Feature Story

By Patti Drapala
MSU Ag Communications

MISSISSIPPI STATE – Diabetes can be difficult to manage in animals, but one Columbus family learned to master the task with help from Mississippi State University’s College of Veterinary Medicine.

By Patti Drapala
MSU Ag Communications

VICKSBURG – Crocheting may be a dying art to some people but not to Gloria Smith.

Smith is a 4-H volunteer leader in Warren County and has spent 50 years providing youth the direction they need to be successful in life. She began her lifelong journey by learning a skill that put her on a path to work with youth.

MISSISSIPPI STATE – Mississippi’s forest industry is poised to take advantage of an old technology that turns sawmill residues into environmentally friendly energy sources for heat and electricity.

Wood pellets are made of the waste products of lumber production, and they can be burned for heat in homes and used to produce energy for industry. The knowledge and technology to make wood pellets have been around for centuries.

MISSISSIPPI STATE – The Mississippi Agricultural and Forestry Experiment Station will hold a Farm and Industrial Equipment Auction Feb. 27 at the Mississippi Horse Park and Agricenter in Starkville. 

The auction will begin at 10 a.m. and feature a wide range of surplus equipment being sold for Mississippi State University. The equipment and vehicles for auction include tractors, trackhoes, ditchers, skid steers, combines, cotton pickers, trailers and ATVs.

MISSISSIPPI STATE -- Mississippi gardeners will have an opportunity to attend an exposition honoring plants and all things related to them at an event the first weekend in March.

The Everything Garden Expo will take place March 6 and 7 at the Mississippi Horse Park, located on Mississippi State University’s South Farm. Doors will be open from 8 a.m. until 6 p.m. on Saturday and from 11 a.m. until 5 p.m. on Sunday. Admission is $5, and children 6 and younger are admitted free.

By Patti Drapala MSU
Ag Communications

MISSISSIPPI STATE – Mississippi State University is working to reach underserved communities through a new mentoring program that encourages minority students to pursue veterinary medicine and graduate degrees in the biological sciences. 

By Patti Drapala
MSU Ag Communications

MISSISSIPPI STATE – Newton’s business and civic leaders have always expected a visit from Johnnie Mae Walker on behalf of the annual 4-H bike-a-thon for St. Jude Children’s Hospital, but they grew worried when other people appeared in her place. 

MISSISSIPPI STATE – Mississippi Women in Agriculture will hold its annual state conference March 11-12 at Mississippi State University with an agenda that continues the program’s goal to improve business skills of farm owners and managers.

The conference will be at the Bost Extension Center on the MSU campus. Registration is $100 and due by March 4. Topics include legal trends, leadership, groundwater regulations, climate change and alternative energy.

MISSISSIPPI STATE – The South’s already long growing season can be extended by high-tunnel production, a low-cost technique that is new to many Mississippians.

Mississippi State University is offering the High Tunnel Field Day on March 11 from 10 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. in Crystal Springs at the MSU Truck Crops Experiment Station. Registration includes lunch and is $15 by March 1 and $25 per person after that.

MISSISSIPPI STATE -- Greenhouse tomato growers and people with an interest in this business should mark their calendars for the 20th annual greenhouse tomato short course to be held in Raymond March 9-10.

The intensive, one-of-a-kind short course is dedicated to helping producers of greenhouse tomatoes. Mississippi is home to about 100 growers who produce a $6 million greenhouse tomato crop annually.

Rick Snyder, Mississippi State University professor and vegetable specialist in Crystal Springs, is organizing the short course.

MISSISSIPPI STATE – Horse owners can look to Mississippi State University for their mares’ reproductive services from quality studs including a new, top-pedigree thoroughbred stallion.

West Coast businessman Neal Jones donated Big Train A’ Comin, a 3-year-old bay stallion. He is the son of Giant’s Causeway, the 1997 European Horse of the Year, and Snowfire, also a past winner in European races. His arrival comes more than a year after MSU lost its top stallion, Minister Slew, to a catastrophic leg injury during a severe thunderstorm.

MISSISSIPPI STATE – Three truckloads of peanut butter are headed to the hungry survivors of Haiti’s earthquake, and a portion of this donation was made by generous Mississippi peanut growers.

The Peanut Butter for Haiti project was initiated by Early County 2055, a non-profit organization in Georgia, but the program quickly spread to Mississippi, Alabama and Florida. The Mississippi Peanut Growers’ Association is part of efforts that have generated $100,000 in donation pledges as of the end of January.

MISSISSIPPI STATE – Those with a desire to learn the latest in a variety of landscape maintenance topics will have a chance to do so in a two-day short course offered through  Mississippi State University and the University of Arkansas.

The 2010 Landscape Short Course will be held Feb. 18-19 at the Desoto County Board of Education Building in Hernando. It is jointly sponsored by the MSU Extension Service and the University of Arkansas Division of Agriculture.

By Rebekah Ray
Delta Research and Extension Center

STONEVILLE -- Peanuts have become a good commercial crop for Delta farmers, and Mississippi State University researchers are evaluating the effectiveness of a group of insecticides on hard-to-control pests that impact these little jewels.

MISSISSIPPI STATE -- Several wildlife groups will assist in a Feb. 13 youth event in an effort to lay the foundation for safe and responsible hunting.

Mississippi State University’s Department of Wildlife and Fisheries in the College of Forest Resources is offering a squirrel hunt for young people. The hunt will take place at the Noxubee National Wildlife Refuge, located southeast of Starkville.

Youth ages 16 years or younger are eligible to hunt. A parent, grandparent or guardian must attend with them. A hunting license is not necessary for this hunt. 

MISSISSIPPI STATE – Young hunters will learn about quail hunting and conservation at two upcoming day-long events in Clarke and Clay counties.

Quail Forever is organizing the Feb. 27 and March 6 events with help from the Mississippi State University Extension Service, the Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks, and the 2009 Youth Participation Initiative Program. Applications for the limited openings are due by Feb. 10. Participation is free and open to youth ages 12 to 18. Lunch and dinner are provided.

MISSISSIPPI STATE – Mississippi State University has launched a Web site to promote its development of high-quality turfgrass cultivars and help consumers find vendors for commercial varieties that result from this research.  

The site, http://www.msuturf.com, highlights several new and improved varieties of bermudagrass and St. Augustine grass researched and developed by the Mississippi Agricultural and Forestry Experiment Station.

By Patti Drapala
MSU Ag Communications

MISSISSIPPI STATE – Hats once were an essential element of a woman’s wardrobe, but some Mississippi State University students have reinvented this accessory as cutting edge fashion for their design class. 

Phyllis Bell Miller, MSU associate professor of apparel, textiles and merchandising, teaches a course every fall called Visual Design in Dress. Students learn basic design and marketing principles of fashion in this class. 

By Patti Drapala
MSU Ag Communications

MISSISSIPPI STATE – The Internet may be a great tool for finding wedding gown styles, but it is an unsatisfactory way to buy one because of fashion counterfeiters and fraudulent businesses lurking in cyberspace.

Wanda Cheek, associate professor of apparel, textiles and merchandising in Mississippi State University’s School of Human Sciences, is concerned about the burgeoning counterfeit industry. She is currently researching fashion counterfeit and leads many class discussions on the ramifications of this issue.

MISSISSIPPI STATE – Different priorities, philosophies and background experiences are among the reasons many couples cross swords over family finances, but several options exist to help reduce some of this conflict.

Bobbie Shaffett, family resource management specialist with Mississippi State University’s Extension Service, said programs, newsletters and publications are available to help couples address finances in a healthy manner.