Thursday, May 23, 2013

The fun has begun...



Hello fellow interns!! I hope everyone is having as great of an experience as I have been having these past couple of weeks!  Last week my week started off to be very busy going around the county checking out disease problems in tobacco greenhouses. Whenever my Ag and Natural Resources Agent, Gary Carter, told me what we were going to be doing I was really excited, because I have helped raise tobacco plants for a few years now and I always enjoy seeing how others raise their plants and learn about different diseases that are present.  We went to one farm that had a bad case of bacterial stem rot and another farm had pythium root rot getting started in their greenhouse.  We were able to give them some recommendations on how to correct the problems and later in the week we went back to check out how the plants were recovering (and all seemed to be getting better!)  After all of the greenhouse visits calmed down we served a lunch to the local hospital staff with the Harrison County Beef Cattle Association.  All the doctors, nurses, and staff were very appreciative of our all BEEF menu that we served!

On Wednesday I had a little change in pace for a day where I went to Environmental Camp with our 4-H Agent, Mike Meyer.  I enjoyed hanging out with the kids and learning a little bit about Falconry through a program that was held there at camp.  

This week I have been involved in planting a test corn plot for our county in which we planted 20 different varieties of corn to see which ones do best in Harrison County. Toward the end of June we will be holding a field day at the farm our test plot is planted, so the farmers throughout the county can see the differences in the corn and it will hopefully be helpful to them in coming years to decide which corn will yield best for typical Harrison County soil.  I have definitely had my fair share of working on some equipment the past couple weeks, anything from seed drills to corn planters as well as working on the jacks that hold the equipment up.  

I have also done quite a bit inside the office such as stuffing newsletters (literally thousands) into envelopes, attending several evening meetings with different boards, picking on the office staff, and doing some research for my summer project.  Speaking of my summer project, I am writing a publication on how to care for your home lawn in Harrison County.  We get several calls especially in the spring time about how to fertilize, what needs to be used to treat different weed problems, etc.  Being a Horticulture major, I thought it was fitting to make a publication that would help answer some of those questions in an easy to read, and user friendly publication.  So far everything has been going smooth with the research and is coming together nicely!

Until next time,
Jessica Brown

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