(ISU Extension News) – Iowa State University Extension and Outreach will offer the Iowa Master Conservationist Program in Adair and Cass County as a joint program between the two county Extension Offices this summer and fall. The program will take place at outdoor parks and public areas within the two counties, providing participants with hands-on interaction with the diversity of the state’s natural resources. The program teaches about Iowa’s natural ecosystems and the diversity of conservation challenges and opportunities that exist in the region. Graduates of the course learn to make informed choices for leading and educating others to improve conservation in Iowa.

The program consists of approximately 12 hours of online curriculum and six face-to-face meetings. The online modules will include lessons and resources by Iowa State subject-matter experts to be reviewed at the participants’ own pace at home or at their local County Extension office. Module topics include conservation history and science, understanding Iowa ecosystems, implementing conservation practices in human dominated landscapes and developing skills to help educate others about conservation practices.

The first meeting will take place on Tuesday May 30th at Lake Anita State Park, beginning at 6 PM. A total of six face-to-face meetings will build on the online lessons and be held at different locations in Adair and Cass County one Tuesday evening per month from June-October of 2023. All meetings will begin at 6 PM and last from 2-3 hours depending on the topic. Each face-to-face meeting will be led by local subject-matter experts to demonstrate how the principles covered in the online curriculum and play out locally.

Registration for the course is $50 per person and is due at the time of registration. To register or with questions, contact the ISU Extension and Outreach office in Adair County at 515-231-2741 or Cass County at 712-243-1132 or visit www.extension.iastate.edu/cass or www.extension.iastate.edu/adair for registration forms and details. The deadline to register is Thursday, May 25 to guarantee a space in the course.

(Radio Iowa) – Iowa Senator Chuck Grassley fears the recent U-S Supreme Court ruling on hog confinement sizes will have “a tremendous economic impact” on Iowa’s pork producers and he hopes a legislative solution will help to ease the blow. The ruling upheld what’s known as Proposition 12, a California law that will ban the sale of pork products from sows that come from pens of a certain size. “It’s not only going to make it difficult to market any Iowa products in California, maybe even prohibit it,” Grassley says. “I don’t want to go that far, for sure, but it could.”

Nearly one-third of the nation’s pork is raised in Iowa and while California only raises about one-percent, that state consumes about 15-percent of the pork that’s produced in the U-S. Grassley couldn’t yet offer specifics on any bills in the works. “We need a legislative solution that is bipartisan, and put it in the Farm Bill as an option,” Grassley says. “I think you’re going to see Senator (Roger) Marshall of Kansas lead the way in this direction.”

Grassley says he and fellow Iowa Republican Senator Joni Ernst co-sponsored Marshall’s bill last year called the EATS Act, or the Exposing Agricultural Trade Suppression Act, which did not win passage. It would have banned state and local governments from interfering with agricultural production in other states. If that bill is reintroduced by Marshall, who’s also a Republican, Grassley is uncertain what level of support may come from the other side of the aisle. “The animal rights organizations of this country are going to be a big voice in this,” Grassley says, “and Democrats tend to listen to their voice more loudly than they should, and that’s a factor that we have to fight here.”

Grassley fears the court ruling could raise pork prices while also forcing some producers to close up shop. An Iowa ag economist says we’re already seeing some of the biggest losses in the pork industry in 25 years and some farmers won’t be able to afford to implement major changes in their operations.

DES MOINES, Iowa (May 15, 2023) – The Iowa Renewable Fuels Infrastructure Program (RFIP) Board approved 15 project applications and 11 supplemental grant requests for a total of more than $800,000 during its quarterly board meeting on May 9. Twelve of the fifteen projects are for E15 infrastructure, three are biodiesel terminals, and the eleven previously funded ethanol projects received supplemental grants of $6,000 each. The RFIP helps fuel retailers provide higher blends of lower cost Iowa grown biofuels to consumers by incentivizing the installation, replacement and conversion of ethanol and biodiesel dispensing and storage infrastructure. Incentives to upgrade biodiesel terminal and storage facilities are also available. While the Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship manages the program, a board appointed by the Governor and confirmed by the Iowa Senate determines grant allocations on a quarterly basis.

