PastureScout (PS) is a soon-to-be new website where people can locate, list and secure pasture leases and purchase harvested forage.  

AGCO, a manufacturer and distributor of agricultural equipment, and Russian Machines (RM), part of the Basic Element group and one of the leaders in the Russian machinery sector, have partnered to manufacture and distribute agricultural equipment and replacement parts in Russia. The two groups plan to make a total investment of around $ 100 million in the joint venture over the next three years.

Landmark Services Cooperative (LSC) recently hosted “Planting for Production Forage Producers Field Seminar” in Stoughton, Wisconsin. Nearly 200 crop growers and producers attended the annual seminar to hear crop forecasts, market outlooks and management advice from industry experts.

Late this summer I had the opportunity to travel across the country with a group of faculty and graduate students from five different universities. We began in the Carolinas, traveled across Tennessee, then up through Missouri, into Kansas, Oklahoma and eventually Texas. Our goal was to study grazing lands systems in different environments, and the tour included cow-calf, stocker and dairy operations with conventional and local and/or organic end-points.

Brad Pfaff, state executive director for Wisconsin’s Farm Service Agency (FSA), encourages agricultural producers to consult with FSA and the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) before breaking out new ground for production. Without prior authorization, a producer’s federal farm program benefits may be in jeopardy.

A nearly year-long project to renovate and expand the University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture’s Soil Testing and Research Laboratory is underway. The facility’s receiving and laboratory buildings will be replaced with new and larger ones and the existing office wing will be improved.

Investment in U.S. farmland is still competitive with alternative investments, but the era of extremely low interest rates and extraordinarily high commodity prices is drawing to a close, according to a new report from the Rabobank Food & Agribusiness Research (FAR) and Advisory Group.

Before you start planting for the 2014 season, you might want to check out new products from Latham Hi-Tech Seeds. In the lineup are corn seeds that offer improved drought resistance, enhanced protection against rootworm, corn borer and herbicide, and refuge-in-a-bag benefits.

The presence of a new Bermuda grass pest has been confirmed in Van Zandt County, Texas, and producers are advised to be on the lookout, said Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service experts. Unlike other insects that attack plants from the outside, the Bermuda grass stem maggot damages them from inside, according to Dr. Vanessa Corriher-Olson, AgriLife Extension forage specialist, Overton. “Basically, they consume material inside the stem, unlike armyworms or grasshoppers, where the damage is external,” she said.

Iron Solutions, a company that specializes in providing data and technology tools for equipment dealer profitability, is expanding at its Franklin, Tennessee, headquarters, doubling its office space and adding staff. The company, which formerly occupied one floor, now occupies two floors of the three-story office building at 660 Bakers Bridge Ave., with more than 12,000 square-feet.