Info from the Atlantic Animal Shelter.

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w/ Denny Heflin

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The Page County Attorney’s Office reports two sentences were handed down earlier this week in separate cases. In one of the cases, 24-year-old Kiel Mark Brittain, of Clarinda, plead guilty to livestock neglect, in association with a Nov. 2012 investigation into malnourished cows, calves and a bull found on a property in rural Page County. Brittain was sentenced Monday to one-year  in jail, with all but 4 days suspended. He was also placed on unsupervised probation for an unspecified length of time, and ordered to have no livestock during that time of probation. Brittain must also pay a fine of $315, plus related court costs.

And, 54-year-old Michael D. Weaver, of Shenandoah, plead guilty Monday in Page County District Court, to a charge of assault with the intent to commit sexual abuse. He had originally been charged with Enticing away a person under the age of 13, Lascivious Acts with a Child/Solicitation, in association with events that occurred in August of 2011. Weaver was sentenced to two years in prison and fined $625, but both were suspended. He was instead placed on supervised probation for a period of two-years, and ordered to reside at a Residential Correctional Facility.

In addition, the judge ordered Weaver to complete a psychological evaluation, risk assessment, and a Sex Offender Treatment Program. Weaver was also ordered to pay related court costs, restitution to his victims, and he must have no contact with the victims for five years.

While a major winter storm is expected to clobber Iowa today (Thursday), a sure sign of spring is already here. The migrating Sandhill Cranes are beginning to appear at the DeSoto National Wildlife Refuge in the Missouri River valley, straddling the Iowa/Nebraska border. Greg Wagner, a spokesman for the Nebraska Game and Parks Commission, says many hundreds of the large white-and-grey birds have already landed in the area. All told, perhaps 650-thousand cranes will stop off in the region over the next few weeks.

“This is one of the most unique things that happens around the world with birds and with wildlife,” Wagner says. “This is the largest gathering of cranes in the world, starting about now and all the way into early April.” The cranes are making a pit stop on the way north to breeding grounds in Canada, Alaska and Siberia. The numbers should peak here in mid-March.

“You’ll see the cranes out feeding in the fields,” Wagner says. “Take along a good zoom lens with your camera, a good pair of binoculars. Enjoy the cranes at a distance. Don’t try to approach them. They’ll fly and go elsewhere.” Several hundred eagles and thousands of ducks and geese have already been spotted along the river, too. The Sandhill Cranes draw some 70-thousand visitors from around the world to the region every year, with an economic impact of about 8-million dollars.

(Radio Iowa)

The Iowa Pork Producers Association has teamed up with the Iowa Pork Industry Center and Iowa State University Extension and Outreach swine specialists to host regional conferences February 25-28. All sessions are hosted from 1 p.m. to 4:30 p.m.  One of the sessions will be held on Mon., Feb. 25th, in Carroll, at the Carroll County Extension Office. Conferences are free for those who pre-register or $5 at the door. Individuals can pre-register by calling IPPA at (800) 372-7675 or sending an e-mail to schristensen@iowapork.org.

Fore more information or to pre-register, contact Tyler Bettin at (800) 372-7675 or tbettin@iowapork.org.

w/ Kate Olson

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Officials with the Women, Food and Agriculture Network (WFAN) say applications are now being accepted for on-farm mentorship experiences for aspiring women farmers (women who want to farm but are not yet farming) in Iowa and Nebraska. Ten aspiring women farmers in Iowa and four in Nebraska will be placed on the mentors’ farms for a minimum of 8 weeks’ work experience during the growing season.

A small stipend is provided to mentees to help offset travel costs, and an effort will be made to match you with a farmer in your geographic area, but a mentee should be prepared to live on or near the host farm for the duration of her mentorship. The 2013 group of farmer mentors has gone through an intensive day-and-a-half learning experience to increase their knowledge of teaching skills, evaluation, communication, and liability mitigation.

An application form is available online at wfan.org., under the “News and Resources” heading, click on “WFAN Beginning Farmer Grant Project.” Then look for the “Opportunities for Aspiring Women Farmers” tab, and scroll down the page. The deadline to apply is March 15, but mentee spots will remain open until filled.

The Atlantic Parks and Recreation Department’s Board of Directors met Monday evening at the Senior Citizen Center, while the City Hall renovations are underway.

An Eaton Corp. brochure picture of a possible version of a park power/water pedestal for the Schildberg Recreation Area.

