(slow music) - Alabama Public Television presents "Spotlight on Agriculture."

- 4-H is the premier youth educational program that is offered by Land-Grant Universities nationwide.

In Alabama, our Land-Grant Universities are Auburn University and Alabama A&M.

Both of those are engaged in the 4-H programs.

4-H stands for Head, Heart, Hands, and Health.

And it is a magnificent program to work with youth throughout our state.

I'm awfully impressed.

We have over 160,000 youth that are engaged in clubs in Alabama.

About 10,000 of those young people are in leadership roles in those clubs.

And about 9,000 adult volunteers support 4-H programs.

The 4-H programs have been around for more than a hundred years.

And one of the things that's striking to me is that they are able to measure the impact that those programs have had on youth.

We found for example four times as many kids that have gone through 4-H, contribute back to their community.

We also found that they're twice as likely to take better care of their health as kids that don't participate.

They also when they go to college they move into the areas of science and engineering and technology and math and agriculture.

And so fields that are so important to our society.

4-H is a great program.

It provides leadership and communication skills to youth.

It's the premier program for youth in our country.

- 4-H is the nation's largest youth program, and it's designed to teach kids life lessons.

We are making a better Alabama by the kids we're investing in today.

4-H will help your child learn how to speak, how to organize and how to feel proud of themselves.

A 4-Hcher is two times more likely to give back to the community, four times more likely to make wise healthy choices, and two times more likely to be involved in STEM projects.

It makes a lasting impression.

These kids we invest in today will be tomorrow's leaders.

- I think the Alabama 4-H is important to the youth of Alabama because we are in every County.

We have a presence in every county.

The demographics of our counties are very different.

The needs of our counties are very different.

And we have a wide array of programs to meet the diversity of need throughout the State.

I think that one of the things that people don't realize is a lot of what we do in 4-H is youth have projects.

And they work on a project and then they do a demonstration of that project.

And so really what they're learning is to follow directions, put something together, to reach out for help, to get better.

And then they do their presentation and you're doing a presentation can be very difficult.

So they learn some really important communication skills.

And we have lots of projects that they can do.

Extreme birdhouse, building a bird house.

Legos, building Lego houses and communities and rockets.

We also have a really strong STEM program.

We shoot a lot of rockets.

We build a lot of robots.

We do a lot of right now that's been really important and been pushing throughout education is for kids to learn how to code.

That's been a real important part of what we're working on right now.

You can become a 4-Hcher through your school system.

But you can also just reach out to your local County office and they will hook you up.

We have an online system where you can join.

It's kind of nice because we can push out information and emails about what's going on at the local level, at the regional level, or at the state level.

So I think I wanna add that's one of the real values of 4-H.

It's not just about the local program, we expose kids to other kids across the State.

We have opportunities for kids to get to meet and greet and learn and grow across counties, across regions and at the state level.

And as they get older, there are opportunities for national events.

So that can be a really meaningful experience for kids.

Some that normally if it wasn't 4-H would not get out of their County.

4-H summer camp is just part of 4-H tradition.

And that's one of my favorite things.

Because we have seven sessions, or sometimes eight, sometimes nine, it just kinda depends.

And yeah, I go to every session.

So you get to see all your staff, you get to see kids from all the counties, you get to see volunteers that have been coming for five years, 10 years, 15 years.

So it's a great time to be with your 4-H family.

And it's a lot of, it's just a lot of fun.

Campus where a lot of kids for the first time get in a canoe.

Campus the first time where a lot of kids get on a paddle board.

Campus a lot of times, the first time people have been away from home or spent night away from home or been out of their County.

So really if it was 4-H camp, a lot of kids got to 4-H camp that if it weren't for 4-H wouldn't get to go to camp.

And you're on a really hot day.

I just think of this little, this young boy and I think he was from Wilcox County at summer camp.

And he came up and he's just sweating and he's hot.

And he goes, "this has been the best day of my entire life."

And so you have lots of moments that are just make it the best day of your life.

- It's helped me grow up a lot.

Not quickly but at a very good pace.

It's taught me a lot about being responsible as well just kind of being my own person growing as my own person not letting.

4-H is not necessarily something that everybody does.

It's something that only a number of people do.

And so it's something that I think is very special, it takes a very special person to do.

So if you're looking to kind of be different, be individual, I would say definitely do it.

This is not my first heifer project in 4-H.

This is actually my sixth or seventh year doing this.

So I've actually had more calves than I have had years.

I've had almost every year I've had two to three calves because they would overlap over the year.

So I've had about 12 I think and they're all in my herd now.

4-H has prepared me for my future in numerous ways.

Actually this past summer, I did a competition where you had to actually look at your financials, as well as how your herd looked and everything like that.

