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Hope your summer is off to a great start!

First off, we want to thank those of you who took the time to attend our field days in May and June, and, of course, we want to thank our gracious hosts, Ole and Nancy Butler, Mike and Julie Campsey and Hunter and Gail Aldridge. All of the events were a big success and a great learning experience. We also want to thank those of you in Extension who were involved. Your collaboration is very important to us.

And finally, our new team Ag Economist, Dustin Oswald, has arrived and is looking forward to working with you. Feel free to contact Dustin at (580) 224-6432 or djoswald@noble.org. The consulting teams are in the process of creating new team brochures, so we hope to have those available very soon.

Be sure to check out and utilize the AgExchange feature at our website.

Have a great summer!

What is AgExchange?
AgExchange is a web site hosted by the Noble Foundation providing our cooperators with an environment designed to help them interact with our consultants and to give them easy access to information beneficial to their farm or ranch. AgExchange is located at http://www.noble.org/AgExchange/ and can only be accessed by Noble Foundation cooperators.

Access your Information
- Forage tests
- Soil tests
- Maps to your properties
- Recommendations

Contact your Team
AgExchange provides you direct contact information for each of your team members, including phone numbers, email addresses, specialty areas, and photos.

Read the Latest Articles
Each month our specialists write new articles for Ag News & Views, our monthly newsletter. View the newest articles in the "Recent Articles & Publications" section or search our archived articles for something written in a previous year.

Use our Agricultural Tools
Choose from over 20 calculators designed to help you with your operations. Categories include agricultural economics, horticulture/gardening, livestock, pasture and range, soil and crops, and wildlife and fisheries. These simple, interactive tools allow you to enter data that you know to find answers that you need.

View your Management Calendar
Our consultants create a wall calendar every year with recommendations for our various consultation areas. With AgExchange, you can view a customized version of this calendar with the ability to filter out consultation areas that do not apply to you. The AgExchange home page will automatically show you the current month's recommendations, but you also have the ability to search previous and future months.

Add Favorites to your Dashboard
If you find something on the AgExchange site that you want to keep at your fingertips, you can use our new dashboard feature. Add your favorite documents or articles, agricultural tools, or (coming soon!) links to external agricultural web sites. Be sure to use our five-star rating system to tell others what you think of our articles, and send feedback to our specialists.

Register for Events
AgExchange lists all of our upcoming events, including cooperator-only events, and allows you to register online. For those events that require payment, you are given the option of paying by credit card or paying by check upon arrival. Make sure you don't miss out on an event of interest to you and your operation by checking AgExchange frequently.

Read the Latest Agricultural News
AgExchange gives you the ability to read the latest agricultural news from industry sources right on our home page. Choose from 20 sources including: Brownfield Ag News, Purdue Agricultural News, Texas A&M University Agricultural News, Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, USDA Economic Research Service, and others. Some news providers update content daily, so be sure to come back often.

Keep up with the Local Weather
The Noble Foundation knows how important the latest weather is to the success of your operation, so AgExchange includes links to the latest weather right at your fingertips. Change the zip code to the location of your ranch and keep up-to-date.  

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Weather and Rising Prices Bring New Challenges by Chuck Coffey
9 ratings:
The ranching industry has become an even more challenging business lately due to unpredictable weather, rising costs and cattle cycles that no longer seem to follow a typical 10- to12-year trend.

Articles by Lori Heman


Articles by Jim Johnson

Weed Control in Wheat for Grain by Jim Johnson
With current commodity prices, there is much more interest in growing wheat for grain. This means that the cool-season annual grasses that were used as forage when fields were grazed and/or hayed are now weeds that need to be controlled.

Articles by Dustin Oswald

Profit Potential in Wheat for Grain by Eddie Funderburg and Dustin Oswald
5 ratings:
Since it looks like wheat may be $8 per bushel at harvest in 2009, many producers are considering planting it strictly for grain. This can be profitable in some situations with good management, cost control and high yields. Unfortunately, costs have increased at a very fast pace and have diminished profit margins.

Articles by Russell Stevens

The Chainsaw - An Overlooked Habitat Management Tool by Russell Stevens
8 ratings:
There are many tools managers can use to manipulate wildlife habitat. The potential a chainsaw offers as a management tool is often overlooked.

Basic Wildlife Habitat Management Makes "Cents" by Russell Stevens
3 ratings:
Food plots and feeders are intensive management practices and, while widely used, they are not real habitat improvement practices in most cases. Usually, they only work as supplemental feeding to concentrate wildlife populations for improved harvest success or observation.

Articles by Steve Upson

Give Your Lawn a SIP by Steve Upson
3 ratings:
Recently, Al Sutherland, OSU Mesonet agriculture coordinator, introduced me to another tool the folks at Mesonet have developed to assist homeowners and professional groundskeepers. This new tool, known as SIP, "Simple Irrigation Plan," was created to answer the most commonly asked questions when it comes to irrigating turfgrass. When should I water? How long should I run it?

Articles by Robert Wells

Are Flies Bugging Your Cattle? by Robert Wells
11 ratings:
Flies will be abundant by the time this article hits your mailbox. I already have noticed a large number of flies on livestock. If you have not already started a fly control program for this year, you are probably already behind the curve.

Interesting Times for Cattle Economics by Robert Wells
9 ratings:
There is an old Chinese curse that says, "May you live in interesting times." The current era in the livestock industry is about as interesting as most of us can stand. I believe we are in the midst of a paradigm shift. The cattle industry of tomorrow will almost certainly look different than it has in recent years.