Coming Events
June 9, Sewing Fun: Perfect Pillow Cases, 9:00 a.m. and 1:00 p.m. 4-H Building, York
June 10, Fashion Fabric, 1:00 p.m., 4-H Building, York
June 11, Photography Workshop, 9:00 a.m. 4-H Building, York
June 11, Leafing Out Workshop, 2:00 p.m. 4-H Building, York
June 11, Quality Assurance Training, 6:30 p.m., York FFA Classroom, York
June 12, Revolutionize your Style Workshop, 9:00 a.m. 4-H Building, York
June 15, Creating with Mosaics, 1:30 p.m. 4-H Building, York
June 16, Creating with Mosaics, 1:30 p.m. 4-H Building, York
June 18, Iris Folding, 1:30 p.m. 4-H Building, York
June 19, Pizza Pizzazz, 9:30 a.m. 4-H Building, York
June 22. Unique Batiki, 9:00 a.m. 4-H Building, York
June 22, Unique Batiki, 1:30 a.m. 4-H Building, York
June 22, Extension Board Exec. Meeting, 8:00 p.m. Extension Office, York
4-H Enrollment & Livestock Identification Deadlines
We are still taking youth 4-H enrollments! If you’d like to join and want to participate in the 4-H events at the York County Fair, youth need to be enrolled by June 15th. Contact us at 402-362-5508 for information or go to our website: http://york.unl.edu/county4h for enrollment details.
Livestock exhibitors, breeding beef, market swine, market lambs breeding does, breeding sheep, feeder calves, market goats and rabbits must be completed by midnight Monday June 15th! Ownership affidavits for dairy heifers, dairy cows and dairy goats must be turned in to our office by Monday, June 15 and then we will submit them on to the State 4-H Office by Monday, June 22.
Additionally if you’re entering animals that need DNA samples they also must be in by June 15th, so all livestock exhibitors check to make sure you have all the paperwork completed.
Finally a “face to face†Livestock Quality Assurance certification meeting is scheduled for this Thursday, June 11, at the York High School FFA classroom, starting at 6:30 p.m. The FFA classroom is located at the middle shop door on the east side of the high school building. Watch for signage at the school. This session will meet the 4-H and FFA livestock exhibitor requirement for youth to complete Livestock Quality Assurance Certification for 2015. There will be a $5 per youth member certification fee payable at the door.
This face to face session and the Online Livestock Quality Assurance course and tests are the only two ways to meet LQA Certification for 2015 for youth food animal programs. State requirements say that LQA Certification must be completed by June 15, 2015.
LQA certification is required for youth to be able to exhibit and market livestock and/or food animals at county fairs, the Nebraska State Fair, the Ak-Sar-Ben Livestock Show and most other youth livestock shows. The animal species list includes: market beef, breeding beef, bucket calf, feeder calf, dairy, market meat goats, breeding meat goats, market sheep, breeding sheep, poultry, rabbits and swine.
If you have not completed the training yet, time is running out!
Cropping Update
We’ve been sounding like a broken record. It’s been another wet week, I reported nearly 3.5†of rain this past week and the official York report is 4.05†for the month which is a little above our normal rainfall for the month. The official May report was 5.22â€!
I know we had considerable low land flooding, but hopefully most of the water had or is draining off. I’m not aware of a lot of hail damage as a result of the storm. Check out the latest issue of CropWatch at http://cropwatch.unl.edu.
They’ve posted these stories as a result of all the heavy rains this past week:
• Corn and Soybean Survival in Saturated and Flooded Fields
• Early Season Flooding and Soybean Survival
• Strategies with Delayed Soybean Planting
• Assessing Corn Replant Options
• Hail Damage to Corn (EC126)
• Hail Damage to Soybean (EC128)
• Late Planting Provisions for Crop Insurance
• Nebraska Extension Flood Resources
Hopefully you won’t need the information, but just in case.
Because of all the rain, the ETgages I’m monitoring dropped by an average of only 1.20†this past week. The earliest planted corn I’m monitoring is at the V6 stage. The Soybeans are V1 and Milo just emerged. I’ll update my ETgages weekly. .
I plan to share this info each week, but you can also check out the York Automatic weather station daily info you can at: http://water.unl.edu/cropswater/nawmdn. Then click on our Online ETgage, York County and the blue balloon.
If you have an ETgage, I really appreciate it if you could post your readings/growth stage each week.
Flooding/Disaster Resources
Hopefully you did not have any major flooding, but I know of a few situations that they did. If you are looking for those resources go to: http://flood.unl.edu/.
The flood.unl.edu site has information about:
Well Water Safety After Flooding
Preparing a Home Which Will be Flooded
Preparing to Evacuate a Farm / Ranch
Equipment for Entering and Cleaning Flood-Damaged Property
Managing a Private Drinking Water Well Before, During, and After a Flood
As well as links to the Nebraska Emergency Management Agency.
