keokukleahj

Farm bill priorities were discussed during a roundtable discussion Monday in Wisconsin.  Many of the top farm bill priorities are familiar.  Nicole Wagner is with the Wisconsin Corn Growers Association. She tells Brownfield, “Protecting crop insurance, increasing MAP and FMD (Market Access Funding and Foreign Market Development) funding, making sure that conservation programs remain voluntary. Those are the top three.” Amy Penterman is a recent past President of the Dairy […]

A change in the weather is amping up planting activity for some Michigan specialty crop farmers. Sixth-generation farmer Travis Fusilier tells Brownfield he’s thankful sporadic temperature changes the past few weeks haven’t caused crop damage. “We’ll be planting pretty heavily with more sensitive crops like summer squashes and tomatoes and peppers, we have confidence the weather has finally broke,” he shares. The family started a home delivery service just before […]

A satellite communications company believes it can help farmers better connect to equipment, people, and applications. Greg Malakoff, associate director of business development for Iridium Communications, says the company boasts the only network in the world that covers every inch of the Earth. “Anywhere anytime. So from those applications on the ground, being a sensor, an irrigation system, a combine, they are communicating over our satellite network to our ground […]

A northwest Tennessee farmer says his wheat crop has faced an uphill battle this year. David Nichols says from weather to marketing, it hasn’t been easy.  “We had a really cold freezing event back in March after the wheat began to a joint,” he says. “We were borderline on some damage on some fields and possibly there’s some freeze damage there.  And then we had a frost back a couple […]

Locks and dams are starting to reopen along the Mississippi River following some recent flooding events. Mike Steenhoek, Executive Director of the Soy Transportation Coalition, tells Brownfield several sites south of Minneapolis/St. Paul and along the Iowa/Illinois border have resumed operations. “There’s still a few that are remaining to be open,” he said. “That will likely happen in the next couple of days.” He says the high levels have had […]

More than 70 percent of farmers surveyed say it’s a bad time for large investments in their operations, according to the latest Purdue University/CME Group Ag Economy Barometer. Jim Mintert is the survey’s principal investigator and director of Purdue’s Center for Commercial Agriculture. “For those who said it was a bad time to make large investments, we asked them why do you feel that way,” he says. “The two responses […]

Farmers have concerns about weakness in commodity prices. Brownfield asked southeast Minnesota corn and soybean grower Ben Storm what he expects the market to do in the coming months. “Ha! If I knew the answer to that question I’d be sitting on a beach somewhere drinking a margarita, not sitting in a tractor.” He says the uncertainty has influenced his marketing. “I would say we’re probably more sold this year […]

This week Illinois Soybean Association Market Development Director Todd Main gives an update on the current state of Illinois waterways and explains why waterways are important to Illinois soybean farmers. He also highlights checkoff partnerships that help make improvements to waterway infrastructure. ...

Senate Agriculture Committee Chairwoman Debbie Stabenow says she is writing a bill requiring stricter oversight of foreign ag land purchases. The U.S. Senator from Michigan says the bill would make the ag secretary and commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration permanent members of the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States and require them to approve every transaction the interagency committee oversees. “It would also add new criteria […]