Hunters play a large role in managing Iowa’s world class deer herd by working with landowners and neighbors to reduce doe numbers, providing tissue samples to monitor for chronic wasting disease and by reporting successful hunts to the harvest reporting system. Officials with the Iowa Dept. of Natural Resources say the reported harvest is an important piece of information used when wildlife experts discuss possible changes to seasons, antlerless quotas, or other potential regulation changes.

But each year, more and more hunters are skipping this step. Presently, one out of five successful hunters is not reporting their harvest. “Our officers are conducting spot checks and have been writing more failure to report tickets,” said Chris Ensminger, wildlife research supervisor for the Iowa Department of Natural Resources. “Harvest numbers are an important piece of information used in our models for deer populations around the state. If harvest is higher than is what has been reported, the proposed management strategies won’t accurately reflect what is on the ground. It’s the local hunters who get short changed in the end.”

Reporting the harvest only takes a few minutes. Hunters must report their harvest to the DNR by midnight of the day after it is killed, or before taking it to a locker or taxidermist, or before processing it for consumption, or before transporting it out-of-state, whichever occurs first. The hunter whose name is on the transportation tag is responsible for making the report.

If no animal is harvested, no report is necessary.

The Iowa Department of Natural Resources says a 24-year old Afton man suffered a self-inflicted gunshot wound to his thigh while checking traps in rural Union County Sunday morning. Officials say Zachery Springer had shot a raccoon that was caught in a set with his .22 caliber pistol. As he was holstering the pistol, the strap of the holster that holds the gun in place entered the trigger guard. As he pushed the gun further into the holster, the strap tightened against the trigger causing the gun to fire, shooting Springer in the upper thigh. Springer was transported to Greater Regional Medical Center in Creston, where he underwent surgery to remove the bullet.

Iowa is sending some turkeys to Washington, D-C. That’s not a commentary on the recent elections — it’s a big honor for the state’s turkey industry. Iowa Turkey Federation spokesperson, Hailey Grant, says a northwest Iowa farm will supply the turkeys for the annual ceremony where the president pardons the big birds before Thanksgiving. “We’re pretty excited. I think it’s a great honor for Iowa to get to raise these turkeys for the president,” Grant says.

She says the name of the farm and its owner are being kept secret until later this week for security reasons to keep animal rights groups and others from going to the farm. While a national election chooses the politicians who’re sent to White House, the selection of the presidential turkeys are picked by one person. “The chairman of the National Turkey Federation selects the state that will raise the presidential flock and this year Iowa was chosen,” Grant says. ” There’s ten or so states in the U-S that have a pretty large turkey industry — and so if you think once a year the turkey is chosen — that means that every eight to ten years Iowa we might be chosen, so that’s pretty exciting.”

The process is a little more complicated for the turkey producers than picking out a couple of birds and sending them out east. “What they usually do is they pull 20 or so from their normal size flocks and they have a special building built on the farm where those turkeys are raise — just the 20 of them — with people or noise, so they get acclimated with crowds,” Grant explains.

The turkeys that pass the test end up getting pardoned. She says they have a radio playing all the time to generate noise and they end up picking two birds out of the 20 that seem to handle being around people without being skittish are sent to be pardoned.

Grant says the honor is a big boost for the turkey industry after being hit so hard last year by the bird flu. She says Iowa’s industry has rebounded and is back to 100 percent production. Most of the turkeys raised in Iowa do not end up on the Thanksgiving table, they are used for meat in sandwiches in fast-food restaurants.

(Radio Iowa)

The recent spell of warm and sunny weather has allowed many farmers to either finish come very close to completing this year’s harvest. The latest U-S-D-A crop report shows 94 percent of the corn crop has been harvested — and for the first time this year the harvest is not behind the five-year average. Iowa Secretary of Agriculture Bill Northey talked about harvest. “It’s really coming along very good, we have some parts of Iowa that are done, and the tillage is done and fertilizer going on the ground,” Northey says.

He doesn’t expect it to take too much longer before all the combines have finished their work. “We do see a lot of progress, the forecast is good, the conditions are very good now, the corn is drying down and I would imagine within the next week or so there won’t be too many acres left in the field,” Northey says.

The numbers he’s hearing on the harvest are good for corn. “Average yield in Iowa across all acres expected to be199 bushels and acre,” Northey says. “And 59 bushels and acre for soybeans. Again that’s a record.” Northey, who farms near Spirit Lake says his harvest is completed after some weather setbacks.

“We had a little wet spell in the middle, so we had a little bit of mud in the middle. And I had a little too much rain in May when I planted some of the corn, so we had some stand issues. My corn crop wasn’t the best I’ve had — it was a little bit better last year than this years,” Northey says.

The Agriculture Secretary says he has some post-harvest work left to do before wrapping everything up for the years. While harvest is winding down in most of the state, southwest and south central Iowa still have more than 10 percent of the corn crop and almost 10 percent of the soybean crop remaining to be harvested.

(Radio Iowa)

Officials with the Iowa Department of Natural Resources (DNR) are monitoring the site of a manure spill, in Carroll County. At around 5:30-p.m. Friday, a landowner reported a manure spill about three miles northwest of the city of Breda.

