Mark Parker: The Top 10 issues with the bargain 160 acres you just bought

Mark Parker:  The Top 10 issues with the bargain 160 acres you just bought

FarmTalk

#10. Four neighbors immediately remove you from their Christmas card lists

#9. You bend over to pick up an old license plate and find out it’s attached to a car.

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Nebraska feedlots prepare to test new European E. coli vaccine

Nebraska feedlots prepare to test new European E. coli vaccine

Dan Flynn

Food Safety News

Commercial development is underway for a third E. coli O157:H7 vaccine for cattle to help prevent human illnesses with a Nebraska field trial set to begin soon. Two North American vaccines developed since 2010 have proven their effectiveness, but for various reasons, including cost, they remain in limited demand in the marketplace.

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Cover Crop Grazing Caution

Cover Crop Grazing Caution

Jodi Henke

Successful Farming

Cover crops are planted on a field to reduce soil erosion and increase soil health. They’re usually either left on the surface to decay or incorporated back into the soil. If you’re planning to graze or feed your cover crops to livestock, be aware of the implications from chemical residues left over from the previous crop, such as corn or soybeans.

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Another flare-up in the feud between NCBA and OCM

Another flare-up in the feud between NCBA and OCM

Ken Anderson

Brownfield Ag News

There’s been another flare-up in the long-simmering feud between the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association (NCBA) and the Organization for Competitive Markets (OCM). It began last week with a blog written by OCM executive director Joe Maxwell, who says a “rigged system” allows NCBA to receive more than 27 million dollars in beef checkoff funds.

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Get it in writing: Cattle industry urged to move away from handshake deals

Get it in writing: Cattle industry urged to move away from handshake deals

Jenny Schlecht

Ag Week

One such case is playing out in South Dakota, where Robert “Bob” Blom operated a feedlot. In February 2019, First Dakota National Bank determined Blom owed principal of $6.74 million to the bank, with additional interest of more than $1,000 per day. After the bank foreclosed, officials discovered Blom may have been operating a Ponzi-like scheme in which he would resell the same cattle over and over again and collect feeding bills from customers on what were often non-existent cattle.

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A new WOTUS definition coming

A new WOTUS definition coming

Gary Baise

Farm Futures
Earlier this month, EPA’s Administrator and the Assistant Secretary of the Army for Civil Works announced their agencies were repealing the Obama Administration’s 2015 promulgated rule – the one that a number of agriculture associations had accused the Obama Administration of impermissibly expanding the definition of Waters of the United States (WOTUS).

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Body Fat in Beef Cows Affects Pregnancy Rates

Body Fat in Beef Cows Affects Pregnancy Rates

L. A. Sprott

Texas Agricultural Extension Service Pregnancy rates are highly variable in beef herds and ar influenced by many factors including nutrition. Low pregnancy rates are caused by improper nutrition in 90 percent or more cases. The amount of fat on a cow is a direct reflection of nutritional status. Recent studies have shown that fat cover, as influenced by level of nutrition, has a strong influence on pregnancy rates.

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