FMC Agricultural Products Group announces Lexi Sistrunk from Oak Grove, Louisiana, as the grand prize winner in the “Stand & Be Heard Anthem Contest.” After two voting phases, Sistrunk will receive the grand prize of a $10,000 college scholarship. The three runners-up were Allison Nohre from De Pere, Wisconsin; Jessica Smith from Picayune, Mississippi; and Katie Wesler from Birmingham, Alabama. They will each receive a $5,000 college scholarship.

Betty Crocker, Aunt Jemima and Quaker Oats are common household names. In the 1950s, there was another popular name among rural families: Irma Harding.

Irma served as the spokeswoman for International Harvester refrigerators and freezers and promoted the products to U.S. farm women.

“Irma Harding is a wonderful part of our International Harvester history,” says Sarah Pickett, Case IH licensing and merchandising manager.

ABS Global Inc. has acquired an elite group of Angus females backed by three decades of feed efficiency testing and ABS proven genetics. The cows were acquired through the Wardens Farm Complete Dispersion Sale, held in September near Council Bluffs, Iowa. In addition to feed efficiency selection for the last 30 years, the Wardens Farm program has emphasized calving ease, carcass merit and overall performance.

The Northern Beef Packers plant in Aberdeen, South Dakota, is being allowed to slaughter more cattle after passing a city inspection. The long-delayed plant earlier received permission to slaughter up to five cattle to test equipment. The American News reports that the city is allowing the plant to ramp up to slaughtering 200 cattle.

The Pennsylvania Soybean Board has awarded a $5,000 grant to the Center for Dairy Excellence to reprint the “Something to Treasure” brochure. Originally produced in 2011, the educational piece showcases the many contributions dairy farm families make to their local communities and economy. More than 30,000 copies of the brochure were distributed in the past 12 months.

Two Utah State University dairy experts are working to enrich knowledge in Azerbaijan, a struggling country with limited information about modern dairy practices. USU’s Kerry Rood and Allen Young made a summer trip to Azerbaijan, formerly part of the Soviet Union. Azerbaijan is 39 percent of the size of Utah, but has more than triple Utah’s population. Rood and Young traveled as part of a USDA Foreign Agricultural Service project aimed at helping the country upgrade its agricultural productivity and veterinary science program by bringing updated information to universities.

Breeding for high quality and retaining heifers over generations, Mike Kasten sees results. The Millersville, Missouri, rancher has used artificial insemination (AI) for decades, finishing the progeny and collecting data.

A federal study prompted in 2008 by a series of newspaper articles says Lower Yakima Valley dairies and several farms are "likely" sources of nitrates contaminating private drinking water wells. However, federal officials said the EPA study was limited and doesn't prove a larger trend of nitrate contamination across the entire 576-square-mile area southeast of Yakima, Washington. Nor does it blame the region's entire nitrate problem on the dairies.

A new report by U.S. and Mexican researchers suggests an uptick in the number of illegal migrants headed to the U.S. in the first half of 2012 and a slight decrease in migrants returning to Mexico. The report says the U.S. Mexican migrant population appears to have stabilized and may be growing slightly. According to the report, "the size of the Mexican-born population in the U.S. has fully recovered from losses experienced during the recession."