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Disaster Preparedness
Disasters may not always be top of mind for Nebraska farmers and ranchers, but being prepared can make a big difference. Nebraska Extension Statewide Disaster Education Coordinator Soni Cochran says producers should have plans in place for emergencies that could affect their land, livestock and families.
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[Mike Straub, Program Host]
Nebraska Extension Almanac.
With farming and ranching, comes busy schedules.
Disasters we may face every day are not always front of mind.
Statewide disaster education coordinator for Nebraska Extension, Sawny Cochran, talks about the importance of being prepared for the many disasters producers in Nebraska face, affecting their land, livestocks, and families.
[Soni Cochran, Nebraska Extension Disaster Education Coordinator]
We're talking about being prepared, so planning, preparing and then steps you could take to protect your family, your livestock, and your community.
So we're doing all hazards.
And, yeah, there's been a lot of fires, but it's almost been statewide as well.
So we had some fires early on in Eastern Nebraska, and we're getting into harvest season.
We're gonna want to think about fires and preparedness with our equipment as we get into the fields, as well.
You have equipment that might get hot as you're going down the rows, and sometimes we have leaves, and stalks get up into those combines, and other pieces of equipment.
You know, it could be that you're in an ATV or UTV, and you accidentally happened to drive across really dry grass.
And just because we've had some rain doesn't mean we're still at risk for fires.
So one thing people can do, as well, is when you are, you know, you have a trailer, you have a truck.
Make sure those chains are up, so they're not gonna spark along the concrete or asphalt, and accidentally catch fire as you go along roadways.
Having communications equipment with you, Having a plan, or a map of your farm, or ranch, or acreage.
So first responders know where to go, and that map is located in a place when they enter the property, that they know where the gates are.
They know where the wrists are.
They know where the chemicals are, the fuel is.
You know that bull.
Where is that bull that might be on your property?
So we have a lot of resources we can help people with and talk through.
And, you know, if you're living in a small town, maybe you have a farmer ranch and, you know, your parents are out there.
You're out there, but your parents are in town.
You know, talk about those things as well.
Do you have a quick go bag you can grab?
That's what we're talking about here?
Do you have an emergency kit if there's a flood or tornado, and you've got to be in place for a few days because first responders can't get to you?
Do you have a weather radio?
Do you have, you know, your phones charged?
Do you have that list of, who you can call, and write that down, that number, all our cell phones, have that in our phones as, My son is like, Ben.
Well, that doesn't help me know what his phone number is if my cell phone isn't working.
So it's really important to have all those pieces, no matter where you live.
So I think one of the things that's really helpful is learn about your community, okay?
And check on your neighbors, take care of your neighbors.
I mean, even if it's really hot.
Not today, hot, cold, whatever it might be, you can also, you know, take classes.
So find out where there's a CPR class that you can take, so you can protect your family compute.
You can volunteer.
There's different organizations whether it's, you know, community emergency response teams.
If you get involved with scouting, if you get involved with your American Legion or VFW, whatever it might be, to try and make sure the entire community has those resources, again.
Those first responsors, responders, your emergency manager, your volunteer fire department, they're gonna be busy responding to that, and at the same time, you can take steps to protect your family, check in on neighbors, and think about the emergency plans.
What are the emergency plan for your local school?
Your local faith based group.
Is it your church?
What is their emergency plan?
Where are the shelters in your community?
Figure out all those things ahead of time, and then get engaged with those your emergency managers say, What else can I do to help?
Your county officials, your mayor, you know, they may already have some meetings that the community can join in to all come together to learn how they can better protect their community.
[Mike Straub, Program Host]
For Nebraska Extension Almanac.
I'm Mike Straub.
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.
Profitable Ways to Promote Wildlife and Gamebird Habitat
Turning marginal farmland into wildlife habitat doesn’t always mean giving up income. Nebraska Extension Habitat Management Specialist Andy Little says farmers can find profitable opportunities by using field edges and hard-to-farm areas for wildlife and gamebird habitat.
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[Brad Mills, Program Host]
Nebraska Extension Almanac.
Some farmers might be hesitant to seemingly take away valuable crop land to uses wildlife habitat.
Nebraska Extension Habitat management specialist Andy Little says, there are good financial reasons to protect and promote wildlife habitat.
On today's almanac.
Andy talks about why protecting game birds and other wildlife could be profitable.
[Andy Little, Nebraska Extension Habitat Management Specialist]
So in general, what you hear a lot is, well, if I put in, especially, and I'll use Eastern Nebraska's good illustration.
We have fairly high soul rental rates in this part of the state compared to Western Nebraska.
So if you look in general, across the state, you tend to see more CRP conservation reserve program, uh, lands enrolled out in western Nebraska, southwest and western panhandle, because it's, you know, basically the, there's an opportunity there, this whole rental rates are substantially less than a lot of cases.
