DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — Dozens of tissue samples from hunted deer in Iowa have been turned over to be tested for chronic wasting disease. The samples are part of a nine-day collection effort by deer hunters and state officials that ends Sunday. The first weekend of the effort in Allamakee and Clayton counties provided 54 samples.

Chronic wasting disease is a neurologic disease of deer, moose and elk that is always fatal for the animals. The disease first appeared in Iowa’s wild deer herd in 2013 and each year since. The Iowa Department of Natural Resources has placed extra emphasis on tracking the movement of the disease with the cooperation of hunters.

Last year, two deer tested positive for the disease as part of the effort in the same counties.

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — A new report on the rapid expansion of hog farms in Iowa concludes the state’s regulatory system is failing to protect the environment and public health for the sake of profit by the politically powerful livestock industry.

The report released Thursday by retired University of Iowa professors James Merchant and David Osterberg recommends a moratorium on new construction until an improved permitting process can be implemented. The pork industry acknowledges rapid growth but considers it good for farmers and the economy.

Eldon McAfee, an agriculture law attorney for the Iowa Pork Producers Association, says environmental and health concerns are being addressed by the current system. He says a moratorium would devastate the industry and Iowa’s economy, adding it’s unneeded because the current permit system has worked for 16 years.

One of the investors in the popular television show “Shark Tank” is in Iowa today (Friday) to give they keynote speech at the Land Investment Expo in West Des Moines. Kevin O’Leary is a billionaire business man who is one of the “Sharks” on the show who listen to pitches from entrepreneurs and then decide if they want to invest their business. In an interview with Radio Iowa, O’Leary says he plans to share some of his business knowledge with the attendees. “It’s a land conference and we’ll be discussing real estate for sure — but there’s a lot of entrepreneurs in that room and they’re interested in the trends that are going on in terms of management of businesses now,” O’Leary says, ” I’m going to bring a lot of that data with me, because I have over 44 of them now. So, I am able to identify good management practices versus weak ones.”

O’Leary says the big ag companies he invests in that supply fertilizer and seed to farmers have seen their margins go up every year while farmers are seeing their margins go down. He says farmers need to adapt some of the methods of those big companies. “If you don’t know what the price of a bag of seed is in upstate New York and you’re buying it in Iowa, why don’t you know? Because those companies are playing a beautiful arbitrage on different pricing and they are taking advantage of every single algorithm they can with computer technology. There’s no reason farmers can’t do the same thing,” O’Leary says.

Kevin O’Leary

He says farmers could bring input prices down by sharing information. “If there was total transparency on pricing — in other words you knew what your competitor bought corn seed for in Champaign-Urbana for example — why wouldn’t you get the same price here. You wouldn’t because you don’t know,” O’Leary says. “They’ve got to be more cooperative in getting transparency in pricing, and that’s what I am going to talk about.”  He says getting farmers to adapt would help them make more on their operations. “I want every entrepreneur in America to succeed and every other large company is taking advantage of technology and farmers are not, and that makes not sense to me,” O’Leary says.

O’Leary — who is also known on the show as Mr. Wonderful — says this is not his first trip to Iowa and he is excited to be able to talk with landowners at the conference. “This is a remarkable place, this is the most expensive acreage for farming in the world, the most productive. This is a very interesting place. There’s a lot of tremendous quiet wealth here tied up in land — and I’m happy to be a part of it,” O’Leary says.

The 11th Annual Land Investment Expo begins this morning (Friday) and runs throughout the day.

(Radio Iowa)

Des Moines – The Iowa Department of Natural Resources is hosting public meetings on February 21st from 6 to 9 p.m., to listen to the public’s thoughts on the hunting and trapping regulations for this fall.  The meetings are part of the process for making rules in state government. Todd Bishop, chief of the wildlife bureau, said “Any rule changes must be discussed with Iowa’s citizens who might be impacted by the changes before the rule changes are proposed. The process helps ensure that rule changes serve the public’s wishes and do not impact Iowa’s economy.”  At each meeting DNR staff will facilitate a discussion about what went well last fall, what didn’t, and what changes hunters and trappers would like to see for this fall.