It taught me a lot about money and also patience.

Patience is so, so big.

Do not procrastinate, do not make the same mistakes that I did procrastinate absolutely everything.

It will ruin, it will a lot.

But also something that 4-H has taught me is a lot of responsibility.

I had to get up every morning and take care of these animals that I'm responsible for.

They're not my moms, they're not my dads, they're mine.

And it's just taught me a lot about paying attention to what I spend my money on, paying attention to how much money I spend and exactly like just looking at my financials a lot I think is important.

I grew up doing 4-H, I grew up being around 4-H. My mom was an extension agent my entire life.

So I got to actually go to different counties and see what all they did and see the different products that got to go on.

It was always something that interested me.

So I've been around 4-H my entire life, I've known about it forever.

- I was a 4-Hcher girl growing up here in Blount County.

And so my involvement in 4-H throughout my childhood actually made me want to become a 4-H extension agent.

So I went to Auburn and did that so that I could hopefully come home and become an extension agent one day.

But in the midst of all doing that, I also got married and had three children.

And really just knew that I wanted all three of my children to be involved in the 4-H program.

I loved what it did for me and what I saw it doing for other young people.

I love that it showed them all of the life skills that they were gonna need no matter what path they took in life.

And so I knew that it was a program that I wanted them to be a part of.

And so my husband and I actually started a Cloverbud Club which is for the younger kids, five to eight.

When my daughter, my oldest daughter was five and got a lot of the community kids involved that way.

My husband was the club later.

And then when she became a nine year old, she became a full fledged 4-H member and she's been in 4-H ever since.

And my two younger boys are also 4-H members as well.

I have seen my daughter changed tremendously through 4-H in a great way.

She's very well spoken.

She can speak and communicate with anybody young or old.

That's a great skill to have going into the workforce.

She's also very patient, she's very responsible, and she's also very mindly about finances.

And what goes into finances and what goes into decisions when you're making important decisions.

So all of those things have come through her involvement in the 4-H program.

I'm a County Extension Coordinator which means I'm basically the administrator in the County extension office.

As a County Extension Coordinator I get to choose the area of responsibility that I work the most in, in the program area that I covered the most.

And I've had the most experience in the 4-H program.

I was a regional extension agent in 4-H before becoming the County coordinator.

So 4-H is my area of responsibility.

But in addition to my 4-H responsibilities, I also help local individuals with their farming questions, their agricultural questions, I help in the areas of community development, I help and just make sure that all of the agents that cover the County that I serve have all of the resources that they need in order to help all of those around them.

- I have Several duties.

The first one is to provide leadership programs for the agents across the State and County 4-H teams.

But I also work with our state ambassadors.

They are kind of the 4-Hcers that represent Alabama 4-H.

This year we have 31.

So my duties alone with my coworkers we prepare them for different interviews, they plan our big 4-H Mid-winter teen retreat.

And along with that I help with our state competitive event stay.

We have over 18 competitions and data bin is held at the Alabama 4-H center there.

So has a lot of duties, I like it 'cause each day is something different.

One thing that really blows my mind with working with 4-Hchers is watching them grow.

One 4-Hcher could come in very quiet and shy and by the end of the 4-H year they're on TV doing programs or presenting to their County commissioners.

And then just seeing 4-Hchers they start here as interns, and then we eventually hire them as staff here.

So just seeing the progress that Alabama 4-H the life skills that we instill in our kids that just blows mind.

It makes me happy, it makes me want to continue to do what I do at my job.

- I participate in a lot.

I am currently a 4-H Alabama State Ambassador.

I'm also involved in the Etowah County leadership counseling youth council.

And I lead a small group in the youth council.

And separately I participate in competitions mainly in public speaking.

It has helped with my communication skills.

It has helped me be more professional.

It has helped me learn how to work with people my age, people who are adults.

I mean, it's really just helped me grow as a leader as well.

4-H has so many different opportunities, so many different things to get involved with.

It doesn't really matter what you like.

If you like art, if you like speaking, if you like farming, growing plants, I mean there's so much you can do.

Honestly the possibilities are endless.

- I think the biggest secret is a lot of them think it's just cows and cooking.

But we have 4-Hchers that's doing STEM, public speaking, leadership skills.

So it's so many different secrets.

I always think that 4-H is kind of the hidden secrets.

A lot of the kids say well I don't have a cow.

Well you can have a chicken in your backyard.

Or I don't know how to cook.

Well you can sell or you can decorate cakes.

So it's a lot of hidden secrets.

And a lot of the kids they find their career within 4-H when they're working with 4-H projects.

So a state ambassador for Alabama 4-H they have several duties.

