The USU Extension Office is hosting the annual Castle Valley Crop School on Wednesday, Feb. 14 from 5:30 pm to 8:30 pm.  Castle Country Radio was able to sit down with Agriculture Agent, Steve Price to get all the details for listeners.

The annual crop school course has been offered to farmers/ranchers in the Carbon and Emery County areas for quite some time. “I think our Carbon/Emery area had one of the first crop schools in the state, that they were kind of the modern style of crop school and now it’s pretty much adopted across the state,” said Price. This free event will be held at the Jennifer Leavitt Student Center on the campus of USU Eastern.

There will be various topics presented throughout the evening, as Price explains, “This year we decided to talk about some ways to manage older alfalfa stands. With seed prices, fertilizer prices, having been really high the past few years, about past four years really, its just gotten worse. We’re seeing a lot of folks kind of falling behind on those rotations.” Different methods and renovations ideas will be discussed and shared with crop school participants.

There is a program through the USU Extension Office called Ag Drip. This program helps water conservation efforts and program details will also be covered during the evening’s presentation.  “Basically, we can help monitor field irrigation use throughout the season and kind of help develop some plans so we’re making sure to use the right amount of water, and when those crops need water, instead of just going off a standard set,” explained Price. The equipment that is used to measure the water is done in real time so corrections and/or adjustments can be made quickly.

Registration for the Castle Valley Crop School is free and currently taking place so a head count is needed as there will be a free dinner served.  “So we’ll start at 5:30 pm, we’ll have dinner there for everybody and then we’ll start the program at about 6:00 pm, and then will go till a little bit past 8:30 pm. You guys can give us a call, and we can answer any questions you may have. We are asking people to RSVP by Feb. 7 just so we have a good county for dinner. We want to make sure everybody that wants a meal gets one,” stated Price. To sign up, please call the USU Extension – Carbon County at (435) 636-3233 or USU Extension – Emery County at (435) 381-2300.