And so then it makes sense financially to put those practices in.
Here in eastern Nebraska.
It's a little harder and it's harder for folks to justify with current prices, commodity prices.
And so, um, to answer original question, yes, there's an opportunity there.
And that's really what we're looking at is, is you can build in not only having your main, you know, kind of breadwinner, you know, say corn soy beans, but you can take and strategically target marginal acres where you're consistently losing money by using things like yield monitor data.
So everybody, you know, who's driving a combine in the fall, they get the, you'll monitor data right in the combine.
And so they're seeing those areas that are consistently low yielding.
We can take those areas out of production, put them into alternative practices, and it doesn't have to be necessarily like CRP, because there's only so much money in that bucket, and that's something we're working on right now is actually some, you know, kind of additional stackable enterprises.
Could be grazing acres, it could be hunting lease, could be a, you know, hey, you want to put an apiary out there?
You want to get some bees.
Um, you, really the, the, the sky's a limit on your creativity, but the ultimate goal that we're trying to get at is how do we help people diversify, especially when you're in current situations like with the stuff going on and over in the Middle East, where nitrogen prices now have been really skyrocketed.
Um, and then you have other costs for the farm really skyrocketing.
And so how can we strategically work on diversifying your financial portfolio so that when you do have bad times come in, which inherently it's going to happen at some point or another, whether it's weather, you know, whatever, and there's going to always be challenges like that.
You do have some other streams of income that can help and diversify in your operation, help pay those bills.
So.
One good way for farmers to profit off these techniques is a hunting lease.
Andy says, using problematic areas on the farm, could be a good opportunity to make money from a hunting lease.
So there's there's a couple of different ways that people have done hunting leases.
So one is, um, right now they, the Rescue Parts Commission has the open fields and waters program, and so they basically that program was specifically designed to help open up access, um, across the state, for people who are wanting to be able to hunt, to recreate, hunt, fish, et cetera.
Um, and so people can obviously go learn more about that at their website and there's, they can contact with their local areas.
But the point is, is that yeah, that, um, there, that's an opportunity.
The other opportunity is, um, just simply, hey, I'm, you know, have, if outside of the open fields of water, I just want to take and have a component of my property that I'm not really making much money on, and I can take and put that into conservation program or something else, habitat wise, and I got people want to deer hunt or pheasant hunt or whatever, and then people will pay for it.
You know, we're talking 1000s upon 1000s of dollars, people paid either have a hunting lease, a hunting operation, that they want to be able to come and hunt their recreationally every year.
I see it all the time.
They're actually kind of like the, there's different platforms now.
Some of them are more like the Airbnb experience, if you want to say.
Um, and you kind of say, hey, I want to come hunt these couple of days.
And then, yeah, you're basically paying a landowner for access to hunt their property.
And so, yeah, there's definitely a market.
There's absolutely a big market.
There are lots of money in hunting industry.
[Brad Mills, Program Host]
Stay tuned for future programs where Andy talks about deeznuts program at the university that is studying this issue and using it to help game birds thrive again in this state.
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.
Landscape Watering
Turf, trees, shrubs and ornamental plants all have different watering needs. Nebraska Extension Educator John Fech says understanding how much water each area of your landscape requires can help plants thrive while avoiding unnecessary watering. Knowing your plants’ needs is an important part of good landscape management.
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[Brad Mills, Program Host]
Nebraska Extension Almanac.
Your home landscape is populated with different ornamentals, shrubs, trees, and grass.
Each area needs different amounts of water to thrive.
Nebraska extension educator John Fesch says, watering this fall has never been more important to the health of your plants, and starts off talking about one way to help conserve water.
[John Fech, Nebraska Extension Educator]
Well, first, all landscape plants will really benefit from a woodchip mulch.
The mulch will help retain the soil moisture and sort of even out or moderate temperatures and soil moisture levels, 2 inches of a mulch, extending out, covering the roots, will really, really be beneficial, not piled up against a tree trunk, but over the top of perennials.
And shrubs is a really good idea.
Once you get the mulch in place.
Um, it's important to uh, water when the temperatures are above 40, but the soil is not frozen.
That's kind of the sweet spot there as we go through the middle to the end of fall.
And you can really do a good job if you check the soil moisture before watering.
So you know when it's time to water again.
And a, you know, simple device like a long screwdriver or a dowel or a piece of rebar or something like that works well.
Um, depending on the plant, you're interested in the upper soil moisture about 12 inches or so.
And that works out really well.
And, and when the, the probe comes out and it's dry, then it's time to water.
If it comes out and it's a little bit muddy, then just wait for a few days.
Um, or if it comes out and it's dusty, then you really know it's time to to do the watering.
Different plants need different amounts of water.