The DNR investigated the spill Friday and Saturday, finding that an unknown amount of manure flowed into an underground tile intake after a tanker became stuck in a marshy area. With Carroll County’s help, DNR traced the manure underground through tile lines to an unnamed tributary which eventually flows into the Boyer River. There were no dead fish seen below the spill area.

The manure came from an Iowa Select facility during land application by a commercial manure applicator company owned by Mark Schroeder. Schroeder and Iowa Select plugged the tile intake and dammed the area around the spill, pumping the diluted manure to a nearby crop field.

Pumping will continue for a few days because of the marshy conditions. The DNR is monitoring the cleanup and will consider appropriate enforcement action.

The Shelby County field/grassland Fire Danger index will remain in the “Moderate” category this week. Emergency Management officials say if you are planning any large burns, contact your local fire chief or the Emergency Management Office. Emergency Management Coordinator Bob Seivert says high winds are predicted this week, so the Fire Danger index could change. Stay tuned for further updates.

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) – An Iowa planter and grain cart manufacturer is asking a federal judge to protect it from having to turn over sensitive internal documents in an antitrust lawsuit in which it’s not directly involved.

The Des Moines Register reports that Kinze Manufacturing, of Williamsburg, Iowa, filed motions Thursday in the government’s lawsuit intended to block a deal between farm equipment maker John Deere and seed giant Monsanto. Kinze says John Deere is trying to access a wide variety of internal documents about Kinze’s business, including marketing strategies, sales data and research and development plans. John Deere served the Iowa company a subpoena last month seeking the documents.

Kinze argues those documents would divulge its most tightly held business secrets and irreparably affect its ability to compete with Deere.

LE MARS, Iowa (AP) — Officials with the Iowa Department of Natural Resources are investigating a manure spill near a small stream about three miles southeast of Le Mars in northwestern Iowa. The Sioux City Journal reports that the rollover crash of a tanker truck on Thursday dumped up to 9,000 gallons of swine manure near the stream, and at least some of the manure leaked into the stream.

A news release from the department says a pumping company was called to try to contain and pump the spilled manure back into the tanker. The DNR says it will monitor cleanup, give advice and consider enforcement actions.

Red Oak, IA – Grab your girlfriends and attend the next fun and educational event sponsored by Women, Land & Legacy of Southwest Iowa! The topic for this event is Grain Marketing. In this period of price instability, an understanding of marketing fundamentals is more important than ever. Marie Thompson-Devin, a grain merchandiser for Scoular, a local grain handling facility, will leave participants feeling like they have a good grasp on the basics of grain marketing and current commodity issues facing Iowa farm families.

The Women, Land & Legacy Grain Marketing event will be held at 6:30 p.m. on Wednesday, Dec. 7 at Noble Manor, located at 404 E Coolbaugh Street in Red Oak. The cost to attend is $10 and will include a casual meal. Tea and water will be provided. Other beverages will be available for purchase.

Pre-registration is encouraged by 4:30 p.m. on Wednesday, Nov. 30. To register, call Iowa State University Extension & Outreach-Mills County at (712) 527-3316, Fremont County at (712) 374-2351, or Montgomery County at (712) 623-2592 or stop by any of these offices. Special accommodations may be requested upon registration.

WLL events are sponsored through a partnership of Fremont, Mills and Montgomery counties Farm Service Agency, Soil and Water Conservation District, Iowa State University Extension & Outreach, and Women, Land & Legacy of Southwest Iowa. Women, Land & Legacy is committed to offering learning opportunities for rural women in areas such as business, management, agriculture and family.

WLL programming is available to all without regard to age, disability, ethnicity, gender identity, genetic information, marital status, national origin, pregnancy, race, religion, sex, sexual orientation, socioeconomic status, or status as a U.S. veteran.

Press Release

A Southwest Iowa Beginner and Young Farmers group will kick off in Montgomery County on December 14, 2016. The Start to Farm: New Farmer Learning Network, organized by Iowa State University Extension and Outreach, is a statewide program designed to provide education and support for beginning and early-career agricultural producers.

The SW Iowa group will meet several times throughout the year to discuss farm management and beef cattle production topics. Based on priorities and specific topics determined by the group, they will discuss production techniques, ways to grow and improve business practices, and farm management strategies.

Production topics include: winter nutrition, reproduction management, preconditioning, nutrition management, low-stress weaning, pregnancy checking, body condition scoring and more. Farm Financial topics include: developing farm financial statements, using key financial rations and indicators, managing cash flow, financing capital assets and livestock economies.

Participants will participate in a wide variety of activities, including the opportunity to learn about resources available to get started and tour successful farming operations. They also will become part of a community of Iowa beginning farmers.

There is no registration fee for this program. It will be held in the White 4-H Exhibit Building at the Montgomery County Fairgrounds in Red Oak, Iowa. The program will begin at 6:30 pm, and it will end at 8:30 pm. The address is 1809 4th Street, Red Oak, Iowa. For more information contact Montgomery County Extension at 712-623-2592, or through their website at www.extension.iastate.edu/montgomery ,or “like” Montgomery County-IA Extension on Facebook.