Saturday, March 20, 2010

Ag Week in Pictures

Ann races her pigs.
Spinners and Weavers show how its done.




Della Eastep works hard in the Farmer's market.



Super chickens with all these eggs.




Jr. Leaders performed through out the evening in their farm animal outfits.






Noble Fry and Virgil Arnold keeps everyone supplied with popcorn.













Kelley Robertson and Kim Miller man the coloring area.








Library Story time.










Tuesday, March 16, 2010

Ag Week Breakfast

This year's Ag Breakfast Chairman Ken Carrington put together another great morning. The highlight for the large crowd in the community building at the fairgrounds was the selection of Ron and Jane Alcorn as the Farm Family of the Year. Other winners included Melvin Nicholson as the Friend of the Farmer winner, Ken Torr with his Eagle picture winning the photo contest, and the Gottschalk family having the 1st farm animal born in 2010. As Mayor of Greencastle, Sue Murray welcomed everyone to the breakfast and displayed her champion ribbon from last year's fair Rooster crowing contest. Jay Alcorn, Beth Legan, and Beth's fiancee were keynote speakers discussing their reasons for coming back to the farm after getting their college degrees.
Tomorrow, Wed. March 17 will be the Kiwanis/Rotary Luncheon and 4th Grade Ag Education tours. Thursday will wrap up the festivities with the Mini Farm Fest with something for everyone. Many new displays and activities are being planned.

Thursday, March 11, 2010

Purdue students compete in Innovation Contest.

Hardwood floor coating, pill binder win soy-corn competitions
Two Purdue University student teams won top prizes Tuesday (March 9) for creating new corn- and soy-based products in the 2010 Student Soybean and Corn Innovation Contests.
The winning teams created a substance from soybeans that acts as a binding agent in the production of pills and a corn-based coating that increases the durability of hardwood floors.
This year's contests - the 15th for soybeans and second for corn - featured 23 students on eight teams that created nine products. The competitions, sponsored by the Indiana Soybean Alliance and the Indiana Corn Marketing Council, promote innovation and entrepreneurship. Awards were given at the Indiana Roof Ballroom in Indianapolis.
"Indiana soybean and corn farmers continue to fund these competitions at Purdue because they believe that encouraging students to think about corn and soybeans in new ways benefits our state's soybean and corn industries in a multitude of ways," said Mark Henderson, executive director for both the soybean and corn checkoff organizations. "We are excited to see that interest in these competitions continues to be strong and that the quality of work from the students is strong again this year."
There were first, second and third prizes for both the corn and soy competitions. First prize was $20,000, second was $7,500 and third was $5,000.
The Soy Tabs team, which took first place, included Ryan Fox, a nuclear engineering major from Rising Sun, Ind.; Krista Eakins, a biological engineering and pharmaceutical sciences major from Connersville, Ind.; Danielle Carpenter, a biological engineering and pharmaceutical sciences major from Plainfield, Ind.; and Brittany Phillips from Monroe, Wis., who graduated with degrees in biological engineering and pharmaceutical sciences. Using soy, they created a substance known as an excipient that binds powdered drugs into pills. The soy allowed for a dry, roller compaction method of production, which eliminated a drying step.
"By eliminating the drying process that is a part of wet granulation, we've saved time and the money associated with electricity," Fox said.
The Impact Flooring team won the corn competition with a coating for hardwood floors that makes it more difficult to scratch or dent the wood's surface. The team consisted of nuclear engineering students Alex Bakken of St. Joseph, Mich., Tom Grimes of Fort Wayne, Ind., and Nick Hume of St. Louis. They used radiation to increase the rigidity of a corn molecule to create the coating.
"If we can refine the radiation treatment, it could be applicable for flooring, cups and many other products," Grimes said.
Students in the competitions must not only create a product, but also develop a project budget and marketing plan. Many teams bridge across disciplines to students with expertise in varying fields from engineering and chemistry to business and marketing.
"These competitions, in my mind, are as good as a paid internship," said Jennifer Nordland, the competitions' program manager. "They win awards and gain knowledge and expertise that they might not have otherwise gotten in a classroom setting."
The students said they learned that product development doesn't end in the laboratory.
"I'd never realized how much work it took to get a product developed," said David Esbin, a biology major from Carmel, Ind., who was part of a second-place team that created a soy-based rubber for shoe soles.
Beyond the competitions, the students have the opportunity to continue the marketing of their products. Several past winners and competitors have had success on the commercial market, including making soy-based candles and crayons. Several team members said they hoped to find companies interested in their products.
"That would be really exciting," said Eakins of the Soy Tabs team. "It would be fun to work with that company and with a process that you started."
Sweet Swirl, a soy-based coffee additive took third place in the soy competition. In the corn competition, Stove Cover, a corn-based, spray-on film that makes cleaning stoves easier, took second place, and corn-based Peelable Paint, which can be used on cars, sidewalks and tables for kids' art projects, took third place.