The discussions along with the data that the wildlife bureau collects on harvest and population numbers will be used to develop recommendations for any rule changes. Any changes must be approved by the Natural Resource Commission and then go back to the public for further comment before taking effect next fall. Meetings will be held locally:

• In Atlantic, at the Iowa DNR Office (1401 Sunnyside Lane)
• In Council Bluffs, at the Fish and Game Club (531 Comanche St.)
• and in Creston, at Southwestern Community College (1501 W. Townline), Room 180.

Any person attending the public meeting and has special requirements such as those related to mobility or hearing impairments should contact the DNR or ADA Coordinator at 515-725-8200, Relay Iowa TTY Service 800-735-7942, or Webmaster@dnr.iowa.gov, and advise of specific needs.

As Iowans begin the task of filling out their state tax returns, they’re encouraged to make a donation to what’s nicknamed the “Chickadee Checkoff” to support wildlife conservation statewide. Stephanie Shepherd, a wildlife biologist at the Iowa Department of Natural Resources, says the amount collected last year for the Fish and Wildlife Fund rose from the year before, but still, very few Iowans donate to the cause. “We were really excited to see that the numbers went up to about $147,000,” Shepherd says. “That was up by roughly $15,000 from the year before. That was a really nice increase and we were really happy to see it, but in its heyday, it brought in over $200,000.”

Iowa has one-point-six million taxpayers and last year about 78-hundred donated to the fund, an increase of about 300 from the year before. “Less than half of one percent of taxpayers actually donate to the checkoff,” Shepherd says. “If every taxpayer in Iowa, for example, gave one dollar to the checkoff, that would mean $1.5 million for wildlife conservation.” Of the Iowans who donated last year, they averaged about 19-dollars each. The fund benefits a wide array of Iowa’s most vulnerable creatures — more than a thousand species, including eagles, songbirds, turtles, lizards and butterflies. Avenues include education, research and habitat management. “The money from the Chickade Checkoff is used to support non-game wildlife or wildlife that you can’t hunt, fish or trap,” Shepherd says. “It was instrumental in developing the Wildlife Diversity Program here at the Iowa DNR where we focus entirely on non-game species.”

The Fish and Wildlife Fund was created by the Iowa Legislature in the 1980s as a way for citizens to donate to wildlife conservation on the state tax form. Before that, non-game wildlife had no dedicated funding. Shepherd says donating on the tax form is easy: simply write the amount next to the Fish and Wildlife Check-Off, line 57 on Form 1040. The sum is either automatically deducted from the refund or added to the amount owed. Plus, it’s deductible from next year’s taxes.

(Radio Iowa)

w/ Denny Heflin

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The Iowa Senate had a heated debate about the water quality bill Governor Kim Reynolds has pledged to sign into law. A bill that passed the Republican-led Senate LAST YEAR got final legislative approval in the Iowa HOUSE on Tuesday. Senator Rob Hogg a Democrat from Cedar Rapids, says the bill fails to target the state money to where it would do the most good and fails to restart the state’s water monitoring program.”It is a facade. It is not a bill that helps water quality in this state…There is no monitoring, reporting or accountability,” Hogg says. “If you don’t measure it, you don’t really care about it.”

Senator Jerry Behn, a Republican from Boone, says he’s using conservation tillage practices on his farm.”The Iowa Soybean Association right now has been monitoring my tile, just exactly to find out what’s good coming out of that stuff, so don’t tell me that I’m not monitoring because I don’t care, “Behn says. “We are monitoring because we do care.” Senator David Johnson of Ocheyedan, the lone independent in the legislature, says the bill was “bought and paid for by the Farm Bureau.”

“You know I could spit in the Little Sioux River in Spencer and think I made an impact,” Johnson said. “…This isn’t a water quality bill. It falls far short of what this state needs.”Senator Randy Feenstra, a Republican from Hull who’s a banker, accused Johnson and other critics of “tramping” on farmers. “Farmers are good people and the ag economy, it’s the number one economy we have in this state and so I’m standing up here,” Feenstra says. “I’m standing up for the farmers.”