Parks and Rec Director Roger Herring said he’s been holding discussions with Connect-A-Dock officials, about the possible purchase of power pedestals for the 18 campground pads being constructed at the Schildberg Recreation Area, with the idea being one pedestal would be used for each of the 18 pads.

The Eaton product brochure Herring presented to the Board indicated the units, which have three-different power point receptacles to accommodate varying power demands of campers and RV’s, and can also be used to supply campers and RV’s with water. They would be mounted on a concrete pedestal off the ground, so as to avoid damage from vehicles and even flood water. The power pedestals would operate on a photocell, and be weather-proof. They would cost about $11,000 altogether. The Schildberg Committee will discuss the option, and possible ways to pay for the campground power receptacles, at a future meeting.

In other business, Herring said bid-letting for the Sunnyside Tennis Court reconstruction project will begin this afternoon. As of Monday, there was no sign of the tennis courts, which were removed by crews with the City’s Street Department, in preparation for the reconstruction project. And, Herring said he’s working with Snyder and Associates Engineers for the final design phase of the Parks and Rec Maintenance Building and office. The final design will be presented for approval by the City Council, next month.

Roger Herring said there aren’t too many changes planned so far for the Summer Rec Program in Atlantic, other than he would like to see some management changes associated with the Swimming Program, whereas there would be a manager on site every shift at the Sunnyside Pool. Herring said the managers currently aren’t spending enough time managing the pool, and his time is stretched too thin to respond to every question or problem that arises during the swimming season.

Representatives of a non-profit group seeking to curtail the widespread use of antibiotics in livestock are in Iowa this week, to hold public and private meetings on the topic. Gail Hansen, a veterinarian, is with the Pew Charitable Trust’s Campaign on Human Health and Industrial Farming. She says as antibiotic use in animals has grown, so has antibiotic resistant bacteria. “People really need to know that we are really at a crisis now,” Hansen says. “Back in the day, or back when antibiotics were first discovered, it seemed like there was a new antibiotic every week and so we were always sort of one step ahead of the game. Well, we’re running out of new antibiotics…Physicians are running out of options to treat people when they get sick.”

Lance Price, a professor of environmental health at George Washington University, says antibiotics are being used in the daily feed rations for cattle and pigs, whether the animals are sick or healthy. “Trying to prevent diseases and they’re trying to make animals grow more efficiently, so it’s really part of the formula of converting dry feed into lean muscle mass, which is meat, and so they’re trying to do it as efficiently as possible,” Price says, “but in my eyes as a public health person what I see them doing is using the crown jewels of modern medicine as cheap production tools and I find it unacceptable.”

When humans get sick from eating meat or poultry that’s contaminated with bacteria — like e-coli — Price says in a growing number of cases the bacteria is resistant to antibiotics. “We’ve been dealing with bacteria on our meat since the day we started slaughtering animals. It’s just an inevitable part of the process,” Price says. “The problem with making the bacteria resistant to antibiotics is that when (humans) get infected with them, with those bacteria, we don’t have that option of treating them with antibiotics anymore and so the cleanest way, the most efficient way to reduce antibiotic resistance is to quit feeding animals antibiotics.” According to Price, livestock producers in the country of Denmark have successfully moved away from using antibiotics in feed rations. It’s unclear how many U.S. livestock producers regularly use antibiotics in feed rations. Some swine producers, for example, use antibiotics in water to prevent the rapid spread of respiratory diseases that can quickly wipe out an entire herd.

Price, Hansen and others from the Pew Charitable Trust campaign against antibiotics use in animals arrived in Iowa Monday and visited a large-scale livestock confinement before meetings with state officials, an Iowa State University researcher and others involved in the livestock industry. They’ll host a roundtable discussion at Des Moines University early this morning (Tuesday) and a luncheon in Des Moines for consumers.

(Radio Iowa)

(Updated with change of meeting venue)

The Atlantic Parks and Recreation Department’s Board of Directors will hold a regular meeting this evening, in the Senior Citizen Center Cafeteria (This is a change from City Hall, as previously announced) . When the board gathers for the 5:15-p.m. meeting, they’ll receive updates on the Schildberg Recreation Area Campground, Sunnyside Park Tennis Court reconstruction, and an update on a new boat ramp near the wastewater treatment plant.

In other business, Parks and Rec Director Roger Herring will review a meeting of the Schildberg Committee that took place Feb. 5th, and the Board will discuss plans for the Summer Recreation Program, including swimming pool operations, the playground program, tennis, men’s softball, and a YMCA management agreement.