So the Alabama Agricultural Experiment Station is a research enterprise research institution that was established by the Alabama legislature in 1883.

So we were authorized by state statute, and we are separately funded at Auburn University.

Our objective is to conduct research on agricultural problems for the purpose of improving the agricultural sector and making it more profitable and sustainable.

So we've been at this work since 1883.

Interestingly, in 1887, the federal government Congress decided that there was a need to invest in agricultural universities at the land grant universities.

And so the Hatch Act was passed.

So the Experiment Station is today funded by both state funds and federal funds for the purpose of conducting research.

One very fortunate thing about the Hatch Act is that some of that funding is used to support collaborative research across states.

And so this is what we call our Hatch multistate projects.

And so it's a way of advancing agricultural research in the states and across our nation.

so as director of the Alabama Agricultural Experiment Station, I oversee an enterprise, that has about 90 faculty members, 90 faculty FTEs about 318 staff members both on campus and out across the state.

In the state, we've got about 95 staff members.

And as an enterprise, that's about a $63 million enterprise in terms of our annual budget.

And out at our outlying stations, we're conducting about 600 experiments per year.

And so I oversee that and that enterprise.

I'm aided and supported by some some key colleagues.

Dr. Art Appel serves as associate director of the Experiment Station.

Mr. Greg Pate serves as director of our outlying units.

And so he really oversees all the research activities out across the state.

Dr. Appell really focuses on research activities on campus.

In addition, each one of the deans of the other experiment station colleges serves as an associate director.

So it's really coordinating all of this research activity that the director does and and that branches into many areas.

So it's it's not only managing, it's managing people, it's managing facilities.

It also more recently is involved real estate transactions, as we just recently acquired a new research site in Autaugaville Alabama, that we'll developing into a new experiment station.

So we make sure that all of the stations have what they need for the project.

If they need specialized equipment, plot, combine harvesters for growing crops or special handling equipment for cattle, those kind of things, we make sure that they have the resources they need to complete the project before we initiate that on the station.

So that may involve anything from small plot research equipment that's very specialized.

Today, we're using drones for research.

Robotics is becoming a bigger element of that, but we still have traditional methods of of collecting data.

We still do ratings by visual ratings.

We still weigh plots those kind of things.

So scales.

And then we have to analyze the material that comes out of that.

So we may employ specific equipment to tell us the elemental makeup of plant materials or or soil samples and those kind of things.

So some is very specialized and some is just general farm equipment that we use in a research setting.

And so we actually have 18 properties that are managed by the experiment station.

At each one of our experiment stations.

We are across our experiment stations.

We conduct research really in three broad areas.

One is in row crops and that includes soybeans, cotton, corn, those types of wheat.

We also conduct research on horticultural crops, and this includes both ornamental crops and fruit and vegetable crops.

And so that work is done across the state.

And finally, we do work on beef cattle across our experiment stations or our outlying units.

Now, on campus, we also do research on poultry, which is our biggest enterprise in Alabama's agriculture.

And we our research efforts are also doing laboratory research on other aspects as it relates to either row crops, beef cattle production or horticultural crops.

So the regional model is was created for the purpose of being able to share, share information and share resources, equipment, personnel and those kind of things.

Their basic model is a geographic model.

There's four regions based on where they are in the state, but within each one of those regions we represent those three main elements of row crops, cattle and horticulture.

Every region has those three elements representing within it.

The regional directors are able to communicate with their associate directors on station and then communicate together to share, not just among stations within a region, but across regions as well.

That makes us more efficient and effective in the work that we do.

We're able to spread the workload across the state as appropriate and to the different stations.

That makes us be more productive.

As North Regional Director, I take care of most of the administrative duties here at Tennessee Valley and over sand Mountain Research and Extension Center.

I work with the associate directors of those stations to approve and and assign projects, work with them on personnel issues, manage budgets, help them to secure resources and share resources across the region.

in North Alabama region we have four stations, three of which are active.

Sand Mountain Research and Extension Center over in Crossville, Alabama, does mainly corn, soybeans and cattle research.

Tennessee Valley Research and Extension Center, where we are now, does cotton, corn, soybeans, wheat, barley and cattle research.

The Upper Coastal Plain AG Research Center is under a memorandum of understanding with the College of Veterinary Medicine, and that station is used to source cattle for various research projects with the with the College of Veterinary Medicine.

The fourth station is not operational, it's been shut down is in Coleman, Alabama.

It used to be the north Alabama horticulture Research Center.

As I said presently, it is inactive.

So in the north region where we differ from the rest of the state in that we have several different soil types up here.

You go from the Appalachian Plains over up at Sand Mountain to the Tennessee Valley, soils here around the Tennessee River to over in Winfield at Upper Coastal Plain, you have obviously the coastal plain soils and some floodplain type soils over there.

