All posts by joeyande

Delaware’s Green Industry

Delaware’s green industry brung in a crazy $21,774,000 in the year 2014. People involved in the industry consist of producers,retailers, landscapers as wells several others. In the industry, containerized nursery products lead at a whopping %62.4. In the means of grower sales nursery crops produce $8 billion and floriculture crops produce $4.8 billion. Over the years, DE cash recipients of greenhouse/nursery has risen from $16,615,000 in 2008 to $21,774,000 in 2014. Some of the green industry’s retailers compose of garden centers, East Coast Garden Center or Ronnys Garden World. While most of the percentage of household bought items consist of 51% also mentioned in the presentation was DELDOT, the largest landholder in the state of Delaware. There job is too maintain along railroads or maintain invasive weeds throughout our state, keepin it looking  at a ugh standard. One thing that really caught my eye was the use of trees or plants used as windbreakers or privacy screens for poultry house.

De Horse Racing Industry

Horse racing is one of the worlds oldest sports first starting in the 12 century, when in 1665 British settlers brought to america and the first horse track in the U.S was in Long Island .Now in today’s world there is 9.2 million horse in the world, with a total of 2 million people owning horses. Horse racing is a huge economic producer  $102 billion impact on the economy. Delaware racing started in 1760 when a race track was built in the town of Newark, the in 1934 the Delaware Racing Commision was put into effect. Tracks began to open in Delaware Park, Branywine, then at Dover Downs.in Delaware today, there are 4,300 standardbread horses with  average value of $16,00 ad 1,800 thoroughbreads with a average value of $19,000. On a average a first place win will give outa total $50,000.,5% to the driver and 5% to the trainer. A total amount of 43.5% of DD funds go to State General FUnd while 42.5% of HRI go to the states funds.

Dave Mayonado

Dave Mayonado works for a company that has come under quite a bit of heat lately through the use og genectic modified organism. Monsanto uses GMO’S to improve field yields by either being able to add or shut off genes in a crop. After a scientific study of GMO’s by scientist, GMO’s were deemed to be just as safe as conventional breeding techniques. Some top products of biotechnology are Roundup Ready, YieldGard, DroughtGard, and Vistive Gold/Plenish. A very interesting topic that Dave covered was gene silencing to control corn root worm. The corn is genetically modified containing a certain type of double stranded RNA in it. Once the root worm ingests the corn the double stranded RNA enters the cells. The cells then defend itself by targeting the gene SNF7, causing the worm to die. Dave mentioned s a take home message that you can never be to educated on your job, staying on top of everything.

James Atkins Irrigation

In James Atkins presentation he covered many  areas that focused on various areas of irrigation. He started his presentation with a very interesting act about how the Mayan empire had started the water irrigation through the way of buckets picking up water, later to be carried to the bottom for use. Another interesting fact he mentioned in his presentation was  that a million gallons of water use of 10 households in a year, 1 /2 olympic pools, water used by 100  acres of corn in 1 day and 166 tanker loads. James also stated that its so very key how much water a field and its distance from the pivot.  On one of the graphs it showed that the farther it got from the gun and right before the water gun that the amount of water was off the point where they wanted it to hit. Irrigation isn’t cheap either with the most expensive irrigation system being $600 to $3500 per acre.

UD Ag Farm

During our visits to the UD Ag Farm we were fortunate enough to visits a variety amount of sites, such as where cows are milked, where the calfes are housed, horse barn, sheep barn, cattle pen, followed by a delicious treat at the UD Creamery. Scott Hopkins, the head director for UD’s Ag farm on the newark farm was who led us throughout the day, explaining in great detail at every stop we made. Some interesting facts about the farm include such things as the farm be 350 acres, 80-85 cows, calf’s are housed in small little houses for a certain amount of time, and also all the ice cream comes from the farm. After finishing the tour you could really sense that Scott is very passionate about what he does and that he cares about teaching young people, us, which is our country’s future. One of the best parts of the trip was the creamery, which was the best ice cream ive ever had, and I definitely intend on stopping in again.

Fifer Orchards

Our trip to fifer orchards was a blast and defenently one to remember. We were greeted by Bobby Fifer, the man who makes Fifers what it is. When visiting, we were shown the the fields where some of th crops are grown, the apple orchard, the packing house, and then followed finally by Fifer’s General store.  The apple orchard was amazing, with a variety amount of apples as well as an abundant amount as well which were all pick you own. Also during the trip we were able to meet with Kurt, in charge of sales. He said that sometimes trucks with go all the way to florida and if something happens on the way down or the product, it’ll be sent back and they have to figure out what to do with all that product, which is worth thousands. The most exciting part of the trip was visisting the store, where i was able to purchase amazing ice cream and apple cider.

Mark Lynas speech

When first hearing about GMO’s in high school i was totally opposed to them as well as the company monsanto, but after hearing Mark Lynas talk about the good outcomes of GMO’s , i was able to see a whole new perspective on GMO;s. In order for the world to survive and move forward, by 2050 were gonna have to increase our food % by 70% and a sufficient way to accomplish that is through GMO’s. Mark Lynas stated that, GMO;s are needed because the world will be harmed due to the shortage of food, but not by the use of GMO’s. Lynas also explained in his speech that GMO’s aren’t as harmful as the public perceive them to be.  With people assuming that the use of organic food are healthier, well lynas disagreed, stating that 53 people died and 3500 suffered kidney failure through the use of organi foods. Another great example Lynas used in his speech was that GMO’s are illegal in Kenya and can result in jail time if people were to use them, but would help the field yields allowing better results for farmers and offering more nutrition, which the country could greatly use. In conclusion i could not agree more with LYnas’s statements and points drawn attention to and will now be abel to look at GMO’s lot differently.

Hoobers Visit

During our trips to Hoober’s Inc. many new things came to my knowledge about the use of precision agriculture in our country. When talking to the gentlemen who worked their, they were able to give us a tour of the shop where most repairs occur. Within the shop their are specific people who work on specific things, such as guys who may only focus on combines, where another guy may focus on just only tires. Also we were able to view the use of a drone, which was pretty amazing. The drone itself allows farmers to view their fields in just minutes, helping them before, during, and after the season. It allows farmers to diagnose problems as well as fix them. Finally the best part of the trip in my opinion was the experience of driving the tractor. Never driving one before really opened my eyes on the use and how a tractor could be so useful. I could really picture a future in this line of work

Tour of poultry farm

On September 9th, 2017 we visited Georgie Cartanza’s organic poultry farm.  Once we had arrived to the farm, we were embraced by Georgie’s small presentation that consisted of details about her farm as well as the chickens on the farm. We were then able to suit up into protective gear, however, this was to protect the chickens, not us! Once suited up, we walked between houses 3 and 4 where we were able to view how the organic chickens were able to graze, as well as being able to play. To get a full understanding of how chickens are taken care of as they are grown, we were ble to enter a chicken house that consisted of 37,000 thousand chickens! Once being inside,  I was able to see that the publics view on how chickens are raised may be off. The chickens are given maximum amounts of food and water, as well as very nice conditions in the house. After seeing life on a organic poultry farm, Georgie then preceded to give advice on how to become successful throughout life and that you get what you give. Overall it was a fantastic trip and learning experience.