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Pros and Cons of Early Season Irrigation
In a dry spring, early-season irrigation can play an important role in maintaining adequate soil moisture for crop establishment. Nebraska Irrigated Cropping Systems Educator Steve Melvin talks about the benefits and risks of early season irrigation.
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[Brad Mills, Host]
Nebraska Extension Almanac. Current dry conditions across most of the state might make crop producers want to get busy irrigating. Extension educator Steve Melvin says, producers will always need to be ready to start irrigating, but encourages them to be cautious. He says the ground might seem hard and dry, but could be holding water from last fall that goes deeper than the surface.
[Steve Melvin, Nebraska Extension Educator]
Well, I think it's always important to have the center pivot ready to go early in the spring. You know, this time of year, make sure it's ready to go.
We hope not to use it, but if we do need it, it's a great option to have.
Pre-irrigation is something that is not really recommended in Nebraska.
Because of the fact that, you know, even in Western part of the state, we get a couple inches of rain on average in April and probably over 3 inches in eastern part of the state.
Some places have got a little better rain now, and we hope it continues.
But we certainly need to also keep in mind that any field that was reasonably well irrigated last year, probably is watter than you might think.
The top 6 inches or a foot might be really dry, but typically we leave some water out there in the fall.
We don't like pre irrigation all that well because of the fat that we get so much surface evaporation from the, you know, there isn't any crop growing out there.
So we get a lot more than we might think.
[Brad Mills, Host]
Steve says there are specific reasons to start getting water on the field, preplanting. He says hard planting conditions or helping and hydrous ammonia applications, or irrigating cover crops might warrant some spring irrigation.
[Steve Melvin, Nebraska Extension Educator]
The main reason I would consider doing some pre-irrigation is if I just simply can't get my planter to work correctly.
You know, maybe I can't get it to go on the ground is too hard or I can't get the seed V closed or something, then it'd be a good plan to pull out of the field and run the pivot and then come back in a few days when we get, you know, a little better condition.
Another circumstance might be if I put on an anhydrous ammonia application, and haven't gotten a couple inches of rain, since we applied that, ammonia, and particularly if it's a higher rate, like maybe 180 pounds, it probably would be a good idea to put some irrigation water on to help prevent any seed burning, seedling burned back.
Also, if you're got alfalfa or wheat or cover crop or something, you're irrigating.
That's not really pre-irrigation anymore now, but with weight, that you're going to harvest for grain this time of year, just kind of keep it moving along well.
You know, we need to keep it really well watered when we get into the boot stage and grain fill.
And with our alfalfa, it's a little different animal.
It's one that we, if we have it established for more than a year.
We've probably used up all of the soil moisture out there last year, and we couldn't really take this time in April and May to refill the profile, some, and get some water out there before we get into the high water use in the summer.
Also, with cover crops or even weed, if we're growing them for a forage, we probably want to keep them well watered during the vegetative stage to grow the maximum amount of forage.
[Brad Mills, program host]
Steve summarized pre-planting irrigation concerns on today's program. Stay tuned to future almanac programs to hear his irrigation advice for spring post-planting. The entire interview can be watched on the Market Journal program, which can be seen every Saturday morning on Nebraska public media or by watching the Market Journal YouTube channel. For Nebraska Extension Almanac, I'm Brad Mills. Nebraska Extension Almanac is a production of IANR media and Nebraska Extension. For more information on how your university is serving Nebraskans, go to extension.unl.edu.
Rebuilding Fences After Disaster
Nebraska fence law generally requires neighboring landowners to share responsibility for boundary fences, but after a disaster, communication and documentation are especially important when determining who pays for repairs. Nebraska Extension Ag Economist Jessica Groskopf emphasizes that understanding fencing responsibility ahead of time can help landowners resolve conflicts and rebuild more efficiently.
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[Brad Mills, program host]
Nebraska Extension Almanac. The recent wildfires in Nebraska have damaged over 900,000 acres of rural land, and some of that damage was done to infrastructure like fences. It might seem like a simple task to reinstall destroyed fences.
But extension Ag Economist Jessica Groskoff says there are some key issues to consider before rebuilding.
[Jessica Groskopf, Nebraska Extension Ag Economist]
As we think about fencing in particular, I think we have to really go back to Nebraska State statute and look through what it specifically says about fencing.
So Nebraska livestock owners are liable for any damage that their livestock cause when they're trespassing.
If the owner does not use reasonable care to prevent that trespass.
So again, the law does not specifically require livestock owners to fence livestock in, but that's often the most reasonable and practical way for us to prevent them from trespassing on others' property.
So in Nebraska, we kind of go by what we call the right hand rule.