So they differ in soil types.

They differ just a little bit in climate from the rest of Alabama, where since we're further north, we have a little cooler temperatures in the winter, we have a little bit shorter growing season than the south Alabama counties in the south region, the west and central regions at most of our stations, we we try to have field days throughout the year.

They are seasonal.

We do some Spring field days, we do some in the summer, we do some in the fall.

In the past we've had beef and forage field days, row, crop field days, so some irrigation field days that we've had.

We do some here, we've done some, weed symptomology field days and by field days I mean we bring in specialists from Auburn to talk about their individual projects.

We invite the public not only from the direct, the immediate area here, but across the region.

They will travel to the different stations and to attend those field days.

We talk about cattle at the beef and forage field days.

We talk about the forages that theyre theyre grazing on.

We talk about any supplemental feeding that we do to those the row crop field days.

We talk about the different crops that are grown in that area.

We talk about weed controlling weeds, controlling insects, we talk about nutrient management and, and pushing yields and those type things for those those crops.

So when you have these field days, it gives the growers and the other attendees an opportunity to actually put hands on what you're trying to show them in the north Alabama region, we have several of the top producing counties in the state, in Limestone, in Madison, Combe and the DeKalb Marshall counties.

There.

They're all top producers in either row crops, some type of row crop or in cattle or poultry, the poultry industry.

So having these field days, as I say, it gives gives the public an opportunity to see what we do, what research we're doing at Auburn University, how it can impact the agricultural and agriculture in their area.

But for the producers, it it gives them opportunity to see new varieties of corn, soybeans, wheat.

South Alabama would be peanuts.

It gives them the opportunity to see these new varieties, those that are developing, they can use that to make choices for their farms that are in that same region.

Maybe select some different varieties from what they have grown in the past to help push the yields and produce more and economically impact their operations.

Have a staff of six so I will oversee them for their day to day activities.

I kind of like the I guess the quarterback.

I call the call the plays.

And then we we try to set goals and we try to execute those every week.

So, you know, as far as timing and things, I kind of will let them know when we need to harvest what and I will go out and check the different plots.

You know, today we're going to harvest some soybeans and they were they're ready now, so we got to get them out of the field.

But, um, there are other varieties that aren't quite ready yet.

So, you know, making sure everything gets carried out in a timely fashion.

So, um, and then I also will compile the data that we get off of our plots and, and get that back to the PIs and all of our record keeping as far as everything that happens on a field.

We keep up with the record of that and make that available back to the researchers.

So if they are curious about when we applied nitrogen or when we or what field work we did in the fall or whatever, we can make that available to them.

So So we have a variety of different row crop projects and they all have different emphasis is what they might be looking for.

So some of them might be a nutrient study or a nitrogen study where they use different rates of fertilizers and that kind of thing to to see how that might affect the outcome.

And another option I guess would be they may look at insect pressure and, what kind of different insecticide rates and things would, would be beneficial.

We also have some weed studies here, so they will look at different herbicide rates to see what might be the most effective to control troublesome weeds.

and there's just a, a wide variety of different aspects in crop production that they will, we'll look at to see, to really give enough information to make a economical decision for agriculture producers across our region.

So that that's really our focus is to set these experiments up with parameters we need to fail.

So that the producer doesn't, you know, we can convey to them what worked and what didn't, and that allows them to to pick solutions that might best fit their farm, um, based on our research.

for me, the big draw was, being involved in something outside, um, being able to get my hands dirty and produce something that was I feel like is beneficial.

So the work that we do here.

But, but not only that, but even just in agriculture in general, producing a crop that has a use in the end, whether it be for food or for clothing or whatever the case may be, it seems like it's gratifying as a gratifying work.

So.

So in my position, I cover three, three experiment stations.

I go with the Chilton Research and Extension Center, the Black Belt Research and Extension Center in Marion Junction and the Prattville Agricultural Research Unit in Prattville.

So the the West central region is somewhat unique, primarily due to the black belt being in this region and the unique soils that the Black Belt has.

You know, we've got soils that are more clay type soils that, you know, have a highest rank swell content.

Um, the, the soil, the, the plants we grow here, the are just unique.

You don't see them in a lot of different places around the state.

The grasses we grow don't grow in other areas.

And a lot of grass is grown in other areas don't grow well here.

And that kind of separates the black belt station out.

But we've also got the Chilton Station, which is outside of Clanton, and that station's primary focus is on Peaches and which is unique to Chilton County.

For the Chilton County Peaches.

So that kind of sets that station apart.

And in Prattville, it's just primarily just a row crop station growing cotton and soybeans and corn.

