As Farm Bill informational meetings concluded this week, the big take home message was: there are a lot of farms to get signed up before the March 15th deadline. For the record, the 60 days was January 15th, and doesn’t account for weekends – making the deadline much closer than we’d like to admit! To help you with program election decisions, a number of resources have been made available from the K-State Agricultural Economics Department.

The first is a ‘tradeoff’ spreadsheet. It compares potential 2019/2020 ARC county level payments with PLC payments for every state, county, and covered commodity for which FSA has released data. Want to know where you might start to see an advantage to one program over another? This spreadsheet is a visual representation showing when each program might pay.

The second are publications that provide Marketing Year Average (MYA) price projections from several sources. One publication shows projections from K-State, with data on year to date grain sales. For example, when confirmed for December, we’ll know a price on almost 40 percent of the year’s corn sales as it pertains to the MYA price. A second publication adds projections from multiple USDA sources and the Food Animal Policy Research Institute at the University of Missouri, including prices for the next marketing year.

If you want to run calculations yourself, the site includes links to online tools from the University of Illinois and Texas A&M plus a link to the Illinois spreadsheet comparison tool. Both will help you sort out the potential payments under each program.

Slide sets and publications shared at previous Farm Bill meetings are posted on the site, including a frequently asked questions publication and another that outlines terminology used in the Farm Bill. Yield update spreadsheets and a spreadsheet to show what payments were made during the last Farm Bill cycle are available as well.

The ‘one stop shop’ for Farm Bill information can be found at www.agmanager.info . Select the Ag Policy tab and 2018 Farm Bill Resources. Need help with navigation – or want to chat about election options? Contact a District Office or e-mail me at [email protected] .

Horticulture Workshop – February 3rd

The first of a set of quarterly horticulture informational workshops is kicking off the 2020 season on Monday February 3rd at the Delaware Township Library in Valley Falls. The free workshop will run from six to eight p.m. and is open to adults and youth ages twelve and older.

We’ll kick off with in introduction to soils and hit on topics through the evening like composting and starting plants from seed. We’ll even have a presentation on good bugs and bad bugs to help you sort out what might be a ‘keeper’ in the garden, versus something you’d rather get rid of. Local Master Gardeners and Extension personnel will lead the sessions.

RSVP’s are requested by Friday, January 31st so we can get a count for handout materials. For details or to register, contact the Oskaloosa Office of the Meadowlark Extension District at (785) 863-2212 or e-mail me at [email protected]