So if I have a neighboring property.
What would happen is each owner would walk to the center of the fence and you would be responsible for the fence to the right of you.
So we call that their right hand rule.
And so that's really what dictates maintenance and rebuilding offenses as we think about this.
However, we know that sometimes, one landowner is more proactive.
So, Just because we're responsible for maintaining and repairing that fence doesn't mean we can't repair the entire fence, but we can ask for reimbursement from our neighbor if we do that.
And I think this is really important as we think about wildfire damage is the fact that we're rebuilding entire fences.
And so we need to understand what type of fence can be built and how we go about building that fence when we have a neighboring property.
[Brad Mills, program host]
Jessica talks about the legal standards for replacing fences after something like a wildfire is damaged or destroyed the previous fence.
[Jessica Groskopf, Nebraska Extension Ag Economist]
So the 1st thing I want to say is that if you don't agree, that's only when these standards apply.
So if you and a neighbor agree to different standards, You can go through those different standards.
If you and your neighbor don't agree.
Nebraska state statute steps in and it says that the fence must be at least 4 wires.
It must be nine, number 9 fencing wire attached to posts, no more than 16.5 feet apart, with a post or a stake between every 2 posts, and the fence must be at least 4.5 feet high, with no more than one foot between the wires measured from the top.
So again, that's in the statute.
That's the minimum fence, according to the statute.
However, if you and your neighbor agree to a different type of fence, you are welcome to build that other type of fence.
[Brad Mills, program host]
Jessica says there are specific steps to take when dealing with an absent landowner when the fence needs to be fixed.
[Jessica Groskopf, Nebraska Extension Ag Economist]
So you must formally serve written notice that you are going to build, maintain, or repair that bordering fence.
If your landowner is an absentee landowner, you must serve that notice to whoever lives on the property or the owner's agent, which is typically their tenant.
And we encourage you to do this probably via registered mail so that you have documentation of that notice.
And then after the written notice has been served, only then can you begin to construct or maintain that fence?
[Brad Mills, program host]
Stay tuned to future almanac programs where Jessica discusses other key legal issues when it comes to rebuilding fences. Today's program was a portion taken from a recent Beefwatch podcast offered by Nebraska Extension. To hear the entire interview, Go to beef.unl.edu, or download from Apple Podcasts or Spotify. For Nebraska Extension Almanac. I'm Brad Mills. Nebraska Extension Almanac is a production of IANR and Nebraska Extension. For more information on how your university is serving Nebraskans, go to extension.unl.edu.
Tips for Establishing Vaccination Protocols
There are several factors to consider when establishing an appropriate vaccination protocol for your operation. Veterinarian and Nebraska Extension Beef Educator Lindsay Waecher-Mead say’s vaccines, combined with good management practices, play a vital role in animal health.
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[Brad Mills, Host]
Nebraska Extension Almanac.
Understanding the principles of vaccination are critical when choosing what product to use, when to use them, and how to ensure the animals get the most benefit. Extension beef educator Lindsay Waechter Mead talks about factors to consider when establishing vaccination protocols for cattle on today's almanac.
[Lindsay Waechter Mead, Extension Beef Educator]
The 1st thing to do would be to have a conversation with your veterinarian, and I think that that's crucial for any plan.
I mean, I'm always gonna promote that for sure, but especially when you're talking about vaccinations.
Because it's really important to remember that vaccines are not one size fits all and the protocol that maybe your cousin has, you know, in a different state or even your neighbor that's like 5 miles down the road may not fit what you need.
And so, starting out before you even think about what vaccines to use.
Um, you know, talk to your veterinarian and discuss some issues that maybe you've had in the past.
Are there certain diseases or conditions that you're really trying to prevent against?
Like have you had problems before?
And even year to year is different.
And so, maybe you had something last year that was new or maybe you've been vaccinating for something that you haven't seen in a long time.
And so, I mean, that could be because of the vaccinations, but again, it may be because the risk isn't quite as high.
And so starting that out with having that valid veterinary client patient relationship is going to really get you started on the right foot.
So, I like to refer to vaccination, like an insurance policy.
So a vaccine is used to reduce risk of disease.
So just like we buy insurance to protect from a tornado or, you know, hail for our house.
A vaccine is going to help to try to prevent any sort of risk that that animal might be exposed to.
So it's not, it's important to remember, it doesn't 100% prevent disease.
And it's, and not necessarily even just like in your herd.
There are animals that will react differently to a vaccination.
So each animal might create a different immune response across your entire herd.
So, remembering that, I think is good, just to kind of give you an upfront.
Now, vaccinations, they go through, you know, research trials and they're going to see how well they are, how, how effective they work and how long the duration works and what type of immunity response those animals get.
