For more information on food preservation, including recipes and tips on technique, visit the program website at www.extension.iastate.edu/humansciences/preserve-taste-summer or stop by the Cass County Extension office in Atlantic for printed copies of program resources. Find a program flier and additional details at the Cass County Extension website: www.extension.iastate.edu/cass.

(Radio Iowa) – The Department of Natural Resources has advised against swimming in 11 lakes across the state again this week. The D-N-R’s Jason Palmer in the Water Quality division says the return of wildlife and agricultural runoff toward the end of the season has created an elevated risk for all types of harmful bacteria. They look first for E-coli.

Palmer says birds in the water around the beaches have elevated the concern of possible bacteria.

The D-N-R held over last week’s advisories as they says the heatwave made it unsafe for workers to take new samples.

(Guthrie Center, Iowa) – The Guthrie County Fair began Thursday, in Guthrie Center, and continues through Labor Day (Sept. 4th).

Activities today (Friday) include:

• 4-H and FFA Swine show, 8:00 am.
• 4-H and FFA Horse Show, 8:30 a.m., followed by Open Class.
• Sheep and Goat Show, 12:30 pm.
• Clover Kids Show, 4:00 p.m.
• The grandstand event at 7-p.m. is the Grand River Rodeo.

Gate admission is $10-dollars, but Carnival rides and Grandstand Shows are FREE. Learn more at www.guthriecountyfair.com, or follow them on Facebook at Guthrie County Fair.

(Radio Iowa) – Iowa has been vexed by too much water — or not enough — this year, leading to natural disasters in multiple counties for flooding and for drought. The federal government is now offering low-interest loans to help Iowa businesses and non-profits recover. Kevin Wynne (WIN), spokesman for the U-S Small Business Administration, says they’re working with the Federal Emergency Management Agency to aid non-profits in seven eastern Iowa counties that were hit by Mississippi River flooding between April 24th and May 13th, which prompted a federal disaster declaration. “They may be eligible for a FEMA Disaster Assistance Grant,” Wynne says, “so they’ll go to what’s called an applicant briefing and then they’ll come back to SBA if FEMA determines that they are not a critical service, meaning that they’re not a food kitchen or something along those lines, or a hospital or some kind of public infrastructure that supports a community.”

The low-interest federal disaster loans are now available in Allamakee, Clayton, Des Moines, Dubuque, Jackson, Lee and Scott counties. “The loans can go up to $2 million to meet the financial obligations and operating expenses and it’s got about a one year deferral on these as well,” Wynne says. “Low interest rate of 2.375% for the private nonprofits, and of course the businesses have it at 4%. Terms up to 30 years, makes recovery very affordable for these loans.”

The S-B-A loans can be used to repair or replace damaged or destroyed real estate, machinery and equipment, inventory and other assets. They can also be used to pay for improvements to protect, prevent or minimize the same type of disaster damage from happening again. “These loans are for economic injury only,” Wynne says. “That means that they didn’t suffer any physical damage but they’re starting to see a decrease in revenues due to the fact that there was a declared disaster in those counties.”

The S-B-A is also offering low-interest loans to small, non-farm businesses in 18 Iowa counties that are being worst-hit by drought. “Businesses in farming towns are going to start seeing a decrease in revenue because farmers are unable to have any disposable income to go and shop in those cities and small towns,” Wynne says. “That’s why we offer these low-interest Disaster Assistance loans to these counties that were economically impacted by the drought.”

The counties covered under this program are: Cedar, Clarke, Decatur, Jasper, Johnson, Louisa, Lucas, Madison, Mahaska, Marion, Monroe, Muscatine, Polk, Ringgold, Scott, Union, Warren, and Wayne. “Those loans are also up to $2 million,” Wynne says. “They have to be used to do any kind of keeping the business afloat such as making payroll, making your rental expenses, keeping the lights on and getting your notes payable paid, just so that they can keep the operating expenses of the economically-impacted business through the disaster recovery periods.”

For information on any of the loans, call 800-659-2955 or visit SBA-dot-gov and follow the “Disaster” link.

(Radio Iowa) – Steam engines well over a century old are chugging to life in southeast Iowa as the annual Midwest Old Threshers Reunion gets underway in Mount Pleasant. Event spokesman Grant Davidson says the machines of yesterday that helped build Iowa into the farming giant it is today are all on display — and they’re still running strong.

The agricultural heritage event includes antique cars, tractors, vintage steam engines, and a steam-run railroad headed by a locomotive built in 1891.

(Midwest Old Threshers Reunion photo)

The five-day event draws tens of thousands of visitors to see the dozens of steam-powered contraptions that were once the latest technology for performing important chores in the field.

(UPDATED) – The latest Iowa Drought Monitor shows drought conditions have worsened. State Climatologist Justin Glisan says there’s been an 18 percent increase in extreme drought conditions since last week’s report. “The big standout that we see on the map this week is a big expansion of that D3 extreme drought category across north central into northeastern Iowa,” Glisan says. There’s a persistent area of extreme drought in southeast Iowa as well. Some farmers have begun chopping corn for silage because most leaves on the stalks have died. “Corn is drying up out there. Soybeans are dropping pods because of the heat and the dryness,” Glisan says. “Harvest is going to come at us fast given the drier conditions and the warmer temperatures that we’ve seen.”

Small sections of Fremont and Ringgold Counties are the only areas of Iowa considered to be drought-free and Glisan says nearly 99-and-a-half percent of the entire state is now in some level of drought. The U-S-D-A began issuing Drought Monitor reports 23 years ago. “This is going into the 166th week of at least D1, that moderate drought category somewhere in the state, so the longest drought that we’ve had since the Drought Monitor came into inception,” Glisan says, “but also longer term than the 1988 and 2012 droughts.” Those two drought years were more intense because of particularly warm temperatures in the upper Midwest, according to Glisan. Glisan says the statewide average rainfall is about three and a quarter inches in August — about an inch below normal, but Glisan says there’s wide variation in sections of the state.

“If you look at the climate divisions in eastern Iowa, so climate division 3 is the northeastern corner and then east central is where the nose of Iowa is — it’s the top 10 driest August on record,” Glisan says, “so that statewide average is skewed where we see higher precipitation totals across the southern part of the state.” The southern two tiers of Iowa got an average amount of rainfall during the past month. On this last day of August, there is no rain in the forecast anywhere in Iowa.

In southwest Iowa:

Parts of northern and eastern Pottawattamie County, all but the northeastern part of Cass County, along with the southern half of Adair County, most of Adams, and all of Union Counties, are considered Abnormally Dry.

Severe drought conditions exist in mainly the western half of Pott. County and the northern tier of Mills County, while other area counties are seeing a variety of Moderate to Abnormally dry conditions.

Extreme drought conditions are being experienced in a large portion of northeastern Iowa, and parts of seven southeastern Iowa counties.

w/Kate Olson.

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The results from the D-N-R’s annual roadside survey show a 15 percent increase in the number of pheasants counted this year. Wildlife research biologist, Todd Bogenschutz (Boyg-en-shuts) says they counted 23 birds for each route.

Iowa’s weather has a big impact on pheasant numbers, and Bogenschutz says a mild winter coupled with a good spring weather for the hatch are paying off.

Bogenschutz says we’re probably looking at a harvest of around 300 to 400-thousand roosters this year, which would be one of the better seasons.

The hunter numbers this year will be around 60-thousand.

The youth pheasant season is October 21st and 22nd. The regular season opens on October 28th and runs through January 10th, 2024.