John says newly planted trees and shrubs should take priority.
So really, that's a situation where we're looking at prioritizing.
And the new to the landscape plants get the 1st priority, because they're going to be shallow rooted.
And, um, then next from that shallow rooted plants, like maples and birch and linden are pretty shallow rooted.
But the newly planted perennials and newly planted shrubs or newly transplanted shrubs are the ones.
And what we're recommending is a soaker hose.
Um, that way you can, you know, not worry about the in ground irrigation system.
Um, of course, you have to take the hose off the house, you know, when you're done watering so you don't ruin your spigot.
But um, that really helps a lot.
And, you know, a soaker hose.
Here's an, you know, a good indicator, a soaker hose will put up about a gallon of water.
Um, for, for every hour you have it on.
Um, so, but again, every soaker hose is a little bit different, and that's the reason for the screwdriver test, but, you know, about a gallon of water in an hour is a good midpoint for most soaker hose products.
John says it's also important to get some water on plants during warmer winter days.
So really, it's a matter of acknowledging the fact that plants use less water when it gets into the 40s and even when it's into the 30s.
Um, knowing that the plant soil uh, is going to uh, freeze up at some point.
And when it does, then you need to cease watering until it falls again.
But really, it's a matter of putting on what is needed and keeping it moist, but not soggy.
And yes, the tendency is to overwater.
We as humans want to care for things, we're nurturers, and we care for our pets, and we want to care for our plants. Too.
You know, it's it's a real common tendency to treat our plants like children.
And they're not.
So once, uh, you know, once you eat 3 meals a day, you're good and once you keep the soil moist, you're good on that as well.
[Brad Mills, Program Host]
For Nebraska Extension Almanac.
I'm Brad Mills.
Nebraska Extension Almanac is a production of IE&R Media and Nebraska Extension.
For more information on how your university is serving Nebraskans, go to extension.unl.edu.
Wildlife Habitat Research
University of Nebraska researchers are studying wildlife habitat, with a focus on gamebirds such as pheasants. Nebraska Extension Habitat Management Specialist Andy Little discusses findings from the research program and what they mean for creating and managing habitat that benefits wildlife.
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[Brad Mills, Program Host]
Nebraska Extension Almanac.
We've recently had several programs discussing wildlife and game bird habitat creation and promotion on our program.
Extension habitat management specialist Andy Little, returns to talk about a research program at UNL that has been studying wildlife habitat, and says it's a critical part of conservation, as well as something farmers should consider to pursue another line of revenue on their operation.
[Andy Little, Nebraska Extension Habitat Management Specialist]
The research started back in 2021.
And so that project was designed to start targeting, basically, areas within the rainwater basin, so kind of like Grand Island East to Lincoln, the other study areas in northeast Nebraska and about like 8 or 9 counties up there.
And so in each of those sites, we went in and we generated a bunch of, we call them crow count points.
And so basically what that means is there are a bunch of generated points, randomized points in a landscape, and then we send out teams of our students, biologists, et cetera, um, to go out to those points and they're listening for about 3 minutes at each of those points throughout basically the, um, uh, breeding season for pheasants.
So kind of that, I would say basically like the 1st week April, um, uh, into basically early part of June, essentially is kind of the sampling time frame.
And so our team will go to each of those points 3 times and during that window of time, and they would basically listen for 3 minutes and record down, hey, how many birds, how many pheasants am I hearing crowing?
We use all that data on the back end to then start combining that with satellite imagery, of land cover out there in a landscape.
And then we combine all of this stuff together.
And basically a modeling platform, uh, which then allows us to be able to identify and prioritize these folkwareas.
So listeners may be aware of like the focus on pheasant areas, the Nebraska and Parks Commission is established across the state, and that's essentially is kind of further refining them and being able to start building out those, like I mentioned earlier, stepping stones, if you want to say, of saying, hey, you know, are there ways that we can work together with the neighboring landowners, to start building out connectivity to some of these other existing patches, because what happens, and I've had people say this, like, you know, um, you, I put in a practice and I'm not seeing necessarily the return on investment that I expected.
And then you zoom out from the property and you say, well, there's really no connection of other types of, say, grassland and Ford communities that are really scaled out around that.
And so you kind of get what I like to say is an island.
And that island is it's hard and you could have an island and still be productive, but if it's a pretty small island, you know, eventually the birds, you know, you're not going to have a lot of birds moving into and out of that area because they, you know, especially when the crops are off in the fall and winter, because they're a higher risk of predation. And other sorts of mortality as we're going out, say, through an open cornfield.
Obviously in the summer, they can totally move around and about, you know, those fields and stuff.
Um, but one of the things today is, you know, there's not a lot of incentive for a lot of birds to move out into the middle of a field because there's not usually a lot of diversity of insects that are out there or other types of uh, plant communities because usually it's the crop and then the soil.
