From: Ron Hays [ron@oklahomafarmreport.com]
Sent: Wednesday, November 29, 2006 06:52
To: ron@oklahomafarmreport.com
Subject: Oklahoma's Farm News Update
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Oklahoma's latest farm and ranch news
Your Update from Ron Hays of RON for Wednesday November 29, 2006
A service of Midwest Farm Shows
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-- Rain and Colder Weather arriving- How much moisture is the big question.
-- LAGP exceeds 1.4 million animal units- ODAFF working on inputting all the last minute applications!
-- Tulsa Farm Show will feature OSU Seminars
-- What about using the Bangs program for Animal ID?
-- Mark Keenum of Mississippi nominated to take the spot vacated by Dr. J.B. Penn of USDA
-- The Single Desk Trading days of AWB appear to be numbered.

Howdy Neighbors!

Here's your morning farm news headlines from the Director of Farm Programming for the Radio Oklahoma Network, Ron Hays. Our email this morning is a service of Midwest Farm Shows, featuring the Tulsa Farm Show December 7-9, 2006 and the Southern Plains Farm Show in Oklahoma City April 19-21, 2007. Check out details of both of these exciting shows at the official website of Midwest Farm Shows by clicking here.

If you have received this by someone forwarding it to you, you are welcome to subscribe and get this weekday update sent to you directly by clicking here.


Rain and Colder Weather arriving- How much moisture is the big question.
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As I write this on Wednesday morning, it's 19 degrees in Boise City and 69 degrees in Poteau- even more amazing is the difference of almost thirty degrees between Enid and Oklahoma City as we wait for the Arctic blast to arrive.

There has been a Winter Storm Warning issued for six pm this evening through early Friday morning for northeastern Oklahoma and northwestern Arkansas- which means that significant amounts of freezing rain, sleet, snow and ice are being predicted.

Unfortunately, this system will not offer much moisture to north Central and northwestern Oklahoma- in Alva, where it's already below freezing on this Wednesday morning, amounts of snow will likely be an inch or less. The coldest temperatures are still expected by early Friday morning before we begin to shake off this Arctic steamroller rolling across the nation.

Click here for the latest temperatures across the state from the Oklahoma Mesonet


LAGP exceeds 1.4 million animal units- ODAFF working on inputting all the last minute applications!
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As of yesterday afternoon, there are now 1,447,228 animal units that have been entered into the Oklahoma Department of Agriculture's computers- coming from a total of 11,813 applications. Jack Carson with the Department says that it has proven to be a massive project to handle the workload of taking the Block Grant dollars from Uncle Sam and accept the applications to provide a small amount of assistance for forage losses here in 2006 by livestock producers.

Based on the current number of applications in the computer so far- each application has averaged around 122 animal units and those animal units are currently worth $4.49 That number will fall as there are still applications to input as the Oklahoma Ag Department was literally swamped on that last day they accepted applications on the 20th of November.

It may be next week before they have them all in place- and that's when the random selection for auditing applications will begin. Carson tells us that around 5% of the applications will be selected randomly for the audit to verify they qualify for the federal dollars. The hope is to have checks cut and in the mail before the end of the year.


Tulsa Farm Show will feature OSU Seminars
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Two seminars are being planned by OSU Extension at next week's Tulsa Farm Show in Expo Square. On Thursday, Dec. 7th. at 1:00 p.m. the first seminar will be on Forage Production and Surviving Weather Cycles with Bob Woods, OSU Area Extension Agronomy Specialist, Northeastern Oklahoma.

On Friday Dec. 8th at 1:00 p.m. the second of the two seminars will be on Vaccine Decisions for Stockmen with Dr. David Sparks, DVM. OSU Area Food Animal Health Specialist, Northeastern Oklahoma.

The Tulsa Farm Show is in its 13rd year- and this year it happens December 7th through the 9th. Admission and parking are free.


What about using the Bangs program for Animal ID?
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We have an animal disease traceback system for at least our breeding animals in this country already in place- so Dr. Max Thornsberry of Missouri says why not use the Brucellosis Testing program as the base got an Animal ID platform.

He tells us that R-Calf has sent a letter to Secretary of Agriculture Mike Johanns making this recommendation. He contends that the cost to the producer would be no more than what we now pay for the current program- and that since the infrastructure is already in place- why reinvent the wheel and add lots of cost when we have a system for animal disease traceback already working?

You can hear a portion of our interview with Dr. Thornsberry by clicking below. I will be interested in talking with some folks like Dr. Becky Brewer (our state Vet) to see if this concept has legs or not.

Click here to listen to Ron talk with Dr. Max Thornsberry on Animal ID


Mark Keenum of Mississippi nominated to take the spot vacated by Dr. J.B. Penn of USDA
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In something of a surprise- the Bush Administration has nominated a staunch supporter of cotton and rice subsidies to take the place of Dr. JB Penn who left USDA earlier this year to become the Chief Economist for Deere and Company. Dr. Penn was the Undersecretary for Farm and Foreign Ad Services.

Keenum has been the long time ag aide to Senator Thad Cochran of Mississippi. His nomination will be considered by the Senate Ag Committee in a hearing next Wednesday. His nomination has the support of a wide range of farm groups- from American Farm Bureau to the National Farmers Union. The groups call on Congress to quickly confirm Keenum so he can participate in the development of the Bush Administration's development of their position on the 2007 farm bill, as well as to help defend current ag programs before the World Trade Organization.

The groups add they believe that Keenum can work well with a Democratically controlled house from within the Republican administration. He has been involved in helping craft the last three farm bills.


The Single Desk Trading days of AWB appear to be numbered.
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The Australian Wheat Board, now known as AWB, Ltd. faces a very uncertain future now that an Australian Blue Ribbon panel has confirmed that the organization paid out over 221 million dollars in kickbacks to Iraq when Saddam was in power in order to control the sales of wheat into that country under the U.N. sanctioned Food for Oil program.

Prime Minister John Howard of Australia told reporters earlier today in Canberra that "the status quo can't remain" as he spoke of the AWB scandal. The US Wheat industry has long been critical of the lack of transparency of wheat deals made by both AWB as well as the Canadian Wheat Board- and are hopeful that the export trade in Australia will move away from the "single desk" concept.


Our thanks to Midwest Farm Shows for their support of our daily Farm News Update. Go to their website at the link at the top of today's email for more information on either the Tulsa Farm Show or the Southern Plains Farm Show.

We also invite you to check out our website at the link below to check out an archive of these daily emails, audio reports and top farm news story links from around the globe.

Click here to check out WWW.OklahomaFarmReport.Com



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