99 Bushel Beans In Kansas

Owen Taylot's AgFax email caught my attention this morning.  It reports a farmer who hit 100 bushel soybeans in Kansas!

We have travelled Kansas a bit and when you think of Kansas you don't think of 100 bushel soybeans.  I think of wheat, sunflowers and irrigation because that's more what I've seen there.

It's a big state with lots of dryland and home to the Dustbowl.  I do know that Eastern Kansas towards Kansas City is not as dry as western Kansas but the state's annual rainfall is still probably half of what we get in Ohio or less than half.

"Bob Wietharn, Clay Center, topped the irrigated division with a no-till entry that made 99.81 bushels per acre. Meredith Jeschke, Highland, led the dryland division with a no-till entry of 84.30 bushels per acre. Harold Koster, Hoxie, won the value contest with $1.56 per bushel of increased value (15.3 percent over the cash price)."

The dryland yield is even more impressive to me than the 100 bushel irrigated yield but they are both really good.  What does it take to raise 100 bushel soybeans or even 80 bushel for that matter?  The farmer has to do everything about perfect but Mother Nature has to also, especially in Kansas!

When my little 2 acre bottom of Apex semi dwarf soybeans averaged 94 bushels in 2013, I knew I had done a lot of things right.  My variety, planting date, population, fertility and weed control was spot on.

I have enjoyed talking to you about high yield soybeans and 100 bushel soybeans here on HyMark Highspots.  It's been a passion of mine the past ten years and the principles involved can help us all make more profit raising soybeans.

I don't hear much talk about high yield plots this year as everyone seems to be scratching their head just to figure out how to at least break even this year.

Just maybe a high yield plot would keep us positive this year and we might even learn a few things to help us make money when things aren't so rosey.  One young friend has been working on his 400 bu corn plot and I see the positive juices flowing.  It's good for the soul.

Congrats to the high yield producers, that's a good diversion for me on a winter's day.

Ed

How I Feel

Many people ask how I feel.  I think I felt a little better at the Machine Shed back in 2011!  I need to call my doctor this morning and tell Gretchen or one of the nurses how I feel.  I feel so bloated I have little appetite.  I feel like the meds are all fighting each other.  I don't feel terrible but the belching, bloating and full feeling is very uncomfortable.

This is all new to me and I know each individual takes it differently.  I am able to get around the house OK but I have to push myself to eat or even take a shower.  I am sure my lethargic feeling is not uncommon.

If I can manage these symptoms, I think I can do this much easier but right now I don't see anything easy about it.

Nausea

Medications called antiemetics or anti-nausea drugs are used to prevent and treat nausea and vomiting due to chemotherapy. Not all chemotherapy drugs cause nausea. Many anti-nausea drugs are available, and your doctor or nurse will recommend what is expected to work best for you.
If possible, have your prescriptions filled before your treatment day. Please call your doctor or nurse if your medications do not give you adequate relief or if you experience side effects with the anti-nausea medication.

Practical Hints for Nausea

• Before your chemotherapy appointment, eat a small, light meal. Most people do better if they have something in their stomach.
• Eat what sounds good to you. Generally starches such as rice, bread, potatoes, hot cereals and puddings are well tolerated.
• Try not to skip meals. An empty stomach will worsen all symptoms. If you don't feel like sitting down to a meal, try nibbling on something that appeals to you.
• Drink plenty of fluids. Herbal teas, water, sports drinks and diluted juices are recommended more than soda.
• Avoid smells that are unappealing.
• Freeze meals so that you don't have to cook. Ask your family and friends to help with meals, especially following chemotherapy when you are most likely to feel nauseous.
• Schedule a free appointment with the dietitian by calling (415) 885-3693 for more practical tips on dealing with nausea.

Fatigue

Chemotherapy can make you feel tired. This fatigue may or may not worsen as you are treated with more cycles of chemotherapy.
Most people have to make some adjustment in work and family responsibilities; the degree of change is very individual. Try to balance activity and rest. As much as possible, try to maintain your everyday activities. It can be very beneficial to both your physical and emotional recovery. The fatigue will go away after you recover from chemotherapy.
The Cancer Resource Center also hosts monthly Fatigue Management workshops to address these concerns. For more information, call (415) 885-3693.