“Consumers save money when they can fill their tanks with higher blends of ethanol and biodiesel,” said Iowa Secretary of Agriculture Mike Naig. “By helping fuel retailers install this infrastructure, we are continually increasing the number of Iowa fueling stations where consumers can buy cleaner burning and more affordable homegrown biofuels.”

Counties with locations receiving one or more of the 15 project grants include the following: Story, Polk, Dallas, Linn, Sioux, Benton, Buena Vista, Crawford, Dickinson, Dubuque, Clinton, Howard, and Madison. The complete list of locations can be found here. The supplemental grants were awarded to retailers that have added tanks and associated equipment, including dispensers, for dispensing E15 or higher ethanol blends at additional locations. To receive supplemental grants, retailers must be awarded multiple RFIP grants and complete their projects within one year of the original installation.

To date, $5,755,228 of funding for this fiscal year has been awarded to 119 biofuels infrastructure projects. The program also leverages significant private investment by the participating fuel retailers. The Renewable Fuels Infrastructure Board will consider additional RFIP grant applications during its next quarterly meeting in July, and the deadline for accepting new applications for that meeting will be Friday, June 23 at 4:30pm. The RFIP grant application is available on the Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship’s website.

The breakdown of RFIP funding for this fiscal year, so far, is as follows:

• $270,000 to 6 E85 projects
• $3,738,320 to 76 E15 projects
• $1,250,000 to 26 Biodiesel projects
• $430,908 to 9 Biodiesel Terminal projects
• $66,000 to 11 ethanol projects as supplemental grants

Over the history of the program, the state has invested approximately $60 million while private industry has invested over $200 million. To learn more about the Renewable Fuels Infrastructure Program, visit the program’s webpage on the Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship’s website.

(Radio Iowa) – Wetter weather slowed the planters in the fields a bit last week.The U-S-D-A crop report released Monday, showed an increase of 16 percent in the amount of corn planted during the week — about half the amount planted last week.

The corn planting total is now at 86 percent — eight days ahead of last year and one week ahead of the five-year average. Bean planting moved at about the same pace — gaining 20 percent compared to last week — putting the total at 69 percent. That’s about one week ahead of last year and the five-year average for beans.

Thirty-five percent of planted corn has emerged from the ground, nearly five times as much as last week. And the report now says 19 percent of the beans have emerged.

(Radio Iowa) – Iowa is the nation’s top corn grower, with more than 13-million acres devoted to the vegetable, but some Iowans are planting their first small crops of -sweet- corn this spring. Aaron Steil, consumer horticulture specialist at the Iowa State University Extension, says if you’d hoped to have sweet corn by the 4th of July, you would need to have planted in mid-April, but he says there’s still plenty of time to get seeds in the ground. “The last practical planting day, especially for the early varieties, is the end of June,” Steil says. “You would obviously be harvesting later if you planted that late, but you would still be able to get a crop in before frost easily.”

There are many types of sweet corn from which to choose. Steil says the “standard sugary” cultivars have the traditional sweet corn flavor and texture, but are only of the best quality within the first day after harvest, because sugars quickly convert to starch after picking. “Most folks really enjoy sweet corn that has good storage life,” Steil says. “Sweet corn really does start to go downhill very quickly after harvest and so certain varieties, like the super sweet or the augmented super sweets, store pretty well.”

Before buying seed, you’ll need to consider what elements are important, including flavor, sweetness, crunch and kernel color. When arranging your sweet corn plot, plan ahead for irrigation and make sure the soil is well fertilized, because corn uses a lot of nitrogen, as well as phosphorus and potassium.  “Rather than planting corn in long rows, like we so often see it in the field, planting our sweet corn in blocks because it’s wind-pollinated,” Steil says. “When we plant them in blocks, it does a better job of pollinating those ears of corn and you get better filled corn ears. You don’t have those little gap-tooth missing spots in the corn ear.”