The bill’s backers say it will provide 286 million dollars for water quality projects over the next 12 years. However, there’s just a four-million dollar allotment for next year. Iowa Ag Secretary Bill Northey expects most of that will be used as incentives to farmers for “edge of field” projects that prevent run-off from cropland. “That’s the bio-reactors, saturated buffers, nutrient-reduction wetlands,” Northey says.

And Northey says the four million dollars in state money can leverage far more in federal funds along with the investments from landowners. As for measuring how voluntary nutrient management is working on farms, Northey says in “a big state with billions of gallons of water moving all the time,” it’s hard to chart progress at “scores” of locations.

(Radio Iowa)

w/ Extension Program Coordinator Kate Olson.

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State Representative Pat Grassley — the grandson of U.S. Senator Chuck Grassley — has announced he plans to seek reelection to the Iowa House. The move ends speculation the younger Grassley is hoping the governor named him state ag secretary whenever current Iowa Ag Secretary Bill Northey leaves for a job in the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Texas Senator Ted Cruz has for months been blocking a confirmation vote for Northey in the U.S. Senate. Two OTHER Republicans have already announced they plan to run for state ag secretary in 2018. Ray Gaesser, a farmer from Corning who’s a former president of the American Soybean Association, launched his bid last week. “Strong family farms build a strong, healthy community and grow a strong, healthy Iowa,” Gaesser says. “And I will work with farmers, with legislators, with citizens to share that message that we’re all in this together and we all have responsibilities that we can share.”

Gaesser says the goal should be a “responsible, but profitable” agricultural sector. Gaesser Farms has been nearly 100 percent no-till since 1991 and Gaesser says his family plants cover crops on about half of their corn and soybean ground. “Our goal on our farm is to have 100 percent,” Gaesser says. “We just see real value in conserving the soil, giving that blanket of protection for Mother Nature in our soil that is needed and building organic matter, sequestering nutrients, all those things of being a benefit from the practice.”

In late October, former Iowa Farm Bureau president Craig Lang announced he’s running for the Republican Party’s 2018 nomination for state ag secretary. Lang is a farmer from Brooklyn who also has served as president of the Iowa Board of Regents. No Democrat has stepped forward to announce plans to seek the elected post of state ag secretary.

(Radio Iowa)

A Guthrie County farmer, who’s resisted using synthetic chemicals for nearly two decades, is this year’s recipient of the Practical Farmers of Iowa Sustainable Agriculture Achievement Award. Earl Hafner of Panora was honored by the group Friday night at its annual meeting in Ames. Hafner recalled his decision to abandon chemicals in the late 1990s, saying the label “certified organic” quickly paid off. “People start calling you because the demand is so high…marketing is not hard because people, once they find out you have organic crops, we get all kinds of brokers calling,” Hafner said.

Jeff-and-Earl-Hafner-in-aquaponics-greenhouse

The demand for organic food continues to rise, which is good for Hafner’s bottom line. And while the 71-year-old Hafner likes making DOLLARS, he says going chemical-free just made SENSE. “I just remember when I was a kid in the 1940s and 50s very few, if any, chemicals were used. We would walk the beans and we didn’t have near the weeds in the beans that we do know,” Hafner said. Hafner farms with his son, Jeff. Their operation, called Early Morning Harvest, covers 2,000 acres and includes certified organic row crops, grass-fed cattle, hogs, and pastured poultry for egg production. The father and son also run a grain mill and an aquaponics greenhouse that includes tilapia (teh-LAH-pee-uh) — fish raised for food.

“The grain mill was my hobby and the greenhouse with tilapia was Jeff’s hobby and, you know, those hobbies just kind of went wild,” Hafner said with a laugh. “We just kept growing and expanding. “You wouldn’t think that tilapia would be in such demand, people know exactly where they’ve come from and what they’ve been fed, so there’s no river contamination or anything like that.”

The Hafner’s diversified farm also produces honey and vegetables.

(Radio Iowa)