And so they usually spend a lot of time around the peripheries of those fields.
Ultimately, a couple of the big things come out of that is we basically have identified that strategic targeting of habitat is really, really critical, especially in highly fragmented landscape so we see today.
And that's no different than when we kind of go back into the 60s.
And we say, well, pheasants, they don't they don't need a big, huge block of cover necessarily.
They need mixtures of different cover types on the landscape.
So they do need crop fields, kind of interspersed with those grassland patches.
But those grassland patches can't necessarily be just a thick, you know, uh, or thick dense cover to the point where it doesn't provide any of that brood ring cover that I alluded to earlier because that's where you, that's one of the limitations.
You got to think about kind of the what they need biologically throughout the season.
And so with all of that, it gives us opportunity to start saying, okay, how can we be more strategic with those investments and getting out and meeting with landowners and really engaging to build those kind of complexes, if you want to say out.
[Brad Mills, Program 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.
Pickling
Pickling is a great way to preserve homegrown produce while saving money. Nebraska Extension Educator Cindy Brison says you can safely pickle a variety of fruits and vegetables from your garden. She shares tips for making sure your pickled products are both safe and delicious.
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[Brad Mills, Program Host]
Nebraska Extension Almanac.
Most of our home gardens have given up their produce for the season, and it's always nice to have fresh vegetables for your meals during the season.
One tried and true method of preserving your homegrown produce is pickling.
On today's almanac, extension educator, Cindy Bryson talks about how to safely pickle just about anything that comes out of your garden.
[Cindy Brison, Nebraska Extension Educator]
So pickling is preserving by using an acid, and it's usually some form of vinegar.
So you can make quick pickles where you, for example, you make pickled onions, you mix vinegar and a little sugar and some salt, pour them over sliced onions, put them in your fridge, and within a couple hours, you have pickled onions, cheese and your pork sandwich.
Um, they last, you know, they probably last about a week in your fridge and they're okay.
You can do pickles the same way quick quick refrigerator pickles.
We mix up the brine, you pour them over the the spiced cucumbers, you leave it in the refrigerator for a couple days, and and then you have quick pickles, but again, they're not gonna last, you know, all year long.
We make fermented pickles where people put them in crocs, and they um, you know, let them ferment for long periods of time and then they can them or they or they just can pickles, but the biggest thing, use fresh produce, nothing damage, make sure you're using 5% acidic vinegar, doesn't matter if it's white vinegar, could be flavored vinegar. That's fine.
The most important part when you're pickling is that you're using 5% acidic vinegar.
Um if if it's not, it's not going to be safe.
Um, the ingredients you use are important so making sure that you use fresh produce use pickling salt when you're when you're pickling.
If you use table salt, it'll still work, but because of the iodine in the table salt, it's gonna make your pickle brine very cloudy, and it's not gonna look pretty and you're gonna think that they're not okay.
Use pickling salt. Be just fine.
Making sure when you're canning you're using the appropriate headspace.
So once you put your pickles in and you put your liquid in, you know it tells you to leave X amount of headspace at the top.
Follow the directions, if you leave too much or too little, um either the jar won't seal or you will have something that is unsafe, so make sure you, you're following again, following a research based recipe.
Never alter the amount of vinegar, food or water proportions.
Um making sure that you know you're you're following those because you're setting up a certain pH inside your jar and you want it to be saved.
Make sure your jars are in good shape before you use them run your finger around the top.
Are there any small mix or chips in it?
Have you put pickles in before or other things and run a knife down the side of your jar to make sure you got all the air out?
Are these, are your jar scraped?
Sometimes those grape marks on the inside of your jar can cause them to crack during a food preservation and you don't want that to happen either.
Making sure that you're cutting off the blossom end of your cucumber when you're making pickles.
Um, if you don't, the blossom in releases an enzyme that actually softens your pickle, which is the biggest complaint we get.
People don't want they want crispy pickles like they're buying plastic pickles at the grocery store.
Well, when you can pickles at home, they're not going to be that way, but there are things you can do to me- help make them crisper.
Um, you can use soft water, soft water helps with firm pickles.
Um, we don't recommend pickling lime or necessarily alum anymore.
Refrigerating your pickles prior to opening them can help with the crisp crispness too.
There are some commercial firming agents out there.
You can buy, but these are all things that you want to again, follow the follow the instructions, making sure you're doing them um, appropriately and um, and following, following a research based recipe.
[Brad Mills, Program Host]
For more pickling recipes, visit UNL's food website at food.unl.edu.
That's food.unl.edu.
For Nebraska Extension Almanac.
I'm Brad Mills.
Nebraska Extension Almanac is a production of IA&R media and Nebraska Extension.
For more information on how your university is serving Nebraskans, go to extension.unl.edu.