Women in Ag Tour 2014
On August 22nd approximately 60 women participated in the Cape Girardeau County Women In Ag Tour hosted by Cape Girardeau County Soil & Water Conservation District. The ladies started the day at Meier Horse Shoe Pines. This Christmas tree farm is owned by Stephen & Teresa Meier of Jackson who gave a brief overview of the operation before loading the ladies into wagons to head out to the tree fields. Once in the fields, Stephen spoke and showed the ladies the different varieties of trees grown. He also discussed their life span, maintenance, and pest and disease control. He then demonstrated for the ladies how to prune and shape the trees, remove the dead needles, and wrapping the trees for transport. After a brief stop at their retail shop, it was back to the University of Missouri Extension office for some brief presentations.
The first presentation was by Paula Meier and James Hunt in which they briefly described the programs and practices offered by SWCD and NRCS. The next presentation was by Ross Peterson and Emily Scifers of Laughing Stalk Farmstead. Laughing Stalk Farmstead is a Community Sustainable Agriculture (CSA) Farm just outside of Cape Girardeau. Ross informed the ladies of their background and experience in CSA’s. He then went on to discuss how they started their CSA in Cape, how to become a member, and their current member benefits.
Then it was off to SEMO Milling LLC. SEMO Milling was established in 2007 and provides dry corn ingredients to food and beverage companies across the US and throughout the world. They create flaking grits, brewers grits, snack meal, corn meal, corn cones, corn flour and corn bran. They can also mill customized granulation to meet unique specification and offer private label packaging options. In addition to the food ingredient products that they produce, SEMO Milling also produces Premium Hominy Meal which is a high-protein, high-fat feed ingredient used by the livestock, poultry, dairy and pet food industries. For all of these products they use locally grown corn. The ladies were broken up into groups and given a highly descriptive tour of the many aspects of the mill from where the corn first arrives and gets dumped to the finished product and all steps in between.
Farm Day 2014
On April 30th we were fortunate enough to speak to local third graders about soil conservation and streambank erosion. We participated in Farm Day 2013, along with over 800 3rd graders, parents, and teachers at Flickerwood Arena, sponsored by the SEMO Cattleman's Association. Students traveled from one station to another to listen, answer questions, and participate in activities about forestry, port, beef, poultry, corn, dairy, conservation, bees, soybeans, agri-tourism, and received a snack made from some of the products listed above. At the conservation stop, we demonstrated with stream tables the effect that running water can have on soil and why it is so important to conserve soil. Farm day has been very educational for many children the past 19 years, and we look forward to helping continue this benefit by participating in Farm Day 2014 on April 29, 2015!
Check out the you tube video from The Angus Report regarding Farm Day 2014.
SE Regional Envirothon 2014
On April 3rd, the Cape Central Envirothon team traveled to the St. Louis area to qualify for the 16th annual Missouri state competition on May 1st. Unfortuneately, Cape Central was the only team able to compete from the Southeast Region this year. This is a competition for area high schools where they are competing in Aquatics, Wildlife, Forestry, Soils, Current Issues and are required to give an oral presentation. As you can imagine this competition takes a lot of preparation and dedication by the students and advisors. Good luck to Cape Central at the State Competition!
For more information on this event, please contact the office at 573.243.1467 ext. 3.