The first duty is to be the voice of Alabama 4-H.

They represent the face of Alabama 4-H.

When they put on that green blazer, they know that this 4-Hcher here is representing Alabama 4-H.

They go they do speaking engagements, but they also tell their 4-H story.

And they tell their 4-H stories to younger and older kids.

And we always say the younger kids we can keep them in 4-H but sometimes is those older kids.

When our 4-H state ambassadors they go out and say, because of state ambassador program I am able to provide leadership skills.

The older kids are like I think I wanna do that.

So they provide leadership skills.

And I think the main thing that they do, they plan a wonderful 4-H winter team retreat.

And we average over 200 kids from across the state.

And they leave the program 'cause being a state ambassador that's a leader.

So they do the workshops, they do the planning, they do the opening video.

So they do a lot.

They have a lot of roles.

And a lot of times I think I'm managing them but they manage me.

'Cause they say Ms. Joy, we need to have this planning meeting, we need this activity.

So they do a lot to make the best better for Alabama 4-H. - I learned about 4-H through my family because I've grown up on the farm.

And as long as I can remember, we've grown up in the Cloverbuds doing stuff with all the kids in our community and hanging out and getting together and learning about them.

My heifers name is Ellie.

She is a registered key, and she will be a year old in November, and we've gotten really close.

My favorite part of 4-H is getting to make really good friends and go into all of our shows and all the hard work that goes on that people don't see, because I love working with cattle and doing everything behind the scenes.

When I grow up I would like to do something in agriculture because I love being around animals and helping around the farm.

And it's just something that I'm very passionate about.

- My knowledge of 4-H started when I was a young boy.

So I was probably involved at nine or 10 years old in livestock judging and then moved on to showing cattle and did it through high school and then a little bit in college early on.

So I've been involved with it the entire time and now with my children and it's really been a blessing.

Kids today live a lot faster paced life than we did.

When I was a kid growing up, then it was kind of what we did.

Today I think it takes them into a different place.

It allows them to concentrate on the work and the responsibility aspect of it.

Something that's not in front of a screen.

So it's been very powerful I think for both of our kids to be involved in 4-H and have something that's real and useful that they can use as tools in their lives.

The children that are involved in our area are great kids.

I think not only the kids here in Blount County where my daughter and son had been involved with, but across the State.

So that's one of the aspects I like about it.

I still have friends I made when I was 10 years old and I'm 44 today from 4-H and FFA growing up showing cattle.

And my kids are getting to do that.

So they're networking across the State.

And these are good hardworking kids that you don't mind your children being friends with and having fun with.

And it's really been a blessing for us.

- My favorite thing about 4-H is chick Chain 'cause I love the responsibility.

It teaches you responsibility and how to run a business.

Chick Chain is where you get 18 chickens and you raise them up, and then you take them to the 4-H Chick Chain show, and you can sell them or you can buy them back.

And then from there on you do pretty much whatever you want to with them.

And I've kept mine in growing a business with an egg business.

If I had a friend that was interested in 4-H I'll tell him there's no pressure in doing it.

You can do as much or as little as you want or and it's really, really fun.

I really love it.

I have a good time doing it.

My mom was in 4-H and the 4-H agent came to my school and she started telling us about it.

And then my mom told me about it and I just got interested in it and decided to try it out 'cause some of my friends were doing it too.

So I tried it out and I liked it.

- I wanted Grant to try 4-H because of the opportunities that it offers.

I feel that 4-H provides opportunities for kids that they may not have in other activities.

It also teaches things like responsibility, public speaking, getting along with others, respect for others.

And so I just wanted him to try and see if he would like it.

I was actually a 4-H member when I was in elementary school.

I joined and was part of our local club there.

And I did more stuff like the baking contest, things that we had at our school.

And then now I'm a 4-H mom.

- Alabama 4-H has always held a special place in my heart.

If you ask me how long have I been in 4-H it's probably been about 30 something years.

Because I'm a 4-H alumni from Coosa County, Alabama.

And I had zero talent for sports, like zero talents.

But my public speaking skills and cooking.

So those were my major programs in Alabama 4-H.

So I always tell people they're like, you love 4-H I'm like, I bleed green.

I've been in it for so long and I've had the opportunity to be a 4-H intern, when I was at the University of Montevallo intern back in Coosa County.

And I always say hard work pays off.

I feel like I was a pretty good intern 'cause they hired me to be with 4-H and I thank 4-H everyday for the opportunities that they instilled in me.

And the opportunities that my agents in state staff and people helped me, I try to instill that into the young people today because I know how it helped me out in everything.

So I always say to make the best better.

Alabama 4-H made me a better person and that's my goal as a 4-H state specialist to make it better for the kids of Alabama.

