Author: Mattea Mitchell
Planning Unit: Hickman County CES
Major Program: Grain Crops
Plan of Work: Improving the efficiency of producers' marketing abilities and production practices.
Outcome: Intermediate Outcome
Our annual Winter Ag Conference focused on two new chemicals and the new label guidelines for them. With 89% of the land in Fulton County in row crop along with 91% in Hickman and 83% in Carlise County the new guidelines for Xtendimax Max and Engenia for soybeans will be a choice farmers will have to make again this year. Crop sales just in Hickman County is $56,841,000. The need for this new information to get out is necessary to our producers. We teamed up with Adult agriculture educators from WKCTC to bring an informational meeting to the farmers on the new guidelines required. The meeting was hosted in Pilot Oak, Kentucky by Lowry Farms. Agriculture agents from Graves, Fulton, Calloway, Hickman, and Carlisle County hosted the Winter Agriculture Conference in Pilot Oak. The program consisted of Corn and Soybean Management with Carl Bradley and Kiersten Wise, Kentucky Weed Control in 2018 with Travis Legleiter, and Life, Death, and Reality: with Dale Dobson. Following lunch there was a separate meeting for the Dicamba training with Travis Legleiter and KDA. 235 farmers and several sponsors attended the morning session. Lunch and door prizes were provided by 18 product vendors on site. The Dicamba session had 100 in attendance. 83% of producers surveyed found that the value of the content presented by speakers was very valuable while 23% said it was valuable. 96% felt the conference as a whole was relevant to their needs. 100% thought the conference was well organized. 81% of producers strongly agreed and 19% agreed that the content was related to current needs of the agriculture industry. Our attendance was one of the best in the last four years.