Practical Hints for Fatigue

• Plan your activities, such as grocery shopping, for a time when you feel the best.
• If you have children, rest when they are napping. When you feel most tired, consider hiring a babysitter for a few hours so that you can relax or take a nap.
• Take naps early in the day so you do not disturb your sleep pattern at night.
• Consider exercising every day or several times a week. Good forms of exercise include swimming, walking and yoga. Call the Cancer Resource Center for information on free exercise classes at (415) 885-3693.

Appetite and Taste Changes

During chemotherapy, you may experience taste and appetite changes and a heightened sensitivity to odors. Don't worry if you don't have an appetite the first few days or a week following chemotherapy; it is not unusual. As you feel better, your appetite will improve.
Reflux — when food backs up into your esophagus — burping, or a burning sensation may worsen nausea. Please report these symptoms to your physician or nurse so that they can be treated. You may find that you can tolerate only certain foods. We encourage you to eat what appeals to you during this time, and to drink enough fluids: eight to 10 eight-ounce glasses per day, more if you have a fever or diarrhea.
Recommendations for healthy nutrition include a diet low in fat (less than 20 percent fat) and high in whole grains, fruits and vegetables, and plant-based proteins. Some people want to begin dietary changes during active therapy; others prefer to wait until chemotherapy is completed. Some people prefer small, slow changes, while others benefit from a "major overhaul." We encourage you to become informed and make healthy dietary and lifestyle changes.
Many people gain weight while on chemotherapy for reasons that are not well understood. Again, if you have concerns about nutrition, please consult our staff dietitian at (415) 885-3693.

Practical Hints for Taste and Appetite Changes

• Eat what appeals to you during this time.
• Eat foods that are warm rather than hot.
• Avoid places where food is being cooked, such as the kitchen at dinnertime.
• Avoid smells that are unappealing.
• To try drink eight to 10 glasses of fluid a day

My stomach feels warm enough I just want cold things right now.  Grapefruit really tastes good but I can't live on that alone.  I don't like the protein shakes but I try to keep sipping at them.

It's day 5 and I hope I feel a little better each day but this morning is not so great.

Ed

Crops Can Do Their Own Weed Control

"In conventional farming, the most frequently used herbicides for weed control have a negative impact on the environment. On the other hand, organic farmers enlist machines to battle unwanted growth. These machines guzzle fuel and produce CO2, while their tyres compact soil and damage its structure. New research results from the University of Copenhagen's Department of Plant and Environmental Sciences report that weeds would have a tough time competing against crops such as corn, grains and beans if farmers were to alter their sowing patterns.

"Our results demonstrate that weed control in fields is aided by abandoning traditional seed sowing techniques. Farmers around the world generally sow their crops in rows. Our studies with wheat and corn show that tighter sowing in grid patterns supresses weed growth. This provides increased crop yields in fields prone to heavy amounts of weeds," states Professor Jacob Weiner, a University of Copenhagen plant ecologist.

Weeds battered, crop yields bumped
Research studies performed in Danish wheat fields, together with recent studies in Colombian cornfields, demonstrate that modified sowing patterns and the nearer spacing of crops results in a reduction of total weed biomass. The amount of weeds was heavily reduced - by up to 72% - while grain yields increased by more than 45% in heavily weed-infested fields. The trick is to increase crop-weed competition and utilize the crop's head start, so that it gains a large competitive advantage over the neighboring weeds.

Jacob Weiner explains: "Our results make it possible for agriculture to be conducted in a far more sustainable manner while maintaining consistently high grain production. This requires affordable new technologies to make it proactical out in farmers' fields. We can develop methods for out competing weeds even more if we learn more about how plants interact."

The research results from Colombia have just been published in Weed Research, one of the leading scientific journals in its area. They were achieved via a collaborative effort between the Jorge Tadeo Lozano University in Colombia and the University of Copenhagen.

I think I need to see an example of what they are talking about because I feel like I am a long ways off from the concept!  We are using thicker canopies and generally less herbicide but we are still very dependent on herbicide for weed control.

Ed

Diet

A friend typed this out with one finger as to what he is doing to fight his cancer so I will try to decipher:

"Don't feed the cancer meat or dairy products....no sugar..use stevia. For sugar...it takes half as much..use sea salt...green vegetable. In a juicer. ?fruits. ?.soak in tub and water above legs. With one cup of dear salt. And cup of sea salt every couple days...glass of filtered water and lemon juice daily..what is your pH?   Problem below six..you gotta raise.baking soda and water will do that..at least one glass a day tablespoon..drink a boost drink..

