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Agriculture

  • Slight Decrease in Food Prices for Second Straight Quarter

    The most recent Kentucky Farm Bureau (KFB) Marketbasket Survey indicates a slight decrease to the overall cost of food in the fourth quarter of 2018. However, the average marketbasket price showed an overall increase for the year, going from $115.07 in 2017 to $116.92 in 2018. The final 2018 survey is still lower than the final marketbasket of 2016 which was $118.87.

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  • Reducing Feeding Waste

    Much expense and many long hours go into harvesting and storing hay for winter feeding.  So why waste it? Reducing hay feeding waste could be especially important in 2019 since hay supplies seem to be limited and quality has proved to be below average.

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  •  Pesticide certification: Who needs it?

    There has been some confusion with respect to who is required to have pesticide certification — either private or commercial certification. This article is based on information provided by the Kentucky Department of Agriculture (KDA) to clarify this issue. KDA wants to make sure that everyone using pesticides on the farm is aware of who needs to be certified/licensed.

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  • Quarles announces farm to school grantees

    Ten Kentucky agribusinesses have been awarded United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) Farm to School Producer Engagement grants for training, equipment, and other needs to enable farmers to develop or enhance their farm-to-school marketing efforts, Agriculture Commissioner Ryan Quarles announced on Monday, January 7.

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  • Reduce stress with good record keeping

    Record keeping may not be every farmer’s favorite activity, and probably not the reason someone chooses farming as a career. With time, patience, and a commitment to get it done, it can make your financial life a lot less stressful.

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  • Looking forward to the summer gardens

    Many of you are already receiving seed catalogs for the 2019 vegetable-growing season. While listening to the cold wind blow outside, what a comfort it is to think about spring and summer and planning your garden.

    To make the most of your garden, every aspiring gardener should follow seven steps to have a successful gardening season.

    1.Plan your garden on paper before you begin.

    2.Select a good gardening site that has full of sun for at least eight hours each day, relatively level, well-drained, close to a water source and not shaded.

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  • Improving reproductive efficiency in beef heifers

     

    To improve the reproductive efficiency, and thus profitability, of a beef cattle operation, a beef producer must understand proper heifer development. Properly managing yearling heifer reproduction is the first step toward reproductive efficiency.

    The goal is to manage heifers so they’ll conceive early by reducing the age of puberty, shortening the time from puberty to conception and increasing fertility.

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  • Winterizing your tools

    Ideally, you should have done a lot of this already. But I know how the weather this fall has gone and it’s made finishing up a lot of the chores around the house harder to complete. I just now got the last of my trees and limbs from the ice storm picked up, so I’m sure there’s others out there that still need to tackle winterizing some of your lawn and garden equipment.

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  • All About Poinsettias

    I have sort of a love-hate relationship with poinsettias. My first taxable job was at a greenhouse and we grew thousands and thousands of them in all sorts of colors. It was very beautiful working there this time of year, but they required lots of hands on labor to move them and tend to them without breaking their fragile stems. The red, green, and white colors of poinsettias make them wildly popular at Christmas time and I’m sure many of you will receive them as gifts or buy them for decoration this year.

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  • Tax law changes for trade-ins

    In the past, personal property that farmers used as a trade-in on a purchased item was treated as a “like kind” exchange. The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act changed the wording to accommodate only real property as eligible for like kind exchanges. Starting in 2018, we will have to treat personal property, such as equipment and livestock, as being sold when a trade occurs.

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