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Feature
Milkweed Plantings Needed to Restore Threatened Monarch Butterfly
Every autumn, millions of vibrantly colored monarch butterflies embark on an incredible mass migration. The remarkable trip takes the butterflies up to 3,000 miles, traveling as far south as central Mexico before that generation’s offspring return to the upper Midwest and Canada in the spring. The wonder of this natural […]
‘Seed Destructor’ Technology Likely the Next Step in war on Weeds
For decades, the fight against weeds in Arkansas agriculture—barnyardgrass and Palmer amaranth, in particular—has been an ongoing war of attrition as weed populations gradually acquire resistance to one herbicidal chemistry after another. During this time, weed scientists and other experts with the University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture have […]
Aged to Perfection
After producing award-winning goat cheese for more than a decade, Baetje Farms is poised to begin a new chapter With the pull of a rope, a trap door at the end of the milking parlor rises. Eight Saanen dairy goats enter, moving in unison like choreographed dancers taking the stage. […]
How Blockchain Could Disrupt Agriculture
Frank Yiannas walked into his staff meeting with a package of sliced mangoes. As he set it down on the table, he looked at his team of Walmart colleagues and said, “The traceback study starts right now. Hit the clock.” Yiannas wanted to know from which country the mangoes came […]
Coalition Seeks to Grow Demand for Biodiesel
When Missouri soybean farmers began investing their checkoff dollars into biodiesel research in 1991, they set the wheels in motion for the development of a renewable fuel that would drive demand for their crop and provide a clean-burning alternative to petroleum diesel. “Biodiesel started out as an idea—an opportunity to […]
Help Wanted
Finding Farmworkers is a Challenge When Dannie Daughhetee reached out to his local unemployment office in West Memphis, Ark., last fall looking for help in filling four positions on his 5,000-acre rice, soybean, corn and cotton farm, he received 18 applications. Only four people bothered to show up to the […]
Why I Farm
Oliver Farms While most family farms have a long history, the Oliver family is breaking ground with their first-generation farm, Oliver Farms. Bill Oliver started farming in the 1990s, during his high school agricultural education courses. Fifteen years ago, Laura came on board, turning the farming project into a family […]
Cattlemen Have a Beef with Fake Meat
Missouri Bans Misrepresentation of Meat Missouri has become the first state to ban alternative-meat products from being marketed as meat. The state’s lawmakers approved legislation outlawing foods originating from sources other than livestock or poultry from using the term “meat” on product labels. The surge of interlopers vying to compete […]
Black Cows, Big Dreams
From pasture to plate, Gourley Land & Cattle Co. offers premium beef When Billy Gourley Jr. says he manages from the ground up, he couldn’t be more literal. At Gourley Land & Cattle Co. based in Ozark, Mo., success starts in the soil. “If you have good soil, you’ll have […]
Disconnected
Lack of Access to High-Speed Internet Hampers Rural Communities The digital divide separating rural Americans from their urban neighbors has left the far-flung communities across the country cut off from the economic, educational and social opportunities high-speed Internet provides. While recent advancements in Internet technology have transformed the ways people […]
Don’t Wait to Plan Your Estate
I recently had the difficult task of sitting by the hospital bed of a farmer in his early 80s to discuss his estate plan. This man, who was suffering from the late stages of cancer, had two children. One child had farmed with his father all his life and one […]
Sowing Seeds of Doubt
Researchers Accuse Russia of Spreading Anti-GMO Propaganda Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election has been confirmed by the Trump Administration and U.S. intelligence agencies, but politics is far from the only arena where Russia has sought to shape international opinion. A recent review of Russian-funded media outlets conducted […]