The National Wheat Foundation (NWF) annual National Wheat Yield Contest officially kicked off January 17, 2018. In its third year, the contest continues to drive innovation in the industry by spotlighting the best practices among American wheat growers.

This year, the contest is adding a quality requirement, raising the bar for what constitutes the greater grain among U.S. wheat growers. Foundation Board President Phil McLain believes adding a quality component to the contest will encourage growers to share approaches and techniques that help improve quality and maintain yields.

“The wheat yield contest helps improve the overall quality and marketability of U.S. wheat by creating a reason for growers to share success and learn from one another,” McLain said.

This new quality requirement addresses the market opportunities U.S. wheat growers to maximize profitability as they grow the greater grain and allow the industry to compete with wheat growers around the world.

The top five winners from each category & subcategory, along with the overall high yield winner, will be recognized nationally, including at the winner’s reception during the 2019 Commodity Classic to be held February 28th to March 2nd in Orlando, Florida.

Additionally, Eddie Mercer Agri-Services, Inc. and Syngenta AgriPro will be offering an extra incentive to their customers who participate in the contest. The two will pay the state winner $1,000 if the entry is Mercer Brand or Syngenta seed. In addition, Eddie Mercer will pay all county winners $200.00 if they win with a Mercer Brand MBX Wheat.

The 2017 contest had a record-breaking 287 entries from 27 states, and this year’s contest is expected to continue growing the momentum of sharing best practices and techniques throughout the industry.

Maryland grain farmers Chip Bowling, Chip Councell, and Paul Spies recently returned from the U.S. Grain Council (USGC) 14th International Marketing Conference and 57th Annual Membership Meeting in Panama City, Panama.

The kickoff event allowed attendees to get a firsthand look at the Panama Canal expansion. This was a unique opportunity to see trade in action and an important reminder of the dynamic global trade environment. Before the tour, Chio Councell, USGC chairman signed a formal memorandum of understanding with Manuel Benitez, Panama Canal deputy administrator, recognizing the importance of the Panama Canal to U.S. grain trade.

Sixty-nine percent of all cargo traveling through the Panama Canal originates from or is destined for the United States, including roughly one-third of total U.S. grain exports. The new set of locks will open opportunities for larger and more efficient shipments of all products.

During this international conference, Advisory Teams met to discuss issues of importance in each trade region of the world major topics including ethanol, innovation and sustainability, trade policy, and value-added products. The US Grains Council delegates also met in sector-specific groups, for corn barley, and sorghum producers as well as agribusinesses and general farm organizations.

“As market opportunities constantly ebb and flow, so must USGC continuously adjust our activities to maintain our long-term global trading partners and meet increasing demand in developing markets,” said Councell. “The input of our Advisory Teams is essential to both developing the Council’s overarching strategy and planning the Council’s annual activities.”

Building personal relationships with those involved in grains trading around the world is an important part of increasing market demand for U.S. grain and grain products. MD Grain Producers Utilization Board is proud to have Maryland farmers leading the way in building and strengthening export markets for American farmers.

The Maryland Grain Producers Association will offer four $2,500 to students pursuing an agriculturally related degree or career in 2017. Applicants must be a resident of the state of Maryland and must be enrolled or accepted to a four-year institution working toward a Bachelor of Science Degree, or enrolled or accepted to a two-year institution with an agricultural program. The applicant, or the applicant’s immediate family, must be involved in the production of grain in Maryland and a member of the Maryland Grain Producers Association.

Scholarship funding is provided by the Maryland Grain Checkoff Program, which supports promotion, education, and research projects beneficial to the grain industry. Given the dynamic changes in agriculture today, the advances in biotechnology, global positioning systems, environmental protection, drone technology, and crop and livestock production, Maryland’s grain farmers believe it is very important to encourage students to consider careers in agriculture by supporting their educational needs through scholarships. More than $150,000 in college scholarships have been awarded since the program was established in 1991.

The National Corn Growers Association (NCGA) and Maryland Grain Producers Utilization Board (MGPUB) would like to congratulate Drew Haines of Midletown, MD for being named a national winner of the 2016 National Corn Yield Contest. Haines placed second in the non-irrigated division of the contest with a yield of 324.9316 bushels per acre. He used the DEKALB DKC58-83RIB variety to achieve this high yield. This variety has been an all-time favorite of Hanes, who has found it to be very successful over the past five years.