Friday, March 5, 2010

Ag Week

Ag Week is coming soon on March 16-18. Remember to submit your pictures for the Photo contest and schedule your days so you don't miss it. Activities for the kids have been upgraded and there will still be plenty for the adults to learn about Agriculture. No the breakfast has not changed (sausage & pancakes) but for $1 it's still the best deal in town. Young Farmers and Future Farmers in Putnam County will provide the keynote speeches during the breakfast. So remember to go to bed early and get to the fairgrounds on Tuesday morning March 16 at 6 am.
The Mini Farm Fest will be Thursday March 18 from 3:30 - 6:30 pm.

HSUS hit by Lawsuit

HSUS Gets Hit With Racketeering Suit
In a landmark RICO (Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act) lawsuit certain to have far-reaching implications for the animal-rights movement, Feld Entertainment and the Ringling Brothers circus sued the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS), its lawyers, and several other animal rights groups recently. The nonprofit Center for Consumer Freedom (CCF) unearthed the lawsuit in federal court records recently. CCF has the lawsuit available online at its new website, www.HumaneWatch.org. "America's farmers, ranchers, hunters, fishermen, research scientists, fashion designers, and restaurateurs have seen for decades how the animal rights movement can behave like a mobbed-up racket," says David Martosko, CCF director of research. "But it's still shocking to see the evidence laid out on paper. In a treble-damage lawsuit like this, a jury could actually do the humane thing and finally put HSUS out of business completely." In its Feb. 16 lawsuit, Feld leveled bribery, fraud, obstruction-of-justice, and money-laundering charges against HSUS and two of its corporate attorneys, three other animal rights groups, the Washington law firm of Meyer Glitzenstein & Crystal, and all three of that firm's named partners. On Dec. 30, Federal Judge Emmitt Sullivan ruled these defendants collaborated to pay more than $190,000 to Tom Rider, a former Feld employee who was an elephant "barn helper" for two years in the late 1990s, in exchange for his impeached testimony against Feld in an earlier lawsuit; testimony Judge Sullivan declared "not credible" and disregarded in its entirety. That lawsuit was dismissed. Feld is also suing Rider and a nonprofit "Wildlife Advocacy Project" charity, claiming that Meyer Glitzenstein & Crystal used it to funnel money from their plaintiff clients to Rider. These clients included the Fund for Animals, which merged with HSUS in 2004. "The new HumaneWatch website is the only place the public will be able to read this lawsuit," Martosko adds. "We're publishing a treasure trove of information about the HSUS, including lots of surprising documents that HSUS would rather remain hidden from its contributors." CCF launched www.HumaneWatch.org last week. It’s an online watchdog project dedicated to analyzing HSUS's activities and keeping the group honest. It includes a blog, an interactive document library, and a growing body of information about HSUS-related organizations and staff. -- Center for Consumer Freedom news release