Crayon drawings by kids may depict eight or ten ears of corn on each stalk, but Steil says you shouldn’t expect nearly as many. “One good ear can be expected from each stalk of corn,” Steil says. “In general, you can expect in a 10-foot row that you’ll get about 11 to 13 ears of corn, when you properly space your corn plants when you’re planting.”

For a continuous supply of sweet corn, plant early, mid-season and late cultivars. Also, he says to plant only fresh seeds, as old seeds may not germinate well. In addition, keep sweet corn isolated from popcorn as the quality of sweet corn will be lowered if it’s cross-pollinated by other types of corn.

(Radio Iowa) – An Iowa State University economist says there was a whole lot of uncertainty in the hog market well before last week’s Supreme Court opinion on pork production. The court ruled California may require that any pork sold in California must come from pigs that are the offspring of sows that had enough room to turn around in a livestock barn. I-S-U Extension livestock economist Lee Schulz says some producers have already retrofitted or built new confinements. Others may not be able to afford it.

“Pork producers are having some of the largest losses in 25 years. You have to go back to 1998 to see losses this large,” Schulz says. “…We’re already seeing contraction in the industry.” There could be an opportunity for businesses that make and install the metal enclosures for sows, but Schulz says given the labor market, finding enough employees to do the work will be challenge.

“Not only the availability of labor, but the cost of labor also is kind of a prohibitatnt when we think about having to make large changes on farms to both buildings and equipment,” Schulz says. California produces just one percent of U.S. pork. However, Californians consume 15 percent of all the bacon and other pork products sold in the country.

“The adjustments will have to take place outside the state of California. Where those exactly take place are still to be determined,” Schulz says. “Certainly there will be an impact here because of the size of Iowa’s pork production.” Nearly a third of the nation’s hogs are raised in Iowa. Schulz says Iowa swine operations that have already adjusted to California’s new rules will get higher premiums for their pigs in the near term.

“Likely they are the lower cost producers that would enable them to do that,” Schulz says. “A lot of times it’d be the larger producers. There are economies of scale in pork production, so if I have per unit lower costs, I am able to make some of those transitions a bit quicker.”

A court injunction that has prevented pig production rules for pork sold in California from taking effect will expire July 1st. The U.S. Humane Society says the Supreme Court made it clear preventing animal cruelty is a core function of state governments and California will have the strongest animal welfare law in the country.

(Radio Iowa) – A scientist who’s monitored Iowa’s water quality in the public and private sectors for 36 years is retiring this week, while also publishing a book about what he says are the reasons our waterways are dying. Chris Jones has run the state’s largest water sensor system at the University of Iowa’s Institute of Hydraulic Research the past eight years. Jones says we need common-sense regulation of corn and soybean production with regard to its environmental outcomes.

“We ask the taxpayer to mitigate the pollution from the system while at the same time giving farmers and the industry at large license to do whatever they want on the field,” Jones says. “You know, this is just not going to work. It’s a perverse approach to it.” In his book, “The Swine Republic: Struggles with the Truth about Agriculture and Water Quality,” Jones says Iowa has devoted the equivalent of 20 counties solely to growing corn that’s used to make ethanol.

“Is that contributing to the common good? Well, there’s a lot of evidence that ethanol production does not reduce greenhouse gas emissions, for example, and there’s some evidence that it actually increases greenhouse gas emissions. So why are we doing this?” Jones asks. “We need to take a look at that land area again, which is 20% of our state.” Jones suggests the solution to the long-running water pollution problems may also lie in diversifying what we grow in Iowa. He says we only have two species covering the majority of our fertile cropland — corn and soybeans.

“We need diversity on our farms. We need more and different crops. We need different systems of animal production,” Jones says. “That’s just the bottom line here. If we want these nice things, nice lakes, nice rivers, nice air and so forth, we need to look at the entire system and what can we do to transform it to something else?” Jones hopes the book finds wide appeal, as he says it’s important that people — politicians, farmers, industry leaders and everyone else — know the truth about what’s happening to our Iowa’s water, and to that “dead zone” in the Gulf of Mexico.

