With all the political confusion presently surrounding agriculture, domestically and globally, there’s at least one ray of common sense that shines through – the fact that the ag lime price in the U.S. has increased very little, and its availability has remained very constant. Being an almost exclus...

During 63 months as an agronomy/livestock Extension agent in Central New York, I learned the “correct” term for winter small grains planted in early autumn: cover crops. After leaving Extension for a career in ag sales in 1978, I continued referring to such crops as cover crops. Then I began resurre...

According to Katelyn Miller, Western New York field crops and forage specialist, a relatively new disease threatens NY corn production – tar spot. This plant disease originated in Central America and was first reported in the U.S. in 2015. The first significant yield-reducing tar spot event was obse...

Under the auspices of the Cornell Departments of Animal Science and Agronomy, the results of a feeding management study were released in 2023. That study’s purpose was to determine how well brown mid-rib (BMR) forage sorghum could substitute for corn silage in supporting 85 lbs. milk/day production ...

A report released Jan. 23 by Save Our Seeds highlights the increasing use of “generative artificial intelligence (AI) in the development of genetically modified (GM) plants, raising significant new concerns about their safety.” These developments come at a time when the European Union is considering...

I’m writing this column 11 days after spring officially started. Five days prior to that (March 15), the New York State Environmental Conservation Department ordered a mandatory outdoor burning ban. Such remains in effect at least until June 15. The compulsory ban is based on average early spring co...

One week into Daylight Savings Time, as the sun was starting to set, the sky in our part of Central New York got dark. That darkness soon framed lightning bolts which hit every few minutes for about an hour. The first flash-to-bang time was seven or eight seconds. With speed of sound at approximatel...

Country Folks classifieds for March 19 lists 28 hay for sale ads. In addition to that section are three more hay ads on the “farmer-to-farmer” page. None of those ads mentions forage analysis. Almost without exception, any farmer I’ve talked to who has purchased out-of-region hay has been provided f...

I have monitored colony collapse disorder (CCD) since it was first identified by entomologists over a quarter-century ago. CCD occurs when vast majorities of bees in any given colony – generally worker bees – die unexpectedly. Because queen bees need the nectar these workers provide to nurse new bee...

According to plant geneticists, male sterility means that crops in question will not translocate nutrients for grain or seed production. Almost all of the nutrients remain in the leaves and vegetative plant tissue, producing high-quality forage. With male-sterile sorghums, no grain is produced unles...

The American Meteorological Society defines “spring snow” as being coarse, granular, wet snow, resembling finely chopped melted ice. Foresters worry that this kind of snow can seriously harm trees. When such heavy snow piles up on branches, the stress can be too much, resulting in fractures. Such br...

It’s time to take another look at current soil nutrient commodity prices. These numbers come from research compiled by Jeff Cassim, general manager of Liquid Products in Seneca Falls. Cassim extracts his data from fertilizer industry periodicals – not just commodity prices, but geopolitical facts im...

My classic 1959 copy of “Morrison’s Feeds and Feeding” (22nd edition) comes in quite handy in balancing livestock rations. That hardcover book was a relatively new text when I took basic livestock nutrition at Cornell under Professor Richard Warner in 1966. Dietary energy need was expressed in TDN (...

According to the Weather Channel, before a huge crowd filled with excitement and anticipation, and bundled up against temperatures in the 20s, a groundhog named Punxsutawney Phil saw his shadow on Feb. 2 in Gobbler’s Notch, western Pennsylvania. Phil seeing his shadow means humans should expect to s...

Two years ago, in Central New York, Ken, a “grass-fed” organic dairy farmer, asked me two cropping questions as he was planning his growing season. He was considering no-till seeding Japanese millet into land where he had planted rye cover crop the previous two autumns. He asked me how would millet ...