And so that also helps lead us in, you know, which vaccine we're going to use.
And there's lots of different options.
I'm not even just talking about brands, but just, you know, maybe route of giving the vaccine or um, what type of pathogen that's inside of it and and what kind of reaction are we going to get in our animals?
So keeping that in mind is going to be good to kind of help you assess on the protocol that you get started to go with.
And then also, the way that the immune system works.
So you think about you get the vaccination and the body recognizes that as something that's not normal.
And so the immune system will start to look at that and say, okay, I need to kind of replicate this and create protection for the next time that I see it.
And so you want to make sure that that immune system is ready to go.
So there's some things that might affect how well the immune system will work, and one of those would be illness.
So if your body is already fighting off something.
So just like if we, If we were sick and we had a fever, maybe we were fighting off influenza, it probably wouldn't be the best time to get an influenza vaccination because your body is already fighting pretty hard to protect itself from what's going on.
And then if you add on another vaccine on top of it.
That might be where you're not going to get the reaction that you would want.
So it's think about your immune system is already kind of preoccupied with the current issue and so you want to make sure that you're vaccinating healthy animals.
So that's really important, especially when we talk about, I mean, at branding time for sure, you know, if you would have somebody that's really sick with scours or you've got maybe an early respiratory thing, you might want to hold off on vaccinating that cap at that time.
And obviously a big time would be like during weaning when we have high stress events, we want to try and decrease the amount of that stress because that also will affect how well the immune system reacts.
So it's just like we want to make sure that the animal is nice and calm and healthy so that it can get the best reaction from that vaccination.
[Brad Mills, Host]
For Nebraska Extension Almanac, I'm Brad Mills. Nebraska Extension Almanac is a production of IANR media and Nebraska Extension. For more information on how your university is serving Nebraskans, go to extension.unl.edu.
Strategies for Early Season Irrigation
Early-season irrigation in a dry spring can help maintain soil moisture, support germination, and protect yield potential by ensuring uniform crop emergence and effective use of inputs. Nebraska Irrigated Cropping Systems Educator Steve Melvin says irrigation decisions should be based on actual soil moisture conditions, not just the calendar.
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[Brad Mills, Host]
Nebraska Extension Almanac. In part one of this discussion of early spring irrigation extension educator Steve Melvin talked about specific reasons to get some water on the ground before planting.On today's program, he focuses in on key irrigation points after the seed has gone into the ground.
[Steve Melvin, Nebraska Extension Educator]
Yeah, so after we plant, I think it's always a good option to think about turning the center pivot on when we pull out of the field.
Um, you know, we always want to think about the costs associated with that.
You know, if we've got a particularly a water allocation, you know, we can't replace that water, you know, money, I guess we can spend a little more on irrigation if we need to, but keep the costs in mind.
And the other thing is, we've got the dry land corners and a lot of fields in Nebraska, particularly in eastern half of the state.
We plant the corners to the same crop that we do on the same pass, where we're going to irrigate.
And so that certainly implies that we need to get a good stand there as well.
So I'd rather put the seed just a little deeper in the ground, if that's what it takes to get good seed to soil contact and good moisture, maybe even use the fur openers and push a little dry soil out of the way ahead of time.
But we're really trying to make sure that we get good seed to soil contact and very good uniform moisture around the seed, particularly with corn.
Ideally, we'd have every plant come up within a few hours of each other with corn.
And so it's very important to have good uniform seed to soil contact and moisture around our plants.
The other thing to keep in mind is a half inch water can incorporate herbicides and some nitrogen that we might put out there as well.
But the logistics of that get to be a little more complicated.
You know, we want to get that moisture on the corn seed right away, but a lot of times it takes a few days to get the herbicide and fertilizer out there.
So then one needs to decide, you know, if you're going to water to get good uniformity of the seed, or if we're going to delay a little bit, think on our seed is simply good enough.
But again, if we do that, we want to make darn sure we get moisture all the way down to moisture soil down below.
We don't want to have, you know, maybe at 4 or 5 inch depth, the really dry layer of soil that our little seedling roots just can't grow through.
So we want to make sure we get enough water on to get clear down into that, you know, so we don't stall out the root system any.
[Brad Mills, program host]
Steve says if current drought conditions continue, encourages producers to pay special attention to precipitation this spring and have an idea of what moisture is already present in their fields.
[Steve Melvin, Nebraska Extension Educator]
Yeah, so after we get the crop established, the seedlings emerged and growing, then really what we want to kind of keep in mind is that with irrigation in Nebraska, we always want to consider it, even on dry years and even in a Western part of the state, that our irrigation is a supplement to our rainfall.
