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Organic rice producers were able to attend two meetings in March about LockDown Liquid use in organic rice, one in Nada and one in Beaumont.  A big thanks to Greg Devillier, Douget’s Rice Mill and Vivian Spanihel, American Rice Growers for arranging the meetings. 

LockDown Liquid is sold by Agricultural Research Initiatives and Kelly Cartwright.  Kelly was able to make the meetings and discuss both how LockDown works and how it should be applied in 2023 to control Northern Jointvetch and possibly other weeds as well.  It’s great to have affordable organic weed control when things get bad! (read a previous post about weed control)

If you are interested in purchasing LockDown Liquid for use on your organic rice acres then we do need to get the orders in soon.  We are shooting for a June application, but this will require an order to be made soon (April 15-May 1).  Cost is $15 per acre and orders require the number of acres to be sprayed (3 liters per acre). 

You can call Greg, Vivian, or myself to place an order and since this is a live organism once ordered it is yours! No returns….just dead weeds!

The form below will make it easy if you want to order LockDown Liquid! Fill it out and click the button and I will get your message. Bob Whitney

Texas has a rapidly growing organic dairy industry, and from 2019 to 2021 saw a large growth of organic dairy herds (+4 herds), peak cow numbers (+8,752 cows), milk volume (+193.4 million pounds), and sales value (+$59.2 million) (USDA NASS, 2022).

Texas holds the top rank for the volume of marketed organic milk (1 billion pounds of milk) with a value of $320.5 million in 2021 and ranks second to California for having the most cows producing certified organic milk (51,444).

Texas also ranks as the top state in three areas; milk sales by volume (1,015,247,902 lbs of milk); average cows per herd at peak (3,430); and milk sold per cow (19,735 lbs), making it an important state for research and extension efforts in organic dairy production.

Where are Texas organic dairies? We have 4 organic dairies in the Central Texas area near Stephenville and the rest are located from Muleshoe to Stratford in far north and west Texas. Organic dairies are required to provide access to grazing a minimum of 120 days during the year and only be fed organically produced feeds. What you may not know is that during the summer most of the grazing is done at night when possible. The cows love the cooler temperatures and so do the dairymen!

Also, did you know that cows need to lay down 12 out of 24 hours. This resting time is for chewing their cud and normal metabolic function. Their daily schedule is:

Eating	3-5 hours (9-14 meals per day)
Lying down or resting	12-14 hours
Standing or walking	2-3 hours
Drinking water	30 minutes

Any other time is devoted to milking and any herd health checkups.

Typically, a cow can be milked in 7 minutes and will be in the parlor area no more than 15 minutes from entering to leaving. Most organic dairies will try to limit pasture distance to less than a mile to help the cow and because of time. Remember there are only 24 hours in a day and every minute counts!!

Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service and the San Saba County Pecan Growers Association will host the annual Pecan Field Day on Monday May 1^st at the San Saba Civic Center, 1190 Thomas Stewart Drive.

Registration will begin at 8 a.m. with the program beginning at 9 o’clock. There will be a $40.00 registration for those who Pre-register and $60.00 at the door. Lunch is included in the registration and will be grilled pork loin, boiled red potatoes and green beans prepared by the District 7 County Extension Agents.

Speakers for this year’s program: Tom Guthrie, Mills County Extension Agent, Sunlight Management in Pecan Orchards; Monte Nesbitt, Extension Horticulture Specialist, College Station will discuss Pecan Integrated Pest Management; Monte will also present Pecan Pathology. Bob Whitney, Extension Organic Specialist, will discuss Pecan Laws & Regs.

Six Continuing Education Units have been approved by Texas Department of Agriculture. These are for those of you with Private, Non-Commercial, or Commercial Applicator License. (3 General, 1 IPM, 2 L&R) This annual Field Day has been well attended for many years. Plan to attend and invite someone interested in the Pecan Industry. Please call to pre-register by noon Friday April 21st. This will enable Michael Palmer to better prepare for lunch. Call or come by the San Saba County Extension office to register or if you have questions. We are on the first floor of the Courthouse east side. (325) 372-5416

March 31-April 1, I was privileged to travel with and discuss organic with some Tarleton State University agriculture students. It was a weekend of organic agriculture with a particular emphasis on organic fruits and vegetables.  I was asked to help out with the tour because I do know a lot of people in both the conventional and organic world of fruits and vegetables and to help talk about Texas organic production in that world.  The Viva Fresh Expo was held in Grapevine this year which is very close to Tarleton State University and Stephenville and so an easy trip to make and lots of fun. The Viva Fresh Produce Expo was created in response to the vegetable/fruit industry’s need for better opportunities to create meaningful networking opportunities that highlight products and build relationships. The Texas International Produce Association and Viva Fresh conduct a special program where they invite college ag students to attend Viva Fresh to learn and meet folks in the produce industry. To say the least, the students from Tarleton were wowed at the Viva Fresh Expo when they saw nearly 3,000 folks on the exhibit floor and talked to hundreds of prospective employers!

On the way to Viva Fresh we were treated to a behind the scenes tour of the Fort Worth Botanic Gardens and the Botanical Research Institute of Texas (BRIT). It was one of the best tours I have ever been on and the staff at the Botanical Gardens and BRIT are super to work with. If you have never, been it is definitely worth the time.

A few months ago, I was contacted by NRCS to help with their organic training program.  NRCS is making a real effort to reach out to organic growers and to offer more assistance both on a personal level and with new programs and services. 

One of the things they wanted to do was to get their local staff out and on organic farms and to meet organic farmers.  The only way to do that is to travel around the state and meet people and so in March we did!  The plan was for me and a few NRCS state staff to travel to the sites and to meet the local staff at the farm.  Any NRCS staff member within 2 hours of the organic farm was invited to travel and spend a few hours visiting the producer and learn about the organic production in their area.

Where did we go? We started out near O’Donnell on the Carl Pepper cotton farm (2nd row). Wow! The way Carl conserves moisture in dry west Texas. Next, we traveled to Central Texas near Dublin to see Henk Postmus’ organic dairy and organic forages done right (3rd row). From there we moved east to Wills Point to see Jamie and Katy Kulesa and Lone Star Organic Dairy (3rd row).  In one week almost a straight-line west to east and the change in scenery was fascinating!

The next week we started off in the Rio Grande Valley at South Tex Organics and talked citrus and onions with the Holbrook’s (top row). The citrus was blooming, and onion harvest was just starting. Traveling north we ended up in Runge to talk regenerative ag and organics in sorghum fields and cattle pastures at the Zack Yanta farm (4th row).  Zack has many great experiences in soil health improvement. Last, we had a great visit with Kenneth Danklefs at Garwood in rice country.  Vivian Spanihel with American rice growers talked organic rice marketing and Kenny gave us a rice field tour and talked organic production (bottom row).

We haven’t made it to the High Plains just yet, but it is on the agenda soon!  It was a great chance to see lots of organic farms and talk to super farmers about organic.  Thanks to everyone who helped.