The growing season of 2015 will be one that we talk about for some time to come. The good planting weather for most of the grain crops was followed by six or seven weeks of excessive rain that delayed hay harvest, some tobacco being set, and most of the wheat from being harvested, so that meant very few double crop soybeans, too.
The soybeans that were planted suffered from the excessive amount of water just like much of the tobacco crop and hay and wheat that could not be harvested in a timely manner. Corn for the most part seems to be ok or in most cases better than just ok. The later corn that is grown for silage seems to have been impacted more than the early corn.
Diseases have shown up in many of the crops as a result of the excessive moisture. Some of the diseases are typical diseases that we see from time to time in crops. However, last week I received a call about something that was taking a toll on many acres of the soybeans in the Sardinia/Mowrystown area. Our OSU Extension State Soybean Specialist and I visited some of the fields where the problem was showing up, last week. Unfortunately there was no clear cut answer for what was happening. There could be a combination of things, but what is most likely a big factor is just too much water. The issue flared up after a 2.5 inch rainfall that occurred during the evening of Aug. 19.
If you have not scouted your soybeans recently, it may be worth the trip. Then again, with no answer for the cause other than excessive moisture, maybe you just don’t want to see it. The damage in severe in some of the fields I saw late last week. Yield loss will be significant. The beans are podded and have beans in them. However, the entire field was not showing the symptoms, so parts of the fields appear to be dead and losing or already lost their leaves while parts of the fields are still very green. The areas where beans were dead were already subject to pods shattering.
Antibiotic Resistance: Let’s Change the Way We Understand It
I found this in a recent Beef Blog. This is one of those topics that we really need to know more about, and as it is in most cases, we only hear one side of the story. This link will take you to the full article if you wish to read more, http://www.foodsafetynews.com/2015/08/antibiotic-resistance-lets-change-the-way-we-understand-it/#.VeXOQ02FOM8.
In the past few days, there have been two interesting reports on antibiotic resistance. One was released by Consumer Reports entitled, “How Safe Is Your Ground Beef?” The other, much less publicized, was put together by scientists and physicians who work in public health and do know something about antibiotic resistance.
This second report was published in the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report and is part of the Grand Rounds by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. From this second report, I like both the title, “Getting Smart about Antibiotics,” and the fact that the authors present an appalling number of figures pointing out the impact of inappropriate antibiotic use in human medicine.
There is no doubt that the “increasing prevalence of antibiotic-resistant bacteria is one of the most serious threats to public health in the 21st century.” But there is also no doubt that this is a complex issue, and pitting one food system against others will not solve the problem. Blaming the use of antibiotics in medicine versus veterinary medicine will not solve the problem either. But for some reason, the discourse about antibiotics resistance has taken the form of blaming somebody or something.
The study of antibiotic resistance is extremely complex because of the variability in the methods of testing for antibiotic resistance and the temporal and spatial inconsistencies in the results. An example of this variability can be seen on the website of the National Antimicrobial Resistance Monitoring Systems.
Farm Science Review Tickets
Remember that we have Farm Science Review tickets available at all OSU Extension Offices until Sept. 21 or we run out of tickets. For more information about the Farm Science Review go the website at http://fsr.osu.edu.
Dates to Remember
Sept. 3- Adams County Junior Fair Beef BBQ
Sept. 5-12- Highland County Fair
Sept. 14- Pesticide Testing at Old Y Restaurant at Noon. Pre-register at http://pested.osu.edu or call 1-800-282-1955
Sept. 22-24- Farm Science Review
Sept. 28- Oct. 3- Brown County Fair