“I’m 62 years old. The water has been bad here my entire life,” Jones says. “Has that been explained to anybody why that is the case in any sort of detail? I don’t think it has. I’m trying to reach the person on the street. I think this condition only changes if there’s grassroots demand for that change, and so that’s my audience.”

The book is being published by North Liberty-based Ice Cube Press.

DES MOINES, IA, MAY 15, 2023 — USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) is seeking new Organic Transition Initiative (OTI) and Conservation Stewardship Program (CSP) applications now in local NRCS field offices. NRCS accepts conservation program applications on a continuous basis but sets application cutoff dates as funding allows. The next application cutoff for OTI and CSP applications is June 15.

Organic Transition Initiative (OTI)

Through OTI, NRCS will dedicate $70 million nationwide to assist producers with a new organic management standard under the Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP). The OTI supports conservation activities and practices required for organic certification and may provide foregone income reimbursement for dips in production during the transition period. NRCS will help producers adopt the new organic management standard by giving producers flexibility to get the assistance and education they need, such as attending workshops or requesting help from experts or mentors.

OTI-specific practices include:

Organic Management (Practice Code 823)
Conservation Plan Supporting Organic Transition (Practice Code 138)
Transition to Organic Design (Practice Code 140)
Conservation Cover (Practice Code 327)
Conservation Crop Rotation (Practice Code 328)
Cover Crops (Practice Code 340)
Field Borders (Practice Code 386)
Nutrient Management (Practice Code 590)

Conservation Stewardship Program (CSP)
NRCS is also announcing an application cutoff of June 15 for new CSP applications in Fiscal Year 2023 for Iowa farmers. CSP funding is available for organic production practices and applications through the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) which emphasizes the adoption of climate-smart practices and enhancement activities. In Iowa, areas of focus for climate smart agriculture include soil health, nutrient stewardship, grazing and pasture lands. Eligible practices include cover crops, no-till, crop rotations, prescribed grazing, and nutrient management.

During this application signup cycle, NRCS will use ACT NOW, where applications can be immediately approved and obligated when an eligible applicant meets or exceeds a predetermined minimum ranking score. Higher payment rates and other options are available for historically underserved producers including socially disadvantaged, beginning, veteran, and limited resource farmers.

For more information or to apply, visit your local NRCS field office.

(Iowa DNR News/Des Moines, Iowa) ⎯ Several state parks and forests will be hosting family-friendly programming and activities as part of Iowa Department of Natural Resources (DNR) new Summer Kick-Off event, June 9-11. “Summer Kick-Off is our way of showing appreciation for our visitors with activities the entire family can enjoy,” said Sherry Arntzen, chief of Parks, Forests and Preserves Bureau for the Iowa DNR. Planned events include hikes, nature programs, fireside chats, kayaking clinics and more. A list of parks and their programs, activity sheets and ideas for ways to explore parks is available online at www.iowadnr.gov/kickoffsummer.

Those wanting to camp during the Summer Kick-Off celebration are encouraged to make their reservation soon. Iowa has more than 4,400 state park campsites with most reservable in advance. Reservations can be made through the reservation system. “Iowa state parks are beloved overnight destinations for many people,” said Arntzen. “We offer campsites that appeal to a broad range of campers, from the more rustic hike-in sites to those with all the modern amenities.”

For visitors who prefer cabins over tents, the Iowa DNR has more than 90 cabins available to rent across 20 state parks and forests, Arntzen said. In the off season from Labor Day to Memorial Day, cabins can be rented for a two-night minimum stay. During the peak of summer, most cabins require a seven-night minimum visit. As of now, all state parks have water turned on, with shower and restroom buildings open for campers. A few parks do have renovations and closures, so check the park closure page at: www.iowadnr.gov/parkclosures when planning your visit. Visit the DNR’s website to sign up for electronic news updates and information about campsites, cabins, events and more.