- I pledge my head to clearer thinking.

My heart to greater loyalty.

My hands to larger service.

And my health to better living.

For my club, my community, my country, and my world.

- The future for Alabama 4-H is bright.

One thing that I know is that kids need us more than ever right now.

I think that one of the things that 4-H provides is we provide programming in all areas and a lot of content areas.

And I think one of the things that we really offer is getting kids outside.

Getting kids in the barns and the fields and the rivers and the streams, getting them its summer camp.

So I think that's just a real important role that we place, that we play is getting them to experience the natural environment of Alabama and appreciating the natural environment of Alabama.

And also I think that we're at a time that kids have stressors that I certainly did not have growing up.

And I think it's very clear we need young people.

What the research will tell you is they need three significant people in their lives to care about them to be successful.

And 4-H can be one of those if not two of those significant people in a young person's life to be successful through staff or through our volunteers.

Because one thing that is very clear to me is that our staff and our volunteers they're committed to all kids and the success of all kids.

- Alabama extension takes the University, Auburn University to the people of Alabama.

It delivers relevant research based information that allows them to make wise choices, that'll improve their economy and quality of life.

If you as a resident of Alabama have the question, let's say it's either an agricultural field or in your backyard, give your extension office a call in your County.

They'll help you, give you that information that you need to make a wise decision.

What kind of a weed is it?

How can you treat it?

How can you prevent it?

It's an agricultural thing?

How do we do it in a sustainable manner?

It still makes you a profit?

But we are here to give you that information and help you learn to be a better homeowner, a better farmer, a better businessman.

Extension system started officially as a national program in 1914.

Actually it started a little earlier here in Alabama about 1912, during the boll weevil infestation.

And it was how do we keep our farmers from starving to death when the weevil came.

And out of that extension agents started talking about diversification growing more than just cotton, starting to grow cotton and other things and diversify and that's really...

But its start out is to make sure that Auburn University got taken to the people.

You don't have to come to the hill, the hill goes to you.

- The Grow More, Give More project is a direct result of the challenges that we have faced since March of this year.

As things began changing very quickly lots of folks were isolated at home.

We started getting calls from first time gardeners are asking questions.

I've never planted a garden, I'd really like to know more about that.

And then we thought about the other side of that.

Maybe there are some folks who aren't physically able or economically able to grow their own gardens.

So we kind of put it together in a project where we wanted to provide the educational resources to new and even experienced gardeners.

And then those resources would help them actually grow more.

And then in growing more we hope they would give more and donate to either their neighbor down the street, a food assistance organization, maybe at their church or senior center, or even state food or assistance organizations, food banks that kind of thing.

We were at home as well working remotely but we were still answering all those emails and phone calls and that kind of thing.

So our team got together and strategized on how we could meet those needs.

And so we started working on putting together digital resources, webinars, videos that we put together and all of it really centered around vegetable gardening.

So we provided the educational component.

And then as the project started to expand, we pulled in other teams, the food safety team.

So we had them ask them to help us with food preservation videos, webinars, that kind of thing.

So it's really a multi team, a multilevel project for Alabama extension.

As time has progressed, there are fewer and fewer folks who really know how to grow their own food especially on a large enough scale to feed their family.

So, especially even in the more rural areas, they're several decades away from the farm.

So we wanted to help in that area.

We also wanted to provide information to make it easier for even those folks in urban settings.

So it's not resources for somebody to go plant the back 40, it's resources for somebody to grow lettuce in a pot, it's resources for someone to plant a four by eight raised bed and be able to do that successfully to aid their food supply.

They may not be able to provide everything they're gonna need but it's gonna be a start.

And hopefully as we help them be more successful, their growing will expand, they'll maybe put in another raised bed or maybe they'll look at planting and say, a larger pot in the backyard.

So we wanted to make it as easy as possible in that we provided the information they needed, the resources they needed.

We even compiled shopping lists so they could come into a store such as this, they've got their list and they would be able to say okay, I need all of these items and this is gonna help me to be more successful in growing my own food.

For anyone who has extra vegetables that they would like to donate, if they don't know of a source in their community, that's one thing we learned.

Not every food assistance organization has the capability to take fresh produce.

So that's something that needs to be investigated.

But we have representatives.

In each of our extension offices we've recruited volunteers to kind of help in each County locate those food assistance organizations.

So if you're not sure where to donate your extra produce, call your local extension office they can put you in touch with somebody that can help you figure that out.

- At the food bank, I do volunteer on Tuesdays and Thursday mornings, but I have been bringing donations from our church and from the Lee County Master Gardeners and my neighborhood in Auburn for about eight weeks now.

People are definitely getting involved in the Grow More, Give More program.

