Where’s your pesticide card?
Corn planting time isn’t far off and I had a farmer tell me the other day he needs a pesticide card.
If you’re going to need Attrazine herbicide to spray your corn ground he’s right, you do need a current Private Applicators card. This card is issued by the TN Department of Agriculture to folks that have completed the training offered by the UT Extension Service.
I’ll offer the training for those of you who need a card this spring on next Wednesday, March 26 at the Extension office. Now you need to look at your card. If you don’t have a current card you need to be at the Extension office at 2 p.m. on March 26. Participants in the class will watch the original certification program and the recertification class. The fee for this program is thirty dollars.
Again this meeting is for those who want to get a pesticide card for the first time or anyone who has an expired card. We’ll have class for those who want to get re-certified later this summer. I’ll see you on the 19th.
”
PLANTING TIME IS HERE
If you are planning on planting some new trees or putting in some replacements in your home landscape this spring now’s a good time to get the job done.
Setting the trees early will give them the opportunity to become more established before hot summer weather comes than trees set out in April and May.
I get lots of questions about mature size of trees and with smaller home landscapes small trees are becoming more popular. Small trees are considered to mature at about 25-35 feet tall. Trees such as Sourwood, Serviceberry, Kousa Dogwood, Carolina Silverbell and Smoke Tree are a few of many that we can use.
Now these trees may not shade a house but they do provide good fall color and are useful in shading a courtyard, patio or porch. We can find small trees with different growth habits such as upright (Lombardi Poplar) or horizontal spreading (Southern Magnolia) or weeping (Weeping Willow or Cherry). Many different small trees can add to your landscape throughout the year. If you’d like a list of these trees and some more information about them give us a call here at the Extension office.
”
TIME FOR SPRING
GARDENS
March is here and many home gardeners are ready to get some spring vegetables planted. It’s a good time for those early spring vegetables to go in the ground.
Onions, greens, radish and lettuce are just a few of the crops that many gardeners grow in the spring. If the ground is dry enough for you to work it’s time to plant!
Time to harvest will depend on the weather the rest of the spring but generally you’re going to be harvesting in 30-60 days. Once you have these crops in don’t forget potatoes, cabbage, broccoli and others. Cooler temperatures, fewer weed and insect problems are some of the positives about spring gardening. For more information give me a call here at the Extension office.
The Farmers Market association will open the local market on Saturday, April 3. That’s only a few weeks away!
”
WHAT ARE THOSE CULL COWS WORTH?
Many area farmers did some cow culling the past several months and many have been disappointed in the prices received.
What did you cull? It’s important to remember that who ever is buying these cows is trying to make some money on them.
Some culling of beef cows occurs in most herds every year. The Beef Audits have generally shown that cull cows, bulls, and cull dairy cows make up about 20 percent of the beef available for consumption in the United States. About half of this group (or 10 percent of the beef supply) comes from cull beef cows.
In a drought-plagued year, the percentage of some herds that are being culled goes even higher than the survey estimates of 20 percent of each cow herd. Whether we are culling because of drought or to improve the productivity of the herd, it is important to understand the values placed on cull cows intended for slaughter.
The USDA market news service reports on four classes of cull cows. The four classes are divided primarily on fatness. The highest conditioned cull cows are reported as ‘Breakers.’ They usually are quite fleshy and generally have excellent dressing percentages. Body condition score 7 and above are required to be ‘Breakers.’
The next class is a more moderate conditioned group of cows called ‘Boners’ or ‘Boning Utility.’ These cows usually would fall in the body condition score grades of 5 to 7. Many well-nourished commercial beef cows would be graded ‘Boners.’
The last two groups of cows as reported by the market news service are the ‘Leans’ and ‘Lights.’ These cows are very thin (Body condition scores 1 – 4). They are in general expected to be lower in dressing percentage than the fleshier cows and are more easily bruised while being transported than are cows in better body condition. ‘Lights’ are thin cows that are very small and would have very low hot carcass weights.
Leans and Lights are nearly always lower in price per pound than are the Boners and the Breakers. ‘Lights’ often bring the lowest price per pound because the amount of sell-able product is small, even though the overhead costs of slaughtering and processing are about the same as larger, fleshier cows.
Producers that sell cull cows should pay close attention to the market news reports about the price differentials of the cows in these classes. Cull cows that can be fed enough to gain body condition to improve from the Lean class to Boner class can gain weight and gain in value per pound at the same time. Seldom, if ever, does this situation exist elsewhere in the beef business. Ideally, market your cull cows while still in good enough condition to fall in the Boner grade. If cows are being culled while very thin, consider short term dry lot feeding to take them up in weight and up in grade. With the high price of feed in today’s economic climate, some close scrutiny of the amount of feed per pound of added gain is warranted. Changing body composition of adult cows must be done in two months or less. Feed consumed per pound of gain will become to expensive once the cows have returned to normal (BCS=5) body condition. Rarely does it pay to feed enough to move the cow to ‘Breaker’ class. There is very little if any price advantage of Breakers over Boners and cows lose feed efficiency if fed to that degree of fatness. If you need more information give me a call here at the Extension office.