(Iowa DNR News) – There’s a pretty good chance that, in the next several weeks, Northeast Iowa will be visited by a few wandering black bears coming down from Minnesota and Wisconsin ahead of the breeding season. It’s been an annual occurrence in this region each spring since 2014. While much of Iowa does not have the habitat necessary to support a black bear population, certain locations do, primarily northeast, eastern and southern parts of the state. As black bear populations in Wisconsin, Minnesota and Missouri are stable to increasing, it is possible that a small population could set up residence in Iowa.

“Within the next three to five years, we may see cubs show up and a small breeding population become established. If that occurs, we should look to our neighbors in Wisconsin and Minnesota who have learned to live with bears,” said Vince Evelsizer, furbearer and wetland wildlife research biologist with the Iowa Department of Natural Resources (DNR). “It won’t be perfect and there will be bumps along the way, but we need to start having conversations about the idea of bears coming back to Iowa, at least in certain places along the Mississippi River and Northeast Iowa where suitable habitat exists.”

Wisconsin’s black bear population is estimated to be 23,300, Minnesota’s 12,000 – 15,000 and Missouri, which held its first bear hunt last fall, as many as 1,000. Missouri’s population is growing at an estimated 9 percent annually. “For example, in Wisconsin, with that many black bears, residents have learned to make a few adjustments to minimize bear conflicts, like putting away their bird seed in the spring, putting away their barbeque drip pans, and by keeping pet food and garbage in places bears can’t access. There are still occasional problems, but these basic precautions result in much fewer negative encounters between bears and humans,” Evelsizer said.

Bears are omnivores and their diet changes with the seasons. In the spring, bears emerge from their winter dens hungry. They’ll feed heavily on newly emerging tender grasses and sedges. In summer, its berries, ants, various plants, and grubs. In the fall, its acorns and other tree nuts. They are also known to feed on nontraditional sources, like row crops, orchard fruits, and honey – which is similar to striped skunks and raccoons. “They’re like a big raccoon, motivated by hunger and willing to take advantage of whatever food is available, from fawns to eggs, bee hives, bird feeders – this is where making some changes can minimize nuisance bear interactions,” he said.

Black bears are native to Iowa. However, Iowa has been without a resident bear population for more than 100 years. In the Iowa code, black bears are not listed as a species of wildlife found in Iowa because they were not present in the state when these laws were created, nor have they been since. This means the Iowa DNR does not have the legal authority to manage black bear populations through actions such as designating protection status or adding a limited hunting season if the population eventually support it in the future. Iowa is the only state among its Midwest neighbors where the state’s wildlife agency does not have regulatory authority to manage bear populations, which typically includes handling nuisance conflicts and conducting research.

While the Iowa DNR does not regulate bears, it does have a bear response protocol. “The objective with the response protocol is to provide guidance for our staff in dealing with any potential human-bear conflicts that arise. A proactive strategy will increase the odds for a better outcome for both the bears and for humans. For example, trap and transport of bears is a common scenario shown on TV shows, however in reality most states have moved away from this method because it often results in simply moving the problem to someone else’s backyard. It’s all about reducing conflicts where bears are instead,” Evelsizer said. “We want to keep Iowans informed about this interesting and emerging wildlife story and increase our collective knowledge about bears in order to live with them successfully and minimize conflicts.”

Since 2002, there have been 49 confirmed black bears in Iowa, and two to five per year since 2014. As bears have become more of a regular visitor, the chance to encounter a bear, although small, is a possibility. “Black bears have some general tendencies and habits, but individual bears may go against the norm. Some are shy, others are not. They are typically secretive and want to be left alone – while others are bold and may be more daylight active,” he said. Bears are typically nocturnal but get more active during late May to July breeding season, especially at dawn and dusk. Most of Iowa’s bear sightings start in late May continuing into early July.

“If you encounter a bear, avoid running away,” Evelsizer said. “Instead, back away slowly and cautiously while facing it. Make noise so they know you’re there.” There are a number of resources available to help people minimize conflict with bears, Evelsizer said, including www.bearwise.org.