So through the neighborhood they're dropping things off in my driveway, our church is dropping things off in my truck when it's parked there on Mondays, different members of the Lee County Master Gardeners are bringing things themselves to the food bank or dropping it off in my driveway as well.

And to date we've donated about 397 pounds of fresh produce.

There's definitely a greater need for food in our community.

So my church works with residents at a mobile home park in the area, and many of them have been unemployed during this COVID pandemic.

So we have helped them to start gardens.

So 21 families have taken advantage of community the garden space that we developed for them and help them with the plants and the seeds.

And that's definitely helped a lot with the food that they are growing to supplement their diets.

It is very important for people to be growing their own food so that they know what they are putting on their table, and it's definitely fresher and better for their families.

- SmartMap is an educational program that explores a suite of geospatial technology apps and unmanned aerial systems better known as drones that help forest landowners and natural resource professionals, better map their forest lands.

It was designed to be easy to use, low cost and adoptable by a large number of nontechnical users.

And for that reason we'll use as a basis for the program the smartphone, thus the name SmartMap.

SmartMaps, I mean smartphones if you think about them for one second are pretty sophisticated computers, high resolution screens, got a built in GPS unit and they have a good camera.

And when you bring that technology together with a growing number of geospatial apps that are out there, it is a great tool for forest landowners and resource professionals to get out and map with especially since we are all carrying it in our pocket every day.

The SmartMap pores is offered in two formats.

One is as a face to face class that we offer throughout an entire day.

It is designed to be hands on, every person gets an iPad to use throughout the class.

And we have assignment says format.

So you get a chance to see how the technology works.

And as we go through the class, we unpack that technology so that you can see every step of the process from opening an app to dropping GPS points whether it's in the field using aerial imagery and as the background all the way through demonstrations on flying drones and how the imagery that you collect with drones can imported back into that geospatial app.

The second format that we are offering now, is gonna be as an online virtual class.

This is for those people that can't come to one of our in-place meetings, but instead they're able to go to the web and we have a lot of these tutorials built in where the idea is you bring your own tablet, your own smartphone with your application, and you can follow through the course and hopefully learn how to use this technology to map on your forest land.

This program is important to outdoor professionals because GIS and mapping technology and UAS or drone technology is evolving very quickly.

Not too many years ago we were using a separate clunky piece of software on our computers, we had a separate GPS unit.

Today all this technology is starting to kind of marry itself together.

It's available now on your tablet, on your smartphone and it's becoming incredibly easy to use.

And so we're seeing these professionals be very interested in applying this technology, in particular in a few scenarios.

One example might be hurricane comes roaring through, knocks down a lot of timber, accessibility to that forest land is difficult.

You can put a drone in the air, get a bird's eye view, you can capture up-to-date aerial imagery, import that imagery into some GIS software, and begin to quantify how much timber was damaged.

One thing to note about SmartMap is it's not a piece of software, it's an educational program.

We are teaching people how to use apps that exist out there with platforms that already exist out there.

If you wanna learn more about our program, you can go to Alabama smartmap.com and you'll go to our extension webpage where you'll see about our upcoming classes, and our online classes that'll be launched soon.

- The impact of the cattle industry in Alabama's huge.

When you think about agriculture in general in the State of Alabama, it's one of the leading economic drivers in the State, millions of dollars flow through the agricultural sector.

And in cattle is a big part of that.

We have a lot of land that might not be suitable for other row crops and stuff but it's well suited for growing forages which is the economical way to feed cattle.

So you have this huge a 300 head.

A new 300 head or herd of cattle in the state of Alabama produce about roughly a half a million dollars worth of total impact.

Now that's not just on the cattle farm, that's allied industries, that's the feed, and the seed, and the fence and all the work and facilities and the cattle themselves, the land.

So there's a lot of things that are tied together to make this a really impactful industry.

The other thing is, the really neat thing about Alabama cattle producers is that they helped to revive more the safest food supplies, a plentiful top quality food supplies in the world.

When you think about how the cattle industry works, you've got cattle from all over the country.

Farms here in Alabama to farms in California, Minnesota, Dakotas, everywhere, come together to the feed lot system and on through the process and system.

And it's the safest most abundant food supply in the world.

And guys that have cattle we're seeing behind us right here in South Alabama, these are the backbone of that industry.

These guys are the reason why we have food security, we have food safety, we have an abundant food supply in the US.

I think we've seen through the last couple of years when we saw the COVID issues and we saw other issues.

We might've had a little bit of a hiccup in supply, but the supply was there.

We knew we would have food.

And these guys are the reason for that.

The challenges that Alabama cattle producers face are much of the same challenges that other producers face around the country.

