High

49°

Partly sunny. Highs in the upper 40s. Southeast winds 5 to 10 mph.

Geary County Extension Agent Chuck Otte reports that the National Agricultural Statistics Service has released details on the 2017 Geary County winter wheat crop.

Geary County raised the fewest acres of wheat ever, dating back to 1901. The 6,250 acres of wheat harvested was lower than the previous low of 8,500 acres grown in 2010. Crop production in Geary County has been slowly moving away from wheat in favor of soybeans and corn due to herbicide resistant technologies and improved drought tolerance allowing soybeans and corn to be more profitable than wheat.

Winter wheat acreage started dropping in the mid-1980s with a loss of approximately 5,000 acres every ten years. Additional downward pressure due to economics pushed acreage down substantially when the 2017 wheat crop was planted in the fall of 2016. It appears that acres planted this fall was up however. The most acres of wheat ever grown in Geary County was in 1938 when 47,840 acres were harvested.

While the acreage planted was down, yield was very good. At 58.3 bushels per acre it was well over the ten year average yield of 44 bushels per acre. The highest county yield was in 2003 with an amazing 71 bushels per acre. The lowest county yield was 11 bushels per acre in 1925. The drought ravaged crop of 1989 came close to that with a mere 11.6 bushel average yield.

Total wheat production in 2017 was 364,600 bushels (21.9 million pounds). This was well below the ten year average, but not a record low production. The record low production came in 1912 when 210,886 bushels was produced in Geary County. The most wheat ever produced in Geary County was in 1990 when 1,187,200 bushels of wheat were produced. Geary County has produced
over one million bushels of wheat 12 different times. The first time was in 1937 when 1.09 million bushels was grown. Most recently we exceeded one million bushels in 2003. Given the changes in crop production we may never exceed one million bushels of production again.

Chuck Otte
County Extension Agent, Ag & Natural Resources

MANHATTAN —Manhattan Town Center, in partnership with Navy Federal Credit Union, will announce the winner of the $500 Manhattan Town Center shopping spree as part of the Military Appreciation Weekend event held Saturday and Sunday.

The presentation is scheduled for 2:30p.m. Thursday, December 21, in front of Manhattan Town Center’s large tree at Center Court.

 

 

MANHATTAN, Kan. – The Kansas State University Department of Animal Sciences and Industry has named Larry Benyshek as its distinguished alumnus of the year, recognizing a notable career as a researcher, professor, university department head and entrepreneur.

 

Benyshek, who now lives in Junction City, Kan., retired in 2002 as the department head of dairy sciences at the University of Georgia, where he had taught at Georgia since 1976. He had also previously taught at Fort Hays State College, and worked for the North American Limousin Foundation.

 

With a vision for the beef cattle industry, Benyshek led a team of scientists that provided research and genetic evaluation for several major breeds of beef cattle in the U.S., Canada and South America. He eventually created Benyshek and Hough Consulting Services where he now serves as president. He has presented research results in several states and countries and is widely known for spreading the expected progeny difference (EPD) concept.

 

EPDs are an evaluation of an animal’s genetic value, taking into account such factors as potential growth, reproductive ability and carcass value.

 

Raised on a general livestock farm in Republic County, Kansas, near Agenda, Benyshek earned his bachelor’s degree from Kansas State in 1969, and later the masters and doctoral degrees in animal breeding at Virginia Tech.

 

Because of his contributions to beef improvement, Benyshek received the Beef Improvement Federation’s Continuing Service Award in 1986 and the Pioneer Award in 2001. The American Society of Animal Science presented him with the Animal Breeding and Genetics award in 1994.

 

“Larry is a leader in the genetic evaluation of beef cattle,” said Ken Odde, department head for animal sciences and industry at Kansas State. “He played a key role in the development of EPDs and in making EPDs a widely used selection tool in the beef industry.”

 

Benyshek and his wife, Isabella, have five children and two grandchildren.

 

 

Angie Stump Denton
Kansas State University Department of Animal Sciences and Industry
Communication Coordinator

The C. L. Hoover Opera House is hosting an open house today ( Tuesday ) from 4-6 p.m.

The public can join the staff for some hometown Christmas cheer.

Issues ahead in the upcoming 2018 Kansas legislative session and the needs for county governments were on the table for discussion at the Geary County Office Building on Monday. Area state legislators met with the members of the county commission and other elected officials and department heads.

State Senator Jeff Longbine noted the key objectives of the county are similar those of the legislators. “And that is that the State needs to provide the funding and the services that our residents need, our state and local governments need, whether that’s highway funds. One area that is particular disturbing right now is how the State’s taken care of mental health, and how that’s falling back on the counties because of lack of funding at the state level.”

State Representative Lonnie Clark said one of the big concerns heard from the county involved auditing of elections that has been considered at the state level, “and the amount of money that it would cost the counties to get the equipment to do the auditing.”

State Senator Tom Hawk and State Representative Dave Baker also participated in the meeting.

High

55°

Mostly sunny. Patchy fog in the morning. Highs in the mid 50s. West winds 5 to 10 mph shifting to the northeast 5 to 15 mph in the afternoon.