If you start to lose wait and not eat let me know..I lost. 35 pounds before I turned it around..I did that with omega 3 and magnesium..take 2000 mg of b 17 daily..start at 50 mg a day and work up quickly..good vegetable are asparagus.cucumber.kale. ?  good immune booster is trans factor I take beta glucan 500mg..one pill for each 50 lbs of body weight..after I started gaining mt weight back the Dr. Gave me prednisone. And marinal. For appetite...take vita d and c. "

"Chris Woollams) A number of expert scientists believe that the Ketogenic diet, involving a high ´good fat´, low carbohydrate, lowish protein combination, may have the potential to manage even advanced cancer cases - preliminary research shows it can stop cancer progression, inhibit metastases and kill off cancer cells. 

Professor Thomas Seyfried of Boston is a biologist and after years of extensive research he believes cancer is a metabolic disease, not a genetic one. Dr Dominic D´Agostino Assistant Professor at South Florida University concurs and has been involved with treating patients with advanced cancer using a ketogenic diet. 

However, before we get carried away by the euphoria, there is cautionary evidence that this effect may depend on the cancer type (see ´Caveats´ below), and nothing has been firmly established as yet.

The Ketogenic Diet has received great interest since we first wrote about it in 2006.  These all come from the idea of starving cancer cells of sugar and keeping your body alkaline instead of acid.

I am going to run these concepts by my oncologist today and see what he has to say.  I've turned my life over to him.  He feels if he hadn't put me on this chemo I probably would not have lived past Valentine's Day and that is his quote.

I am running another 78 miles to get a new shot today 24 hours after the last dose of this round to try and keep my hemoglobin up as it when dangerously low the first round.  The other numbers on my blood print out are excellent or very good.  This should reduce my chance for infection which is a big problem, particularly day 8-14 which starts next Tuesday.

Everyone is very careful around me and I do appreciate the concern.  I expect to see some old faces show up here this weekend with the NNTC starting yesterday in downtown Cincinnati.  I wish I could make a visit but I am not up to it yet.

I had a really bad day yesterday but I got all my doses in and I feel better this morning.  There is a lot to learn for me as I fight this huge battle.  I don't have a good diet related picture today so I will include a picture more in the realm of prayer.  My prayer warriors continue to pray for me.

Ed

Chemo

This chemo regimen is a whole new thing to me.  They and the pain killers are all very constipating, leaving a person on heavy laxative doses all the time.  It's trial and error and a walking a tight rope all day not trying to go too far to one side or the other.

The chemo nurses are great, very special people to do what they do.  My combination of drugs is powerful enough I say she has to wear a hazmat suit to "infuse" them.  The room is called an infusion lab.

They have lots of different recliners to choose one and they even have a section for taller people that are more straight backed.  I tried a EZ Boy low sitting recliner and there is no way I could sit in one of them for an hour, let alone three.

Monday went great, it's the best I've felt in a long time.  The heavy dose and irregularity reversed that yesterday and I had a stomach ache since lunch yesterday until this morning.  I tell you this is not for wimps and can easily beat you down!  I don't see how my stomach tolerates the amount of drugs I have to take in one day alone.

I have another dose today and then a shot for nausea tomorrow.  The next round is 21 days from this past Monday the 12th.  The blood counts drop from day 8 or next Tuesday until about day 14, another week after that.  That is when I have to really be careful with germs, wear a mask, wash all day and ask the same from all who visit me.

It's a challenge folks but I am gaining a whole new perspective on the sick and suffering in this world.  There are so many and the so do suffer.

Spring won't come too soon for any of us!

Prayers for us all,

Ed

Hothouse Tomatoes Coming to Fulton County Ohio

One of our Canadian friends just posted this in the Cafe.

TOLEDO, OH (Toledo News Now) - Nature Fresh Farms says Fulton County is the perfect place to grow their business with plans to put a 175 acre greenhouse facility in Delta.

The greenhouse will be built in phases and will be located on route 109 just across the street from North Star.

They will start by building a 15 acre greenhouse and then expand it over a seven year period until it is eventually 175 acres. When complete it will bring in around $12 million per year and grow produce for the U.S. and Canada.

