As harvest continues Ellis County Fair preparations underway

On this episode of the Post Podcast Cottonwood Extension District agent, Stacy Campbell shares information about the upcoming Ellis County Fair.

 

Transcript:

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James Bell 

As the wheat harvest kicks into full gear throughout the area, Ellis County Fair preparations are also underway. Stacy Campbell from the Cottonwood Extension District stops by to share the all the details on this episode of the Post Podcast.

 

Stacy Campbell 

Well, of course, fair is just right around the corner. In July, like about the week of I think the 16th through the 20th is the main part of the fair. And so we invite the public to come on out all kinds of all kinds of advanced, you know, it's on the Midway, there's bands each evening, the beer garden, there's gonna they're gonna have the mechanical bull out there, James, you ought to come out and give that a whirl.

 

James Bell 

I love riding a mechanical bull. Yeah, my favorite things truly true. I do. Yeah, if there's one around, you'll see,

 

Stacy Campbell 

they've got one out there again this year. So you need to come out and check that out. So anyway, yes, please come out to the fair and kind of mentioning that the Market Week show, we always have that for farmers. And right now no harvest is going on. So if you've got some really good wheat, just put up, put some of it off to the side and a bucket, you can fill a ziplock bag later, bring it into the office or take it to the elevator, and we'll get that entered into the fair. And there's there's cash in there. There's there's prizes and cash for that. So we encourage farmers to enter though, wheat into the open class wheat show. And then also kind of one of the combinations of the county fair is when the kids at their pre at the premium sale sell their animals and the champion baked goods. And that'll be on that Saturday, I believe it is the 23rd of July. And we invite the public to come out to that there's, there's a lunch or excuse me a supper before at five o'clock, and then the sale starts at six o'clock. And James one of the neat things about that is if people just want to add some money on to a kid, I mean, they don't have to buy the animal or the baked good, but if it's the neighbor kid or, or you know, somebody that they know, in what to support them, they can just add some money on simply just go up to the clerk at the sale and say you would like to put $100 on to you know, John Doe steer or something like that. So you don't have to necessarily buy an animal. And then even if you do come out in one is really support the kids embed on an animal there again, you don't have to buy it, it's a premium sale. So you can literally, you know, be the winning bidder on on a on a pig. And then you do not have to keep the animal, the kid, we have one, two options. And then one of the options is you just give a premium price for the animal. And then the animal is the responsibility of the kids, they can take it back home, take it to the to the butcher or whatever. And then the other thing is most of these kids have gotten butcher dates set up for animals. So if you do want some meat to put in the freezer and you buy one, they probably have a butcher date set up for that animal and can get it to a locker and get it processed the way you want it. So

 

James Bell 

very cool. That's what I was curious about. Because you know, if I wouldn't went out there, I wouldn't have any place to put an animal but some steak I could find some room for Yeah,

 

Stacy Campbell 

right. Right. So yeah, in. And the other thing I mean, if you buy an animal and a lot of people know this, they probably come out and do it. But you don't, you know, you can always half it or quarter it, you know, quarter of a beef with with several other people and stuff like that. So lots of different ways to slice it and dice if you will. So yeah, come on out support the kids at the fair at the sale on July 23 At six o'clock. And just yeah, we invite the public to come on out to a lot a lot of different events. You know, there's a rodeo and, and I didn't bring a schedule many other things. And there should be brochures and posters around town and stuff.

 

James Bell 

So yeah, I've seen those around town already. Are they going to get the wheat in before the fair survey and go out and enjoy?

 

Stacy Campbell 

Oh, yeah, cuz wheat harvest is going on now. You know, we've had plenty of hot windy days. So that really drives the wheat down. So it's been it's been going, you know, kind of cloudy, humid days like this. You know, they may not get much cut today until the sun comes out and the wind starts blowing but the wheat harvest is going on. And yeah, I'm sure they'll probably, you know, unless it happens to start raining quite a bit, they'll probably be done here and another 10 days, two weeks, you know, at the most mentioning harvest just kind of wanted to mention to people here and in town that maybe you're going out to the country. Just keep in mind the columbines the grain carts just gotten bigger and bigger and those farmers literally can't see behind them if somebody is behind them, especially when they have to slow down and they've got to turn at an intersection or whatever. So please be very careful. You know, you're driving 50 6070 miles an hour they're doing 24 miles an hour. You can get up on them really quick and then they can't see you so just just be cautious about that. And I guess also talking about wheat harvest after the wheat harvest, you know, for farmers. As a lot of them know it's getting tougher to control some of these tougher to control weeds so I wouldn't wait too terribly long before you decide to spray your wheat stubble once the once you see some weeds, especially if it's Kosha fireweed or pig we'd probably get them sprayed when they're when they're small, it's going to be easier to kill them. And then another thing is just with these high high input prices, fertilizer this boy this is the year to definitely be taking soil samples. So in August or September before you plant your weak crop, you know I would advise taking a soil sample to see just how much fertilizer you actually need instead of guessing you know,

 

James Bell 

and then dilute dial it in because you might be spending money you don't need to

 

Stacy Campbell 

exactly exactly and it the price of sending off the soul samples and getting them is very inexpensive, it's a it's a great return on your time and investment. You know, I've taken those soil samples, you do need to take them properly we've talked about that, you know in a field it's recommended and there's been research to validate that that you need to take about 15 cores you know whether it be a 10 acre 40 acre 80 acre field, tin, tin city and 15 cores and mix those into a clean bucket and then put about a pint into a bag and then take it to the coop they can send it off to us soils lab where you can bring in and dust and we can send it to a soul slab as well. Very cool. And then I guess one of the things we've got time I've talked about it some but since we are dry and if your pond in your pasture has gone dry, this is a good time if you wanted to to clean it out and dig it out some one little tidbit that so a lot of people don't think of is to take that dirt and put it on the back side of the dam a lot of times you'll see them they clean the pond out and they just put the dirt 1015 feet away from the pond. Well where's that dirt gonna ultimately in backup at in the park? Right on Yeah, we get big rains, the cattle even trumpet and kinda you know all that stuff. So put it on the backside of the dam if you clean out your ponds and then if they're leaking, there's a soil texture test that we can send off some soil does take some coarse around the pond about six inches down. Take several cores about half a dozen, we can send that soul in and see what the texture of the soil is. If it has enough clay in it around 30% or more. But the ponds been leaking. You can probably prevented from leaking by this really packing it good with the sheep's foot roller which we've talked about. So it may just need to be packed well if it's leaking, a lot of people think they need to go put bentonite clay in that's very expensive. Yes, it can work but it's really expensive. But before you do that, yeah, get a soil texture test and see just how much clay you have in the soil. You may have enough to where you just need to really pack it well.

 

James Bell 

Yeah, save yourself some money. Exactly.