Cattle producers operate in a commodity market, which means they don't get to just name their price.

Their price is based on what the industry's doing, what's happening in the world, supply, demand, everything plays into that.

So they can't really effect the price of their product.

So they may work for two or three years to get the product, Todd and some other farmers would talk about their calves being their cash crop.

Well that's been a couple of years in getting there, that didn't just happen.

And so from the time you start planning to the time you sell your product, you have really very little input into what the price will be.

That's the challenge knowing what the prices are gonna be, trying to work the cost side of things, being a good manager.

These guys have to be excellent managers with what they do.

Otherwise they're gonna find themselves on the negative side of profitability.

And we don't want that.

Even in the best of times these guys don't work on huge profit margins, but when commodity prices are really low, the margins get really tight.

So what you'll see are these guys that have been in the cattle industry for generations, they're pretty good managers, they're pretty good marketers, they're pretty good producers, they understand costs, they understand total cost, and variable cost and fixed costs, they understand appreciation, they understand that even these metal fences and catch pins will deteriorate over time.

So you're constantly replacing your fixed assets there.

So the real challenge is trying to navigate a perpetually narrow margin because you want to be in the cattle industry, because you enjoy doing it, because you want to supply that food source you enjoy doing what you do.

And these guys are like the heart, they're the backbone of agriculture, they're the backbone of our food supply, but the challenge for those guys is operating under those thin margins like most agriculture producers do.

- Well, my cattle operation is my younger brother and myself.

We got about probably a hundred, 120 brood cows.

It's just cow calf operation, cows have calves in the fall usually starting in October, November, December, we've got most of our calves.

(cows mooing) And then we wean those calves usually around middle of June, July the fourth, background those calves for about 45 to 60 days.

And then we try to sell a truckload of steer calves.

We keep our heifer calves.

Usually my younger brother keeps them, breeds them, and then sales... Let them have their first calf and sales them as a first calf payer.

I've been in the cattle business my whole life.

I'm 49 years old and I guess from the time we could crawl three of us and my daddy made sure that we each had a cow when that calf was sold off of that cow every year that calf was sold in our name went in our bank account.

And it's been that way until we got old enough to do our own.

And then daddy quit doing that and we got our own cattle, bought our own land and been doing that for probably 20 or 25 years now.

Having an extension agent close by helps because these people that are especially with my job at the Coop store.

These people that Coop that have they either have or they want to have four or five cows, and they've got all these questions about what kind they need to get, how many they need to get, what they need to feed them, what they need to graze them on, and what kind of vaccines or whatever else it may be.

We usually refer those to our local extension agent and let him handle that.

Then hopefully they'll come back to us and buy those products that he suggests.

I got involved working with the Alabama extension service through my job and also just being on a family farm.

Started showing calves years ago as a kid, you were of course involved with the Alabama extension agent then, and it's just carried on to have a good relationship with those guys since then be it.

The questions we may have for trials that they may want to run places that they may want to carry people to see whatever it may be, meetings that we may have.

We just have a good relationship with the extension service.

The thing that I'm most proud of as an Alabama cattlemen producer is when we take our calves that we've raised all year to the stockyard, whether you sell them at stockyard, whether you sell them individually, sell them as a load lot that the crop that you've worked for your all year when they come across the scales and you sell those calves, that makes me proud when those calves have done what we want them to do.

Family operations are just seen continuing to grow and continuing to improve.

Be it through their breeding stock, be it through their cattle management, whether they're managing calve in seasons, whether they're healthwise, health programs, whatever else they may be.

I see that improving with family operations especially.

- I work in the areas of soil fertility and soil conservation.

So I'm in the area of soil fertility I really work to implement applied research related to creating the right rates, the right sources, the right timing and placement of fertilizers to optimize production.

And then in the area of soil conservation, we're really working on building practices that sustain soil for use by future generations.

So practices like cover cropping and conservation tillage.

So my program we do a lot of research with cover crops, which are crops that are grown when a cash crop is not actively growing, and that provides some level of benefit to the soil.

So that could be at the base level, it could be protecting the soil against erosion.

When we have fields that are barren during the winter time, that leaves them susceptible to eroding when heavy rainfalls come down.

So if we have a good cover crop out on the soil that helps protect it.

And then also just kind of building up the biology of the soil, the organic matter of content, the organic matter content in the soil, because that over time helps to build productivity.

In the area of cover crops and conservation tillage, we're working to find cover crop systems which work with a specific crop production system.

So the primary cash crops that I'm working with are cotton, peanuts, corn, soybean.

So what cash crop or what cover crops can we grow when those cash crops aren't actively growing to provide some level of benefit to the following cash crop?