The experiment stations have always been a vital part of for agriculture to, to move forward and to grow and to improve it.

They these are areas where things are tested and evaluated before they're introduced into the commercial market, you know, whether it be varieties, certain technologies, those things are evaluated here before a farmer risk his money on it.

We risk hours to evaluate it, make sure it's going be a good fit for the American farmer.

So as far as beef cattle that those projects would all in the west central region would all be here at the Black Belt station in Marion Junction.

We have a forage fertility project where we're trying to determine the fertility value from feeding byproduct feeds to cattle.

Basically, how much fertility value are we getting on the pastures that is passed through to cattle after she eats the feed?

We've done that.

This past summer we did a grazing study using native warm season grasses and how to trying to figure out ways to best manage those grasses.

And then within the last few years, we did a study relating to the different weaning methods of weaning calves beef calves and trying to evaluate those and tracing those cash performance all the way through the feed yard and into the slaughter phase.

My my day to day essential duties are basically overseeing the daily operations here at the Research and Extension center.

It's kind of like managing a farm.

Our day to day operations include tending to the cattle.

As far as tending to them.

We'll be checking water, we're checking the cows, checking for the any kind of health problems we might have during calving season.

We're tagging calves, um, with the row crops we're either planting or harvesting.

We may be scouting for insects, spraying for weeds putting up hay.

We cut, rake and bale hay here to feed the cows in the winter time and feeding feed to the cows in the winter time as well.

We're we're kind of in between seasons on our on our projects, but our, our current projects, we have a, a warm season native grass grazing project that we're we've completed one year.

I think we've got another year of just to try to utilize some grazing potential of the native grasses in this area.

another project is a is a grazing study where we're measuring the fertility through feeding by product feeds, through the cattle.

What kind of what kind of fertility that that the feed is providing.

Processing through the cattle is manure to fertilize the pasture the grazing project has to do with the fertility of the the pasture itself and kind of measuring the value of what you're feeding as a feed stuff to the cow and what is what is what is caught contributing to the fertility of the pasture and giving it the ability to grow more grass.

with the high prices of fertilizer, if you could change up something that you were feeding the cattle, maybe you could you could feed something a little bit better to fertilize your pastures and grow a little bit more grass.

A good candidate to to work at a place like this would be somebody that enjoys being outside, somebody that enjoys agriculture, somebody that has attention to detail, because we're we're essentially a farm.

But we we have to we have to manage it at a more detail level than just your average farm as far as collecting data and measuring things.

So, yeah, somebody that somebody that likes the outdoors and likes agriculture maybe doesn't have a farm of their own, this would allow them to be around it.

the experiment station is important to the agriculture and forestry industries because it provides information to, to growers and foresters about practices that they might can implement into their business to to improve their business.

Well, the Research extension center is an experiment state.

Well, as part of the experiment station system to start in 1948.

It was started here by Mr. Chip Carlton to assist one of the peach growers here in Chilton County, he was an extension agent who is up here.

And he said the peach growers needed some help.

So he, uh, he told them down there in Auburn that they needed an experiment station up here and they they gave him the option of three locations, and this is the location they picked out.

mainly what we're here for is tree fruit, but we deal with a lot of other things other than tree fruits.

Of course, we have peaches Everybody knows Chilton County's a Peach County.

But here on this station, we deal with a little bit of everything from small fruit, from strawberries to blackberries.

We have blueberries and it comes on up.

The fruits and vegetables, you know, grow a lot of cucumbers, watermelons, cantaloupes, tomatoes.

There are a lot with IPM which is integrated past management.

So, You know, the work, the work that we do here is very important for the agricultural industry and the community.

You know, here in Chilton County alone, you know, we've always been known as the Peach County.

Now, you know, maybe the peach numbers are dwindling compared to what they were, you know, 20 or 30 years ago.

But there's still people out there making a living doing that.

And, you know, it's really important that we're there to deal with the issues that they're dealing with.

And, you know, it's better for us to spend our money on it, find out it's a failure than them spend their money on it, go out of business and talk about the Armillaria issue that we had with peaches.

That's just not here in Chilton County issue.

That's a whole south east issue.

That's a whole North American issue.

When it comes to Yellowstone fruit production, everybody deals with it because it is pretty much everywhere.

So you can help people here in the county, but it can help people throughout the US as well.

A lot of stuff that we do, its about survivability.

Is what it's about is dealing with soil born fungus, Armillariam root rot.

it's common name is oak root rot and something that's really impacting the peach industry.

Once you replant an orchard, once you plant an orchard disease as a fungus, it's in the soil and you plant your orchard and that fungus will spread across your orchard and might not kill that orchard out.

But the next time that you come in and plant it infects your next orchard quicker.

