(State News) – The Iowa corn harvest reached 84% this week, up from 68% last week, and soybean harvest is nearly complete, at 96%, as the state nears the end of one of its driest Octobers. According to the Iowa Capital Dispatch, the crop progress and condition report for Oct. 21 through Oct. 27 showed a continued decline in soil moisture conditions. Topsoil rated 75% short to very short, and subsoil moisture condition rated 80% short to very short.

The state climatologist Justin Glisan reported precipitation totals for the week were higher than the past four weeks combined, yet still below the state’s average for this time of year.

Eastern and central counties saw storms this week, with Johnson County logging almost two inches of rain and 30 monitoring locations with totals above one inch.

The National Weather service forecasts more precipitation for the state next week and normal precipitation through November.

“Continued warm temperatures and dry conditions last week allowed for harvest to push forward at a brisk pace,” Iowa Secretary of Agriculture Mike Naig said in a statement about the crop condition report. “Following what is likely to be one of the driest Octobers on record, weather outlooks for early November are indicating more chances for rainfall.”

A crop update report from Iowa State University Extension and Outreach noted the dry conditions have caused “excessively dry grain,” difficulty with tillage and an inability to apply anhydrous ammonia to fields.

DES MOINES, Iowa [KCCI — Lovers of the Iowa State Fair can bid on hundreds of state fair surplus items through Nov. 7. Daugherty Auction & Real Estate Services is handling the auction, which includes various items from used vehicles, machinery and lawnmowers, signage and advertising, benches, bricks and other pavers, artwork, antiques, lumber and much more.

As of the latest check, an 8-by-20-foot enclosed trailer has the highest bid at $1,800. A Bobcat skid loader is next at $2,800.

Bidding closes at 7 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 7, and winning bidders can pick up their items between 10 a.m. and 5 p.m. Friday, Nov. 8, and Saturday, Nov. 9.

The 2024 state fair was the biggest ever, drawing a record 1,182,682 people through the gates over its 11 days.

Officials last month announced “Fair Sweet Fair” as the theme for the 2025 state fair, which is scheduled to run Aug. 7-17.

(Radio Iowa) – The pheasant season is underway amidst a resurgence in the number of birds available and success by hunters. D-N-R wildlife biologist Todd Bogenschutz says habitat is a key for bird numbers and the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) is the main component. “You know, Iowa as a state is doing pretty well with C-R-P. We probably have more than any of the states are joining us, Minnesota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Illinois,” he says. ” But that being said, we are down from our historic enrollments like back in the mid 90s.” The C-R-P program pays farmers to take some land out of regular crop production and it is planted with grasses and other cover crops. Weather is another factor in pheasant populations.

“We had a pretty uh significant turn of weather for about five years there in the late 2000s. That really drove our populations down, but since then we’ve come back to kind of more normal Mother Nature, since about 2013,” he says. He says you can see the direct impact on the pheasant population since the change in weather. “Counts have generally showed a steady increase since then. And you know, that’s why, we’ve gotten a lot more notoriety, I guess, let’s say in the last four years or so, because our counts have come back up,” Bogenschutz says. “I mean, we’re not back to million bird harvest or anything like that. But, you know, half a million still a very respectable number. Half million plus.”

Bogenschutz says increasing pheasant harvest would take a change in the farm policy. ” You know, if we have farm policy, that would push C-R-P back to what we saw in the mid 90s. I absolutely think we could, we could harvest a million birds,” he says. The D-N-R will celebrate the 100th pheasant next fall.

(Salt Lake City, UT) – A handful of states, including Iowa, are throwing their support behind Utah’s lawsuit that questions whether the Bureau of Land Management can hold onto nearly 18.5 million acres of public land within the state’s borders. Filed with the U.S. Supreme Court in August, Utah’s lawsuit argues that the BLM can’t indefinitely hold onto land without giving it a designation, like a national monument, national forest or wilderness area. Those 18.5 million acres are what the state calls “unappropriated land” — they’re still leased for grazing, recreation and mineral extraction, but have no designation. Now, 12 states and a few state legislatures are supporting Utah’s effort, signing amicus briefs with the nation’s high court.

An amicus brief, also called a “friend of the court” brief, is filed by organizations or individuals who are not named in the lawsuit, but have an interest in the case or would like to support a particular side. In total, 11 briefs have been filed with the Supreme Court by various groups, states and politicians, all of them supporting Utah’s effort. The Iowa Capital Dispatch says the states filing briefs include Iowa, which spearheaded a brief signed by attorneys general from Alabama, Arkansas, Mississippi, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Carolina, South Dakota and Texas.

The brief spearheaded by Idaho Attorney General Raul Labrador argues the federal government’s control of unappropriated land curtails state sovereignty. In the filing, attorneys argue that the state’s inability to control that land causes a host of problems. There’s a different criminal code; the land cannot be taxed by the state and results in tax hikes; the state cannot exercise eminent domain; and the state can’t generate revenue from grazing fees, mineral leases or timber sales, the brief claims.