So many of our soils within the state of Alabama are historically eroded and degraded just due to historic practices that were used in the late 1800s and early 1900s.

So there was a lot of tillage back then, there was not cover cropping and that left the soil prone to erosion when heavy rainfalls came down.

Some of the practices that we can use to help build up soils include cover cropping and conservation tillage.

So when you stack on the fact that we have historically eroded soils and also our soils just due to the hot humid climate of this region they don't have a high organic matter content, they don't have a high nutrient holding capacity or water holding capacity compared to some soils for instance in the Midwest of the United States.

So any practices that we can use to improve the profitability, improve the fertility, improve resiliency in times of drought through practices like cover cropping and conservation tillage, are things that we hope will provide some benefit to producers.

Conservation tillage is one way that we can improve soil health in our Alabama soils.

Conservation tillage includes practices which either don't disturb the soil at all, or minimally disturb the soil.

And so instead of if you think about a disc running over the soil, you've got a lot of movement, a lot of turning of the soil, that breaks up our soil structure and accelerates the decomposition of organic matter which is so important for soil health.

So conservation practices again, that may be practices which like no till which don't disrupt the soil at all.

Or practices like strip tillage which only disturb a very small strip of soil that you're gonna plant into.

And then within that strip you plant and you get to see its soil contact, good seed to soil contact.

One of the technologies that's allowed us to do this is just our precision, our precision technology so that we can have accuracy of going through with conservation tillage implement and then planting seed directly in that spot which is a little bit harder to do without that GPS technology.

We've worked to develop a soil health website, Alabama soil health.com and that website provides information on the latest research that's been done related to cover crops.

We have fact sheets on management of cover crops for specific species.

So for example if you're interested in planting cereal rye, you can go to the website and find the appropriate planning depth, seeding rate, all those management practices that are important for planting cover crops.

And we also have some videos of our producers who have excelled at using cover crops and have worked on implementing in their system.

So that's one of our biggest accomplishments.

I think in extension related to soil health we've also tried to have some field days where we show some of our current research at the various research stations throughout the state and work with producers to find out what the next steps are in terms of what research we need to be doing.

Again, we're out here at Lazenby Farms.

Today we have a large research project that's gonna take place at three farms throughout the state.

One of them being Lazenby Farms to look at how we can work on getting cover crops in earlier, so that they can produce more biomass and hopefully provide more benefits in terms of improving soil health.

- We use full precision ag here at the farm.

We have RTK grade technology, GPS which means we can plant within so bench of every pius here at the farm.

The onset of precision ag has not only made us more profitable on acre, but it has made the man hour a lot easier.

It's a lot, it's not as taxing on the body to sit in a tractor for 12 hours when you've got something driving it for you.

Then if you were sitting on the tractor for 12 hours and you had to do everything and turn the steering wheel every time it had to be turned.

So it has helped a lot more on the human aspect of it and taking the human error out of farming so we can plant and harvest a lot more efficiently.

My relationship with the extension goes back to when I was a very young kid.

I grew up in North Alabama and was always around the station and grew up on a small family farm and always had a extension agent to fall back on and always answer questions whether it was a pest or a weed or what was the problem.

And coming up I eventually went to Auburn and have a degree from Auburn and extension's always been a part of what we've done my whole life.

The extension service for the state of Alabama along with Auburn University is a crucial aspect of agriculture inside of Alabama.

They work alongside with us, I view them more as a partner in our quest to be profitable and to make a living farming in the state of Alabama.

We need them to come up with new products and new ways to do things that we just really don't have time to do because we're focused on making a living and making a profit farming in the State.

The extension service in the state of Alabama is a service provided to us that is actually to the farmer is almost free of cost to us.

So it is a service that we're paying for anyway that I think all farmers need to take use of, 'cause it's there you need to use it and let them their experience and their knowledge work for you on your farm.

- SNAP-Ed is a statewide team of passionate extension educators.

We're all working together toward a common goal and that's to cultivate a healthier Alabama.

SNAP-Ed provides nutrition and physical activity education through hands-on interactive lessons throughout communities.

We also have online resources where people can go and learn about healthy recipes or learn about various nutrition topics.

And then we take it a step further beyond the individual and we really wanna look at how can we make Alabama a healthier place to live.

So we also do a lot of community based projects to increase access to healthy foods in places that maybe don't have as much access to fresh fruits and vegetables.

We think about how we can increase access to physical activity in places that may not have safe well at parks or sidewalks.

So SNAP-Ed really does a lot of whole community approach work when we think about health and wellness.

Body Quest is one of our flagship programs.

It is an evidence based award-winning school based program, where we teach kids and their parents about nutrition and physical activity, encourage them to not be afraid to try new foods and try new activities as a family that will promote their health.