This was Haines’ second year entering the cntest. LAst year, he was a Maryland state winner in the no-till/strip-till, non-irrigated class using DEKALB DKC62-08RIB variety. He won the class for Maryland as well again this year using the same variety, with a yield of 315.5972 bushels per acre. “There is potential in every bag of seed, you j ust need to figure out how to reach that potential.” Haines said, “it is exciting as you are harvest the corn plot acres off, watching the yield monitor show places in the field that are over 400 bushels per acre. Now the challenge is how to get that yield for the entire field,” he recounts.

Haines was first interested in entering the contest ater reading about Herman Warsaw began harvest recording-breaking yields in the 1970s. “I found a video and must have watched it fifteen times,” he jokes. Haines was impressed to learn that Warsaw broke 338 bushels per acre in 1975, and 370 bushels per acre ten years later in 1985 without access to any of today’s modern technology. Haines tries to incorporate some of Warsaw’s techniques, as well as new scientific advances in his farming.

Winners receive national recognition in publications such as the NCYC Corn Yield Guide, as well as cash trips or other awards from participating sponsoring seed, chemical and crop protection companies. In San Antonio, durig the 2017 Commodity Classic, winners will be honored during the NCGA Awards Banquet and the NCYC State Winners Breakfast.

Please visit National Corn Growers Associatin website www.ncga.com for the complete list of National and State winners. For more informaiton, contact Maryland Grain Producers.

The National Wheat Foundation (NWF) and Maryland Grain Producers Utilization Board are proud and excited to announce the state winners of the 2016 National Wheat Yield Contest; Donald Lippy, Bradley Rill, and Edward Lippy. Sponsored by Monsanto, BASF, John Deere, Winfield, and seeing nearly 170 entrants, the 2016 National Wheat Yield Contest is the first in twenty years and encouraged farmers to innovate, exchange knowledge, and utilize available technology.

The top yield in the state for dryland winter wheat was Donald Lippy of Lippy Brothers Farms from Hampstead, MD. On a field in Baltimore County, he reached a final yield of 116.81 bushels per acre, 88.4% above the county average. Following his lead were his partners, Bradley Rill who reached a final yield of 117.36 bushels per acre in Carroll County, 63% above average; and Edward Lippy who reached a final yield of 109.11 also in Carroll County, 51.5% above average.

“The Foundation believes that the National Wheat Yield Contest will be the catalyst to driving innovation among growers, and communication with competitors and colleagues to facilitate productive discourse on successful practices and techniques,” says NWF Chairman Phil McLain. “We are thrilled that the 2016 Contest saw a robust level of participation, and we hope that the 2017 Contest will see even higher levels of enrollment from wheat growers. We are at a point, as an industry, where farmers are capitalizing on modern and innovative growing techniques to produce the surpluses that we are seeing today. The Wheat Yield Contest will allow those hugely successful growers to share those techniques to bring the whole industry to the forefront of cutting-edge technology and practices.”

With the announcement of the 2016 winners, the National Wheat Foundation would also like to announce the opening of the 2017 National Wheat Yield Contest. Registration for the fall wheat sector will end on May 1, 2017, and registration for the spring wheat sector will end on August 1, 2017. Growers should look ahead to the coming year to enter the contest and join their fellow growers in achieving the objectives of the National Wheat Yield Contest.

For more information, contact the Maryland Grain Producers.

Cordova, MD – On Friday, October 28, 2016, a team of Egyptian grain-buyers visited Maryland to learn about the area’s grain farms ad elevators as part of the U.S. Grain’s Council (USGC) Export Exchange 2016 Program. The team met with USGC Chair, Chip Councell of Councell Farms, who took them to see corn harvest at Hutchison Brothers Grain and Nagel Grain Elevator.

The buyers were excited to see Maryland grain production and handling systems first-hand and to have the opportunity to make a business connection while on the tour. Councell educated the team on the high-quality supply of Maryland corn, as well as the stewardship and technology used to produce it. The team was highly impressed by Maryland corn production and seemed eager to develop trade relationships.

Hosted every other year by USGC and the Renewable Fuels Association, Export Exchange brings together international buyers with U.S. sellers of corn, sorghum, barley, distiller’s dried grains with solubles, corn gluten meal and corn gluten feed. The team of Egyptian grain-buyers that visited Maryland is one of 19 who participated. The USGC’s market development work is funded by members like the Maryland Grain Producers Utilization Board (MGPUB), the Market Access Program, and the Foreign Market Development Program in the 2014 Farm Bill.