The brief led by Iowa and signed by eight other attorneys general focuses more on whether the Supreme Court should take up the case, and less on the merits of Utah’s lawsuit. Utah is invoking original jurisdiction, which allows states to petition directly to the Supreme Court rather than starting in a lower court and then going through the appeals process. To invoke original jurisdiction, the issue needs to be between a state and the federal government. Iowa Attorney General Brenna Bird said in a news release,  “States have a right to sue the federal government, and the citizens of those States have the right to have their interests heard in court.” Bird says she is “Calling on the Supreme Court to let Utah make its case for control over its own lands.”

Most of the cases considered by the high court are appeals — in Iowa’s brief, attorneys ask the justices to consider Utah’s complaint. “Few issues are as fundamentally important to a State as control of its land,” the brief reads. “The Amici States respectfully ask this Court to take this case out of respect for the sovereign dignity inherent in a State’s dispute against the United States.”

(Radio Iowa) – An expert at Iowa State University’s Insect Zoo says there may actually be some science behind the folklore about how the thickness of a Woollybear caterpillar’s stripes can help predict the severity of the winter ahead. Ginny Mitchell, the insect zoo’s education program coordinator, says a fellow entomologist in New York studied the fuzzy creatures in the 1940s. “He sampled all of the woolly caterpillars in the area for nine years, and during that time, there was actually some correlation between the markings on the woolly caterpillar and the winter,” Mitchell says, “but that study had a very small sample size, so people do not consider it scientifically factual.”

The black-and-brown caterpillars are prevalent in Iowa right now as they’re looking for safe places to spend the winter. As the story goes, Mitchell says the thickness of the caterpillar’s center stripe is key in weather forecasting. “The rusty, kind of orange color, if that band is really big, that means we’re going to have a mild winter,” Mitchell says. “If the black parts of the woolly caterpillar are very large, it’s going to be a more severe winter. If there is more hair on the woolly caterpillar, then that means that it’s going to be a more severe winter.”

There are also theories that if the caterpillar is crawling south when you find it, it’s trying to flee the looming northern cold, and the reverse, if it’s heading north, a mild winter is ahead. At least two communities — Vermilion, Ohio and Banner Elk, North Carolina — have fall festivals devoted to the alleged prognosticating abilities of the woolly bear caterpillar. One remarkable fact, Mitchell says these fuzzy critters hibernate during the wintertime and their bodies contain a sort of natural antifreeze. “Say you’re out raking leaves or moving some brush and you find one, it will kind of look like it’s dead. It’ll be curled up like a ‘C’ and it won’t be moving very much,” Mitchell says, “but if you take it inside and you warm it up, then it’ll start to move.”

There are reports of woolly bear caterpillars surviving temperatures as low as 90-degrees below zero, even spending an entire winter frozen in an ice cube, to emerge just fine in the spring. Once temperatures warm up for the season, it will create a cocoon and emerge a few weeks later as an Alexandra or Isabella tiger moth.

PERRY, Iowa (KCCI) – A company is in negotiations with Tyson Foods to purchase the pork plant according to Perry City officials, KCCI reported. The negotiations were discussed during a meeting earlier this week by Mayor Kirk Cavanaugh. As of now, not much is known about the potential sale.

Perry City leaders have not said who the potential buyer is.

Before the pork plant shut down at the end of June, Tyson Foods was Perry’s largest employer. Over 1,000 people lost their jobs when the plant shut down.

(Ames, Iowa) – An Iowa State University researcher has received national support to take a deeper dive into a gene that helps plants thrive and survive in the face of environmental threats, with the goal of creating more resilient crops to feed the world. According to the Iowa Capital Dispatch, Michelle Guo, an assistant professor of genetics, development and cell biology at ISU, has spent almost 20 years researching a gene found in plants called Feronia, which impacts many different plant functions and processes. Now, with an almost $2 million grant, Guo and her fellow researchers are looking at the gene in different cell types to try and shut down certain functions while keeping others.

The gene has a hand in ensuring plants both grow well and can protect themselves from stress, Guo said. For example, removing or disrupting the gene creates what she called a “dwarf plant,” and the plant would also become more sensitive to things like salt, which would impact its growth.

Guo received a five-year, $1.8 million grant from the National Institute of General Medical Sciences in order to support her research. The grant, called Maximizing Investigators’ Research Award for Early Stage Investigators (MIRA), doesn’t fund a specific project or area of study, but rather funds Guo directly, so she can utilize the award however she needs.

Feronia has “been in the public eye” for about 20 years and Guo been researching it for nearly that long alongside other groups. Gua said she hopes other researchers are approaching the work from different angles so they could eventually inform other people’s research.

Iowa State University professor and researcher Michelle Guo is researching a specific plant gene in order to try and make plants more resilient under stress. (Photo by Brooklyn Draisey/Iowa Capital Dispatch)

With the effects of climate change becoming more and more apparent, Guo said it’s more important than ever that crops become able to produce large yields even when they’re in less-than-ideal conditions. Creating a more food-secure world is the ultimate goal behind this research, along with helping young scientists further their careers by completing and publishing their work on this important subject.

