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 Southern Plains Farm Show in Oklahoma City April 19-21, 2007, as well as the Tulsa Farm Show held each December. 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.

Leading off was the the Maine -Anjou steer owned by Risa Ridling of the Sentinel FFA, as "Ace" was the Grand Champion Steer and led the parade of 195 premium sale animals. A consortium of five companies stepped up to buy the Grand Champion Steer from Risa for $50,000. That consortium included Express Ranches and Personnel, Chain Ranch, Limestone LLC, Bank of Western Oklahoma and Robyn Promotions. Krista Mathena of Yukon FFA then drove her Grand Champion Barrow into the ring- and State Representative Don Armes auctioned off her animal for $25,000 with the winning bidders being a a partnership of Blue and Gold Sausage and Oklahoma Farm Bureau.

Best Lamb of the market show was led into the ring by Baylor Newcomb of Merritt FFA- and Baylor saw Touchstone Energy Coop pay $23,000 for his animal Finally, the newest of the market animal shows had their top animal in the fourth slot of the afternoon- as Stasha Harp of Kansas FFA saw her Grand Champion Meat Goat fetch $9000 from Farm Credit of Oklahoma, the Oklahoma Meat Goat Association and the Oklahoma Youth Expo. One other animal got to the $20,000 level- and that was the Reserve Grand Champion Steer shown by Tara Heldermon of the Sulphur FFA- her top Crossbred of the show brought that amount after it was auctioned off for $15,000- but then the Oklahoma State Fair added $5000 to their purchase price for good measure- the State Fair and Dorchester Capital bought Tara's steer. You can click below to hear a complete rundown on of the top dozen animals as well as comments from some of those involved in last night's Premium Sale!

Click here for an audio overview of the 2007 OYE Premium Sale.

We mentioned several of those yesterday who were being honored at those ceremonies- and tomorrow- we will have a special feature with Paul Brown of Chickasha and Joe Jeter of Copan who were a couple of the individuals who were honored for being outstanding conservationists in their fields- literally!

We didn't mentioned the five teachers who were honored with special awards for their including conservation in the classroom- awards that were sponsored by Chesapeake Energy. Those teachers included Shannon Chatwin, Tulsa; Shirley Nelson, Talihina; Tracy Leeper, Alva; Jyme Tyner, Chickasha and Nellie Patterson, Edmond. After the ceremonies, we visited with Clay Pope, Executive Director of the Oklahoma Association of Conservation Districts, about legislative priorities that many of his people were carrying to lawmaker's offices as the day progressed yesterday- click below to take a listen.

Click here for Ron's visit with Clay Pope of OACD.

For Oklahoma's spring planted crops- Corn planting made good progress during the week and had reached 18 percent by week’s end, 15 points ahead of normal. Seedbed preparations remained well ahead of normal for corn, peanuts, sorghum, and soybeans. However, cotton seedbed preparations were running well behind normal at 16 percent.

Fertilizer demand remained high this past week as producers applied top dressing to pastures. Pasture conditions showed some improvement from the previous week but a little over two-third’s was rated in the fair to poor range. Warm season pastures had started to show signs of growth but are in dire need of moisture. Topsoil moisture conditions actually improved slightly in the last week- as some of the rain from last weekend was not reflected in the March 12 report. IN fact the topsoil ratings moved from 49% adequate to surplus to 61% in those categories in one week- however, virtually no change noted in the subsoil rating. Of course, the REAL HOPE is that we get substantial statewide rains over the course of this week, which could greatly ease drought worries for a few days anyway.

Click here for this week's Oklahoma Crop Weather Update from NASS

In celebration of Oklahoma’s Centennial Anniversary, this unique Road Trip will cover ground from Oklahoma City, up Route 66 East, down to Muskogee, thru Eufaula, by Catoosa and much more! You won’t want to miss this conference featuring Oklahoma highlights!

Just a few of the stops planned for the weekend include:
Muskogee’s Azalea Festival - The 122 acres of Honor Heights Park boasts 40 acres of manicured gardens, over 30,000 azaleas in 625 varieties.
Rockin L-H Asparagus Farm near Eufaula - Enjoy an authentic Chuckwagon Cookout, followed by entertainment from the Homesteaders (who were a big hit Friday night at the 2006 OFU/AFR State Convention).
Hoepner’s Kiwi Farm - Home of the “Hardy” Kiwi. Featured on such television shows as “Oklahoma Living,” “Discover Oklahoma,” “The Oklahoma Traveler,” and “Is This a Great State or What!”
The Castle of Muskogee - Your Gateway to Another World! The Castle oversees a 60-acre kingdom used for many events, including the Renaissance Faire.
Amish Home Meals - A home-cooked family-style meal served on an Amish farm south of Chouteau.
For more information, contact Mandy at 405-218-5562.

Click here for a complete rundown of the 2007 Oklahoma Farmers Union Women's Conference Road Trip!

According to the President - lawmakers have a responsibility to pass a clean bill. He says they shouldn’t use funding for U.S. troops as leverage for special interest spending for their districts. But rejecting President Bush’s criticism on Monday - House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer of Maryland told Congress it was time to do something more than simply rubber-stamp the President’s request.

Farm state interests that have been promoting an Ag Disaster package believe that this may be virtually the ONLY chance to get a package through Congress and past the President without having to find budgetary offsets. However, the talk of a veto continues to bounce around inside the Washington beltway, especially if the Democratic leadership includes language that puts "strings" on the defense monies.

We have been asked by Joe Benton to Emcee the event- and we look forward to seeing many of you this Saturday in Shawnee. Joe says that you can still get the $7 rate for registration which includes lunch if you send it in before Saturday- Registration at the door will be $10.00- but you still must call and let them know you are coming for the meal count. For details, contact Joe Benton at the Pottawatomie County Extension Office, 405-273-7683.

Meanwhile on April 3, the Western Oklahoma Spring Cattle Conference is on tap in Clinton at Ranchers and Farmers Livestock Auction. One of the highlights of this conference will be a presentation planned by Terry Bidwell of OSU on "Range Management After Drought." Check with your local OSU extension office for details on this conference- being worked on by three counties in the Clinton area.

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