1 year ago
Six couples will be honored on March 22 as the 2023 class of Kansas Master Farmers and Master Farm Homemakers in recognition of their leadership in agriculture, environmental stewardship and service to their communities. The statewide awards program is in its 97th year and is sponsored by K-State Research and Extension and Kansas Farmer Magazine. This year’s ...

1 year ago
Six sets of seven chromosomes make the wheat genome five times larger than the human genome. This complexity makes wheat breeding even more difficult, but technology like double haploid breeding has helped public and private researchers unlock potential agronomic, quality and even nutritional traits. Key to this work is a farmer-backed, for-profit plant services company housed ...

1 year ago
A Kansas Community College is preparing for its annual bull sale. According to Colby Community College, their  annual bull sale is scheduled for 1 p.m. on Friday, March 22, in the Beef Unit at the college farm east of Colby. A complimentary lunch will be served at noon. A new event this year for producers is the ...

1 year ago
Walk through the halls of a high school and it is easy to see that not all kids develop at the same pace – some look like mature adults while others appear younger than their age. Similarly, individual animals in a cattle herd also reach maturity at different times, say the experts at Kansas State University’s ...

1 year ago
Kansas State University farm management extension specialist Gregg Ibendahl says the price of oil, inflation rates and demand for fertilizer impact the price of one of the most expensive inputs in farming: fertilizer. “When we look at the variable expenses, fertilizer is the most important one,” Ibendahl said. “Farmers have got a lot of money tied ...

1 year ago
For researchers at K-State’s Wheat Genetics Resource Center, it’s all about the genes. Using powerful new tools like gene editing, these scientists are taking a molecular look at how to reverse engineer nature’s “survival of the fittest” in the laboratory to improve disease resistance, increase yield and protein quality and even reduce gluten toxicity for individuals ...

1 year ago
A proverbial Who’s Who of water management in the High Plains region is expected for the 2024 Ogallala Aquifer Summit, set for March 18-19 at the Seward County Fairgrounds in Liberal, Kansas. The conference marks the third time that an inter-disciplinary group of water specialists, users, regulators and others from eight states will gather to discuss ...

1 year ago
An annual report that summarizes the success of Kansas’ crop harvest indicates that drought and water management were still underlying issues for many Kansas farmers in 2023. The 2023 Kansas Crop Performance Tests are available online from the K-State Research and Extension bookstore, or at local extension offices in Kansas. Jane Lingenfelser, an assistant agronomist and coordinator of the ...

1 year ago
Just as people cut their toenails when they get too long, some beef cattle also need to have their hooves trimmed on occasion to help keep them from going lame, say Kansas State University veterinarians at the Beef Cattle Institute. Talking on a recent Cattle Chat podcast, the veterinarians answered a listener's question about reasons that ...

1 year ago
The 2022 Census of Agriculture has been published.  It is available online at nass.usda.gov/AgCensus and in Quick Stats. Once every five years the Census of Agriculture provides the most comprehensive and impartial agriculture data for U.S. territories, and for every state and county in the nation.. According to Kansas Farm Bureau, here are the takeaways for Kansas: The 2022 ...

1 year ago
In the next couple of weeks each of Kansas Farm Bureau’s 10 districts will be holding their issue surfacing meetings. I am a little late with this for a couple of districts, and I apologize to the 2nd and 4th districts. Good timing has never been my thing. This is the beginning of our policy development process and something ...