(Des Moines, Iowa) – The Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship announced Friday it had “depopulated” birds from Pure Prairie Poultry, Inc., which had previously informed the department it was unable to purchase feed for its broiler chickens and closed its processing plant in Charles City.

The Iowa Capital Dispatch reports, fearing animal welfare concerns, the department intervened Oct. 2  and took over the care, custody and control of the 1.3 million birds, located across 13 Iowa farms. The same day, Pure Prairie Poultry Inc. shuttered its Charles City processing plant and laid off its employees.

Pure Prairie Poultry received $45.6 million from U.S. Department of Agriculture in 2022 to expand the Charles City processing plant. Iowa’s USDA Rural Development office celebrated the expansion with a ribbon cutting in July 2024, just two months before it filed for bankruptcy.

Iowa Secretary of Agriculture Mike Naig commented on the situation in a statement Friday, saying:

“This is an incredibly unfortunate situation and raises serious questions about USDA’s oversight of taxpayer dollars. Congress should exercise its oversight authority to ensure that something like this does not happen again and that those responsible are held accountable.”

A press release said the closure of the plant sent the department searching for a buyer and processor, which was difficult, “due to the structure of the broiler industry.”

According to court filings in the Third Judicial District Court of Iowa located in Sioux County, IDALS reached an agreement with Tyson Foods. It stipulated that IDALS would cover care costs for the chicken until they reached market weight, then Tyson would handle catching, loading and transportation of the birds to a processing plant. The filings state Tyson would have purchased the birds for 50 cents per bird, which was half of the company’s original offer.

Some of the growers contracted by Pure Prairie Poultry indicated they would argue their lien rights on the birds, which the court filings said, “caused Tyson to reconsider the agreement for fear of future litigation” and eventually rescinded its offer.

With mounting costs of caring for the 1.3 million birds, IDALS asked the court to authorize the department to pursue depopulation, or culling the birds. Culling of the birds began Oct. 17 by licensed veterinarians employed by the department and concluded Oct. 25th.  The department has spent over $1 million in dealing with the birds so far, but Don McDowell, IDALS communications director, said the anticipated figure is over $2 million, as many of the expenses have yet to be paid. These costs include feed, farmer contracts, depopulation, disposal, personnel expenses, and mileage.

(Radio Iowa) – The chairman of the Emmet County Board of Supervisors says there will be revisions in a proposed ordinance to restrict where wind turbines may be placed. The board held a public hearing Thursday night on the initial proposal from Emmet County’s Planning and Zoning Commission. Tim Busch, director of the Aviation Program at Iowa Lakes Community College, says he’s not opposed to wind turbines, but he asked the board to be cautious about allowing towers in areas that could impede take offs and landings.

Eight other speakers expressed concerns about the ordinance and three people spoke in favor of wind energy. Todd Glasnapp, chairman of the Emmet County Board of Supervisors, says requiring greater distances between wind turbines and homes and other dwellings is likely to be the biggest adjustment in the ordinance.

Last week, the board approved a moratorium on any new wind energy applications in Emmet County until January 31st, 2025 — to give the supervisors time to update the county’s wind ordinance.

(Radio Iowa) – Scientists say they’ve developed a first-ever vaccine that’s designed to protect cattle from a potentially-deadly tick-borne disease that’s common in Iowa. Bovine anaplasmosis infects the red blood cells of cattle, and researcher Roman Ganta says the vaccine promises to be a tremendous game-changer. “It will change the way people raise cattle, raise meat, and milk production,” Ganta says, “as well as improve the wellbeing of many cattle farmers, especially in third world countries, besides in the U.S. how the industry is impacted.” Ganta, a professor of veterinary pathobiology at the University of Missouri, says the vaccine is performing exactly as hoped in trials.

“We found out that the animals, all the cattle that we tested, remained healthy,” he says, “whether the infection is coming from a mechanical route, which is the standard way many cattle get it in a cattle ranch, or by tick transmission.” There is no widely-available vaccine for the disease, which is blamed for causing nearly one-billion dollars in losses worldwide every year. Ganta says bovine anaplasmosis, also known as yellow bag or yellow fever, can lead to severe anemia in cattle, and in some cases, death. “We tested close to a thousand animals,” he says. “The infection prevalence is very high, which is about 50% of the cattle. It varied significantly from one cattle ranch to the other, but the fact remains that this disease has remained a high problem.”

Ganta says the vaccine will need to receive U-S-D-A approval before it can be used. He says if the testing and approval process goes well, he’s optimistic it will be available to cattle producers by 2030. The Iowa Beef Industry Council says Iowa’s cattle industry contributed nearly nine-and-a-half BILLION dollars in business activity to the state’s economy in 2023, including accounting for more than 32-thousand jobs.