farming

Paulding FFA members attend Farm Science Review

The Paulding FFA had 30 members and two advisors attend Farm Science Review on Wednesday, September 17, in London, Ohio. The members started the morning with breakfast at McDonald’s and then headed to London, Ohio to enjoy a day filled with hands-on learning experiences and learning more about the new technologies in the agriculture industry.  Farm Science Review strives to teach its visitors of all ages about the current issues and opportunities in the agriculture industry. Some notable exhibitors this year include the Farm Bureau, OSU Extension, and John Deere. Students could take shuttles out into the fields of FSR to see equipment in operation and drone demonstrations conducted by local agricultural businesses. Then students could tour the Gwynne conservation area to learn more about native plants, talk with soil scientists, and even go down into a soil pit. In-depth experiences, such as virtual welding demonstrations, were also available to FSR visitors, allowing them to view the industry from a hands-on perspective. There were several different types of livestock on exhibit for the students to learn more about as well. We also saw some local ag companies from our area, as well as former Paulding FFA members, while visiting FSR. Our students and advisors immensely enjoyed this opportunity and will continue working to share their agricultural knowledge. The members are already talking about attending this event again in the coming years.

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Improving your farm

This was adapted from a Randall Reeder article, Retired OSU Extension Engineer at Ohio State University. Most farmers would like to leave their farm in better shape than when they started. The question is: What does that mean? You never hear a farmer brag about making their farm worse. What does it mean to make a farm better when you retire from farming?

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Share rental agreements

Last week, cash rental agreements were discussed and now crop share rental agreements. For crop share rental agreements, both landowner and tenant share crop expenses and also the crop. This involves much more involvement of landowners in the farming operation. The landowner has the land while the tenant supplies the labor and the equipment for farming the crop. Since the landowner has more risk, usually the return is expected to be higher, but they also have to have more cash outlay. For newer farmers or for cash strapped tenant farmers, this can be helpful, lowering the tenant cash outlay and risk, but the tenant should expect lower total returns.

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Crop Update

May has been a cold and wet and many farmers are struggling to get crops planted. Some for the first time. Others are already replanting. Although a week old, May 18th USDA’s crop progress report is probably fairly accurate with the recent rains. Estimates are that only 34% of corn acres are planted in Ohio, with 22% of corn emerged. Emerged acres are probably higher by now. Corn planting progress was behind the 5-year average (48%), but corn emergence was slightly ahead (20%) as of May 18th. For soybeans, 40% of soybean acre were planted and 24% of soybeans emerged.

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Reducing compaction with roots

Brian Doughtery, a Understanding Ag consultant, says compaction is a sign of a poorly functioning soil. Soil compaction is not a natural occurrence, it comes from too much equipment (heavy axle loads, too much tillage), not enough biology (lack of roots and living organisms), and excess nutrients.

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New agricultural research

Recent soybean research by Dr. Rafiq Islam, Ohio State University shows benefits from using sulfur fertilization and small doses of aspirin or salicylic acid (SA, a fulvic acid) to increase soybean yields. Soybeans are planted on about 86.5 million USA acres. Yearly increases in soybean yields have been flat and with lower prices, farmers are looking for ways to get higher yields. Hot weather, drought, flooding and other environmental issues have caused soybean yields to stagnate.

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