Locally, MGPUB supports the Council’s efforts to promote U.S. grain sales in more than 50 countries and the European Union because trade is a critical component of farmer profitability. Exports of Maryland Grain and grain products were last valued at $8.2 million. The economic ripple effects of these grain and grain product exports created $13.8 million in economic output, $4.7 million in gross state product, and 81 full-time equivalent jobs in the state economy.

On Thursday, October 6, Maryland Grain Producers Utilization Board (MGPUB) attended the VIP screening of MPT’s Maryland Farm & Harvest Season 4. MGPUB has been the primary funder of the series for all four seasons. Maryland Farm & Harvest has reached over four million viewers! Secretary Bartenfelder spoke at the event and praised the show for being an educational proponent of Maryland agriculture. The producers of the show thanked Lynne Hoot for her twenty-seven years of service to Maryland agriculture, and for helping to make the show possible. Featured on the first episode of the season will by MGPUB’s very own Bobby Hutchison, along with Triple R Bull Co, Moore or Less Farm, and yoder’s Tomatoes. Be sure to tune into the season 4 premiere on Tuesday, November 15th at 7 pm!

View previous episodes online here.

Did you catch this commentary in the Baltimore Sun last week? Three of Delmarva’s own national leaders, Chip Bowling, Lee McDaniel, and Richard Wilkins, collaborated to share the importance of voluntary conservation in the Chesapeake Bay region. The three boasted that “the Chesapeake Bay, the largest estuary in North America, is home to more than 83,000 farms that together generate $10 billion in economic activity each year. For decades, these producers have stepped up all across the watershed, assumed responsibility for their share of the nutrient and sediment pollution in the bay, and worked tirelessly toward unprecedented, remarkable change. Just in the past seven years, the agriculture sector has single-handedly reduced its phosphorus and sediment runoff in the watershed by 50 and 75 percent respectively.”

Maryland Farmers truly deserve much praise for their voluntary conoservation efforts restoring the Chesapeake Bay. In the past ten years, farmer’s use of cover crops within the watershed has tripled, helping to reduce erosion rates by 57% and edge-of-field sediment loss by 62%. In 2015 alone, 492,000 acres of cover crops prevented an estimated 2.95 million pounds of nitrogen and 98,500 pounds of phosphorus from entering local waterways. In addition, the use of best management practices including conservation tillage systems, riparian buffers, and stream fencing, have decreased the loss of nitrogen by 38% and phosohprus by 45%. Many thanks to Chip, Lee, and Richard for sharing this information. Keep up the great work Maryland Farmers.

Read Baltimore Sun’s full article here.

Maryland Grain Producers wishes a happy retirement and safe travels to former Executive Director, Lynne Hoot. Her retirement was celebrated at Yellowfin in Annapolis, with many of our members in attendance. Bobby Hutchison presented Lynne with an engraved compass and chart weight from Maryland Grain Producers Utilization Board to thank her for guiding them over the 25 years. Lynne received citations from the Maryland House of Delegates, Maryland Senate, and Maryland Department of Agriculture as well. She was presented with a Governor’s citation at the Maryland Association of Soil Conservation District’s annual meeting in August. Kynn and her husband Jerry hope to take full advantage of their retirement and follow another passion of hers, sailing. They will be leaving for their first trip, down the East Coast and over to Cuba in early November.

Lindsay Thompson will be undertaking the role of new Executive Director. Her experience with Lynne will allow a smooth transition of leadership. She, along with Programs and Public Relations Director, Danielle Bauer, and Administrative Assistant, Marguerite Guare, are all set up in their new office outside of Centreville. Please note the new contact information for the business. A new fax number will be forthcoming.

Read more about Lynne’s farewell here.

Thompson Ag Consulting recently announced that Danielle Bauer was hired as a full time program and public relations director.

Danielle grew up on her family’s hog and grain farm in Howard County, Maryland. She participated in 4-H growing up and was Miss Howard County Farm Bureau in 2009.

Danielle graduated from West Virginia University with a bachelor’s degree in Multidisciplinary Studies of Agriculture in May 2015. She was previously employed as a Marketing Associate with The Piedmont Group, Farm Family Insurance. Danielle currently serves as the Howard County Farm Bureau’s Women’s Leadership Committee Chair and is a volunteer with the Howard County 4-H Program.

In her new capacity, Danielle will provide support to the Maryland Association of Soil Conservation Districts, the Maryland Grain Producers Association and Utilization Board, the Maryland Pork Producers Association, the Delaware Maryland Agribusiness Association, the Mid-Atlantic Certified Crop Adviser Program, the Maryland Green Industries Council, and CropLife America.

Danielle may be contacted at (410) 956-5771 or danielle.mdag@gmail.com.