And, you know, we all know that sometimes in April and May and June, you know, we might get 3 or 4 weeks without any moisture, that certainly happens, but we always want to plan on having some good moisture, particularly in May and June.
That's our high rainfall months in Nebraska, and typically we get some during that time.
So, really, what we want to do is base it on them out of sole water, that we have stored in our profile.
So get your soul water monitoring equipment out there early and then keep an eye on it and irrigate accordingly.
We certainly, if we're not going to put soul water monitoring out there, take your soul probe out and see what's out there.
But a lot of times we've got more water than we think for.
And we really need to, you know, focus on trying to keep the right amount of water, but not too much, because we're probably going to get some more, and we don't want to overfill the profile, and deep percolate water, which, of course, that time of year, we're going to take some nitrogen with it.
Sandy soils are particularly problematic because they can maybe only hold two or three inches of water.
And if our crops early, and may aren't using very much water.
So if we keep that soil pretty wet, then we can end up in a situation where, you know, if we catch a nice inch or two of rain, we might deep percolate some water and take some nitrogen pretty easy with that.
[Brad Mills, program host]
Today's program was a portion taken from a recent market journal program. You can watch Market Journal every Saturday morning on Nebraska public media or anytime on the Market Journal YouTube channel. For Nebraska Extension Almanac. I'm Brad Mills.
Nebraska Extension Almanac is a production of IANR media, and Nebraska Extension. For more information on how your university is serving Nebraskans. Go to extension.unl.edu.
Disaster Assistance Programs for Rebuilding Fences
Recent wildfires in Nebraska have caused significant damage to farm and ranch fencing, creating both financial and legal challenges for landowners. Nebraska Extension Ag Economist Jessica Groskopf talks about government programs designed to help farmers rebuild fences after a disasters.
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[Brad Mills, program host]
Nebraska Extension Almanac. On a recent program extension ag economist, Jessica Groskoff detailed a few issues for producers to consider when it comes to rebuilding or replacing their fences lost in the wildfires. On today's program, she continues to discuss key legal issues for fence building. She says, in the case of an absent landowner, written notification of fence repairs required, and encourages farmers to understand the law.
[Jessica Groskopf, Nebraska Extension Ag Economist]
So once you have provided that written notice, then when you go onto the property, I think the most important thing is that you are not allowed to remove trees, buildings, personal property, or other obstacles without the neighbor's permission, or a court order.
The other piece about this is there may be disputes of where the property line actually is, and we highly encourage you to have that property line surveyed in order to make sure that we've put the fence in the right location.
[Brad Mills, program host]
Jessica talks about some of the government programs and cost sharing available to help landowners with the cost of rebuilding fences.
[Jessica Groskopf, Nebraska Extension Ag Economist]
So when we're talking about replacing fence in particular, we're talking about the emergency conservation program, and this program provides between 75% and 90% cost share, for farmers and ranchers, but this cannot exceed half a $1000000 or 50% of the agricultural value of the affected land.
So this program is important and is something that we need to be looking at.
So there will be a sign up period.
It will be for 30 to 60 days.
So work with your local FSA office to make sure that you enroll during the sign up period.
And I think one of the most important parts of this is there is a needs assessment that must be completed by FSA, or in our CS, and you cannot start work on your fencing until that plan or that needs assessment has been completed in order to get the cost share.
So, as much as I think we want to go out and start working on these projects if you are looking for reimbursement from something like the emergency conservation program, we really do need to make sure that we're going through the process of applying and getting the needs assessment prior to beginning work.
Otherwise, we might disqualify ourselves from that reimbursement.
So as we think about this process, I really want you to come up with a strategy of how you're going to apply for these dollars.
It's likely that USDA will not be able to reinverse everyone for the replacement of their fences.
So as we talk about these perimeter fences, you know, starting the conversations now with your neighbors, regarding how that fence is going to be, number one, rebuilt, but number two, how we're going to apply for reimbursement for it, really thinking through some of those interior fences about whether or not they need to be rebuilt or whether we can use new technology or set up our operation a little bit differently to be more efficient.
So all of the articles from UNL extension related to wildfire can be found on our website at disaster.UNL.edu, and that will include this article about rebuilding fences after disaster.
[Brad Mills, program host]
Today's program was a portion taken from a recent beef watch podcast offered by Nebraska extension. To hear the entire interview and read the detailed article, go to beef.unl.edu or download from Apple Podcasts or Spotify. For Nebraska Extension Almanac, I'm Brad Mills. Nebraska Extension Almanac is a production of IANR Media and Nebraska Extension. For more information on how your university is serving Nebraskans, go to extension.unl.edu.