Local Interest

By Chabella Guzman, UNL PREEC communications specialist

The annual Water Education for Tomorrow or W.E.T. event held on October 5-6, 2023 welcomed fifth graders from nine western Nebraska schools. The event is hosted by ESU13, and students visited nine stations dealing with water at the North Platte Natural Resources Department in Scottsbluff. 

“We try to provide these kinds of learning opportunities for each grade,” said Dave Griess, ESU professional learning coordinator. Water is a science standard of focus for fifth-graders. Among the nine presenters at the event was the Nebraska Extension 4-H presenting on the Importance of Irrigation. 

The 2023 Nebraska Pulse Crops Conference will focus on field peas, chickpeas, black-eyed peas, and other pulses. The conference will be held on Monday, Nov. 20, at the Bridgeport Prairie Winds Event Center in Bridgeport and again on Tuesday, Nov. 21, at the Younes Conference Center in Kearney. 

The event will include morning sessions on agronomy and breeding of peas, soil nutrient management, and diseases. The afternoon sessions will look at nutrition and quality for human foods, trade, crop insurance, policy, and talks by seed and food industry representatives.   

By Cody Creech, UNL Department of Agronomy/Horticulture in Scottsbluff; Amanda Easterly, Department of Agronomy/Horticulture in Sidney; and Brian Maust, Department of Agronomy/Horticulture in Lincoln

The 2023 Nebraska Extension Fall Seed Guide is now available at cropwatch.unl/varietytest. The online guide has details on yield, protein, test weight, ratings for disease characteristics, location summaries, and weather information.

By Jessica Groskopf and Dave Aiken, UNL ag economists 

Some farm leases are not written but are verbal or "handshake" agreements. Because nothing is in writing, the parties may have different recollections of their agreement, making lease disputes more difficult to resolve. The most common legal issue associated with verbal farm leases is how a lease may legally be terminated. For verbal leases, six months advance notice must be given to legally terminate the lease. In contrast, the termination of a written lease is determined by the terms of the written lease. If the lease does not address termination, the lease automatically terminates on the last day of the lease.

Terminating verbal leases

The International Millets Conference will be held Aug. 1-3, 2023 at the Gering Civic Center in Gering. The conference is being jointly presented by the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and Rutgers University as part of the United Nations “International Years of Millets 2023.” 

The conference theme is “Promoting Millets through Interdisciplinary Research: New Varieties and New Markets for a Better Tomorrow!” Topics will include millets production in the U.S. and around the world. There will be presentations by High Plains millets producers, representatives from state government and the U.S. millets industries, millets breeders and agronomists, grain handlers and processors, marketers, and millets products (food, feed, and beverages) developers.

Keynote speakers:

David E. Lott, Horticulture Educator, dlott2@unl.edu

Warm summer temperatures prompt vegetable crops to grow and thrive. Keeping garden vegetable crops hydrated is crucial for these plants thriving as water is essential to the photosynthesis process, plant growth, and production. When water availability is reduced, carbohydrate production in the plant, the building block of plant nutrition, decreases significantly. That decrease leads to reduced growth, vigor, and crop production potential.

Here are some very simple tips to help provide the needed moisture levels in vegetable and fruit crops.

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