The Extension Disaster resources website is: http://www.extension.unl.edu/disaster-recovery. It too has links to several very useful information.
Speaking of Disaster preparedness, Ashley Mueller, Extension Educator that is working in the area of Emergency Preparedness did a great job Friday morning teach 12 youth about the topic. Hopefully we’ll see some of the Emergency Preparedness kits at the York County Fair in August.
Nebraska LEAD Applications Are Due June 15
This will be my last reminder, you’ve only got one week to get your Nebraska LEAD (Leadership Education/Action Development) Group 35 application in!  We’re looking for up to 30 motivated men and women with demonstrated leadership potential.
The Nebraska LEAD Program is designed to prepare the spokespersons, problem solvers and decision makers for Nebraska and its agricultural industry. The program will consist of monthly three-day seminars throughout Nebraska from mid-September through early April each year, a 10-day national study/travel seminar and a two-week international study/travel seminar.
Seminar themes include leadership assessment and potential, natural resources and energy, agricultural policy, leadership through communication, Nebraska’s political process, global perspectives, nuclear energy, social issues, understanding and developing leadership skills, agribusiness and marketing, advances in health care and the resources and people of Nebraska’s Panhandle.
Applications are due by June 15 and are available via email. Please contact Lauren at lszalkiewicz2@unl.edu. Those interested can also request an application by writing Room 318 Biochemistry Hall, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, 68583-0763 or by calling 402-472-6810. For information about the selection process, visit http://www.lead.unl.edu.
Yard and Garden
Last Friday we had about twenty 4-H members that spent either the morning or afternoon recycling old pallets into pallet planters. I want to thank the lumberyards for providing the pallets to us and Orscheln Farm and Home for providing the potting soil. One thing I learned is that a full pallet of soil and water is very heavy, so I cut them down to a more manageable size. We’ll see how they grow, but hopefully we’ll have lots of recycle pallet planters at the fair?
I’ve received a few questions about ash and maple leaves that are curling and dropping off. I’m not sure in all cases, but several that I’ve looked at the trees have a disease known as Ash Anthracnose. We often see it following cool wet springs. This spring has been very good for a fungus that causes anthracnose on ash and maples. Anthracnose is just a big word for a number of diseases on trees and shrubs that result in blotchy black or brown lesions on leaves, deformation of leaves around the lesions, and complete defoliation in severe cases. These diseases are specific for the kind of tree they infect, so anthracnose of oak will not be a problem for ash, and anthracnose of ash will not spread to sycamore, but these fungal pests are all related, the symptoms and conditions are similar, and the management is the same for most anthracnose diseases of trees.
When selecting landscape tree, check for resistant varieties available for planting. We typically do not recommend fungicide sprays or injections because these diseases seldom cause a serious problem, and adequate coverage is very difficult to achieve on a mature tree. The Iowa State University Extension bulletin Anthracnose of Shade Trees (PM 1280) gives some good information on ash anthracnose, including details about fungicide applications. It’s available in pdf form at: https://store.extension.iastate.edu/Product/pm1280-pdf
Have you been keeping up mowing and following the 1/3 rule? I’ve been seeing several lawns that have whitish tops? Typically it’s either a dull mower bale or your removing more than 1/3 of the leaf surface. Both are hard on your turf. I’ve been mowing about every six days and have been recycling the clippings which helps seed up mowing and cuts down on fertilizer needs. For the latest turf information check out http://turf.unl.edu.
How is your garden doing? Most of my veggies are going well except my squash and cucumbers. I’ve planted them twice and will interplant a few more. Now that the soils are warming up I’m guessing they’ll start to do better.
I have not seen any of the cabbage worms yet, but I’m guessing they’ll be on the way soon. My first broccoli and cauliflower and starting to shoot head and the peas are blooming, so it won’t be long. The radishes, lettuce/spinach and green onions have all done well.
It’s also time to make fungicide application to tomatoes and peppers to keep they leaves from becoming diseased. Also mulching to keep the soil (or a guess I could say dirt) off the leaves will help reduce leaf spot disease on your tomatoes.
I’m looking forward to our PalletPlanter sessions we’re doing this Friday. We’ve got 17 young people planning to recycle pallets into some type of planter. Should be fun!
Let me know if you have questions I could address in this column. I’d be glad to do that!
4-H Extension Educator Position
As many of you know, Eileen Krumbach retired the end of May and we’ve Elizabeth Peterson helping coordinate the 4-H and Family programming and 2015 York County Fair efforts.
I just received an email that the position has been released to be filled. Information about this position is posted at: https://employment.unl.edu/postings/45016. If you know someone that might be interested in this position, please share this information with them.
Hopefully we’ll have some great candidates apply!