Every year 34 different extensions now that are educators, go into elementary schools and teach the Body Quest program to over 6,000 students and their parents.

We hear from students and parents and teachers every year that Body Quest is effective and their children are trying new foods.

But most importantly is that we do a statewide evaluation where we actually do pretest and post test and measure changes in students who have learned from Body Quest and compare them with students who haven't yet had Body Quest.

So for several years in a row now we've been able to show that students who've gone through the Body Quest program, eat more fruits and vegetables offered through the school lunch program.

And they also report lower amounts of screen time, lower sugar sweetened beverage consumption, higher physical activity.

And so we see real impacts from our statewide evaluation for the Body Quest program.

So we know that what we're doing is making a difference.

- There are many components to Body Quest which include the weekly vegetable tastings, the card sorting activities, and the iPad lessons.

All of these lessons are accompanied by warriors.

These Body Quest warriors help the Body Quest students learn all about all of the different food groups which include fruits, vegetables, grains, and meat, beans, and milk.

The parent component of Body Quest is all about giving weekly tips and tricks from our text messaging program, as well as getting recipes that the kids and the families can do in their home every week.

The quest for healthy school program, is another component of Body Quest.

It is a whole school component, where the school gets together and does a health assessment.

In that health assessment they learn about ways that they can help the school, and letting the students environment be a healthier place to learn and be a healthier place to be more physically active.

The results of the school health assessment lead to bike rodeos, brain breaks in the classroom and healthier ways to incorporate healthy snacks in the schools and aspects like that.

We also do a lot of work outside of the school in the community system.

And in the community, SNAP-Ed educators work in food retail stores, grocery stores, and community and school gardens which we really try to make a huge impact on the way people promote physical activity and healthy foods in the community.

- So for my job, I travel across the whole state of Alabama and I assist beekeepers and agents who are working with beekeepers.

Alabama actually has a long and deep history with beekeeping.

The State has a storied history with raising queens, producing honey.

There are even USDA records going back into the 19 teens showing Alabama's mastery of beekeeping.

Beekeeping is a profitable industry in Alabama.

But because of the laws that Alabama has concerning beekeeping in AB areas, we don't have any of the really large businesses.

Most beekeepers in Alabama are hobbyists or small business or organic farming.

Our major contribution every year is the Annual Alabama Beekeepers' Symposium.

We'll be doing it for the 26th time in February, 2021.

This is a really large event.

We bring in speakers from across the United States, and we also feature a really large vendor floor.

The vendor floor is actually very important.

It's not just for people to make money, but to make certainly the Alabama beekeepers have access to all the newest tools and are able to say hold an instrument that they might need or think of instead of just having to click on a picture.

This does a lot of help.

And also they can interface with experts and network with each other across the State.

And then we also have speaking engagements across the State.

Myself, Alison Shabel, Danny Carroll, and Dr. Jeffrey Williams, we all cooperate to cover speaking in the state of Alabama.

We also cooperate with the master Beekeepers Association in Alabama and work with them.

And then we also help create and support local beekeeping associations across the State to help people get local mentorship and support in beekeeping.

Bee products and the businesses that are associated with them are important in pretty much every nation across the globe.

Here in Alabama that doesn't count any less.

Just honey production is very important.

Someone with only a handful of hives in a backyard, can still turn a tiny profit on honey just by itself.

Other ideas that you can work with are waxes and the lotions, cosmetics, and bombs that they produce.

Then there is also propolis and candles.

And then you can also sell bees themselves.

We're always constantly short of actual livestock and beekeeping.

So producing colonies, packaged bees and nucleus hives, is a big deal.

And then there's the production of woodwork.

So people who are skilled in woodworking actually produce hives and hive parts and other equipment for beekeepers to use, if they don't happen to be quite so handy themselves.

Well we're civil servants and we are available by phone by email and also supply various ways to get specimens and information to us even now in the time of COVID.

So text in pictures of problems that beekeepers have so that we can identify them and help them get over them.

Other things that we do is we supply a really excellent webinar right now called At Home Beekeeping.

If you go to the aces.edu website and search At Home Beekeeping, you can see the list of speakers that we have at any one time.

We have one a month, the last Tuesday of each month.

And these features specialists from across the entire Southern tier of States, it's very pointed towards the Southern state beekeeper.

So this is really special.

We have all these universities working together to bring this information to Alabama and across the South.

- The mission of the Alabama Cooperative Extension System, which combines both Auburn and Alabama and A&M, is to provide you as a resident with the information you need to make good decisions.

This is gonna be research based information that's unbiased.

You will be able to make a good decision that's right for you and your family, and hopefully it'll improve your economy and your quality of life.

And so extension is all about you.