Company leaders say they will eventually hire 300 people for the green house.
Company leaders say they did a very thorough search when looking for a place to build the greenhouse and the delta location met all their requirements.

“Fulton County has a lot of the infrastructure that we're looking for, it has the flat grow that we're looking for and we're also talking to North Star Steel to take advantage of some of their waste heat and CO 2,” said President and owner of Nature Fresh Farms Peter Quiring.

The company plans to break ground in spring and hope to have tomatoes ready to sell by this time next year."

This is good news for Ohio, especially Fulton County, one of our top agricultural counties of the 88 in our state.

I will be curious to see how this works out.  I am sure my friends in nearby Williams County will keep me posted.

Ed Winkle

Maize Came Via Two Paths

"The origin of maize (Zea maysmays) in the US Southwest remains contentious, with conflicting archaeological data supporting either coastal^{1,​2,​3,​4} or highland^5,6 routes of diffusion of maize into the United States. Furthermore, the genetics of adaptation to the new environmental and cultural context of the Southwest is largely uncharacterized⁷. To address these issues, we compared nuclear DNA from 32 archaeological maize samples spanning 6,000 years of evolution to modern landraces. We found that the initial diffusion of maize into the Southwest about 4,000 years ago is likely to have occurred along a highland route, followed by gene flow from a lowland coastal maize beginning at least 2,000 years ago. Our population genetic analysis also enabled us to differentiate selection during domestication for adaptation to the climatic and cultural environment of the Southwest, identifying adaptation loci relevant to drought tolerance and sugar content.

Documenting ancient diffusion routes of domesticates and how they were modified when introduced into new regions has long been a challenge. For example, hybridization and gene flow have long confounded attempts to understand the origins of either indica rice⁸ in the Indian subcontinent or maize in southern Mexico⁹. The origin and adaptation of maize in the US Southwest is a similarly difficult case. Following its initial domestication from the wild grass teosinte in southern Mexico^10,11, maize diffused throughout the Americas, spreading through much of the continental United States after its introduction to the Southwest around 4,100 calendar years before present (BP)⁷. There has been considerable debate about the arrival of maize into the Southwest, however, as early archaeological samples suggested a highland route^5,6, whereas more recent samples^1,2 and morphological similarity to extant Mexican maize support a lowland, Pacific coast route^3,4. And while temporal variation in Southwest maize cob morphology has been described², the genetic changes responsible for adaptation to the Southwest environment during the last 4,000 years are still uncharacterized.

Maize was faced with a number of environmental challenges upon arrival in the Southwest, from extreme aridity to new dietary preferences⁷. Our population-level samples corresponding to temporally distinct occupations of the same cave site (Tularosa cave: SW2K, n = 10; SW750, n = 12), combined with published genomic data of the maize progenitor Z. m. parviglumis (Supplementary Table 4), allow us to distinguish evidence for these more recent adaptations from selection that occurred during maize domestication. We first used the population branch statistic PBS¹⁸ to identify genes with the highest dissimilarity between teosinte and our ancient Southwest landraces (Fig. 2a). These genes were likely to be early targets of maize domestication that preceded arrival in the Southwest. Many of these genes also show a very negative Tajima's D, consistent with the effects of strong selection (Fig. 2a), and seven of the top ten genes (Supplementary Table 1) are located in previously identified selected regions¹⁹. The top gene, zagl1, corresponds to a MADS-box transcription factor associated with shattering, a key domestication feature strongly selected for by human harvesting²⁰. Several other genes are also well known for their roles in domestication: ba1 has a major role in the architecture of maize²¹, zcn1 and gi are associated with the regulation of flowering^20,22 and tga1 controls the change from encased to exposed kernels²³.

The study of domestication and early crop evolution has largely been limited to the identification of key phenotypic, morphological and genetic changes between extant crops and their wild relatives. As demonstrated here, the application of new paleogenomic approaches to well-documented temporal sequences of archaeological assemblages opens a new chapter in the study of domestication: it is now possible to move beyond a simple distinction of ‘wild’ versus ‘domesticated’^29,30 and track sequence changes in a wide range of genes over the course of thousands of years.

Just think, none of us would be here if our Native American's had not done what they did in those early times.  Hybridization of these early maize or corn plants brought the possibility of you and I to life.

I am just "amaized."

Ed