So your longevity of your orchards, the more you replant, get shorter and shorter.

And so we've got now as to where your peach orchard.

We have some places in the county they won't live eight years Armillaria will kill it.

So so the study that we have on going with that is going with the resistant root stalk peaches, you know, they're all asexually reproduced or basically theyre budded.

But you know, all your varieties are budded to be genetically the same.

And so basically what you're doing is grafting the variety that you want on, the root stalk, and the root has what you're looking for, which is your disease resistance.

And the main purpose of that study would be survivability of peach orchards try and bring more return to the grower for the amount of money that they have put in to establish an orchard is to help the peach tree survive longer.

Basically, and integrated pest management as a whole system, uh, to control a pest is not just spraying, but it's scouting its using other controls such as trap crop, uh, biological controls, cultural controls such as keeping the place clean, uh, where the pest you know, just don't feel welcome there, you know?

And.

And then the final result, it'd be a pesticide application and another thing working with pesticides.

We have a strawberry study that'll be going in in a few weeks.

It's, uh, through IR4 And IR4 is something that helps special needs, you know, specialty crops.

When they like to have issue or like, trying to solve it.

And that goes through pesticide labeling.

Maybe there's something already out there, but it don't have a label for this specific crop.

So we have a study going and we're going to be putting down herbicide on strawberries and they're going to check it to make sure it's safe on the strawberries and then they're going to check the residuals on the fruit and make sure that it's safe for the consumer.

So we work with stuff like that.

Well, a lot of our equipment is mostly specialized equipment toward growing fruits and vegetables.

You know, the equipment we use is going by stuff like orchard tractors and air blast sprayers.

You know, where as you go to a larger research farm doing row crops, they're going to have combines and row gators or so a lot of our stuff is a little bit downsized and what other people run.

But yeah, it's air blast sprayers small tractors.

We have high tunnels here.

We don't have any greenhouses and a high tunnel that is kind of like a greenhouse, except it's not heated or cooled You do it by removing the plastic or either you either got to push the plastic up and vent it and things of that nature, or you just put the plastic on it just for the season that you need the protection and then you remove it.

So we work a lot with that.

We have shade structures here.

We have some blackberries under shade structure, blackberries and raspberries, actually.

And you know, that's to help them help keep them cooled during the summertime.

And it seems to help production out.

So most of my works outside.

You know, I kinda take a hands on approach with this whole deal.

You know, I don't necessarily tell you what you have to do, you know, to be a director and all that.

But.

But that's what I really like.

I like the equipment.

I like working on things.

I like to get out.

I like get dirty.

You know, I'm I'm not the type to sit inside.

But I started working here in March in 1999, when I was in high school, Mr. Jim Pitts he was a director here at the station, and I was playing basketball.

His daughter played basketball too.

Well, my dad, he was ag teacher.

they always talk during the basketball game.

Mr. Pitts told him, Bring me over here, and and he'd hire me on part time, you know, during the summer, during spring break.

So I got on here during the summer, during spring break.

I worked here through the two summers till I got out of high school.

When I got out of high school, I just come back working over here and, you know, I kept working here through junior college.

I worked all day and I went to school at night.

And then when I got out of junior college, I went down, I transferred to Auburn and I just continued working here and I worked for Auburn.

I work for Bill Golf on pecans when I was in Auburn, and when I got out of Auburn in 2005, I come back to work here and I got hired on as a research assistant and I worked as a research assistant until 2018 and Mr. Pitts retired and I've been director.

I got hired on as director in 2018 and been director ever since.

So So I was the director at the Plant Science Research Center for 17 years.

Greg Pate, the director of research operations, developed the regional model in 2020 and announced that at our meeting.

And I was really excited for a change and a challenge.

So I applied for the position and I started in June of 2022.

So I've been there almost two years now.

day to day, my my position is to develop and support the East Central team, help with the research projects as they need me to review everyone and troubleshoot if they need me to help.

I also, if there is a problem, develop a standard operating procedure to ensure that we are producing quality data for our researchers and then we oversee budgets, develop our staff, plan for building repairs or equipment needs, and then just look towards the future where the stations are going to go.

typically Category one experiment station appointed professors are the ones who get priority to use the unit, and that would be in the College of AG College of vet med, Co Sam College of Human Sciences and then Forestry Wildlife and Environment.

Past category one, we do have a two and a three and they follow as far as placing an experiment.

When we get that in, the Associate Director looks at it and decides if they can support it.

By support it, it means that the crop fits culturally we have the equipment, we have the budget, and we think that we can make that project successful.

If we can we place it.

If it doesn't look like it fits in our region, then each regional director works with one another to find placement for that project elsewhere.

the regional model has been set up for each region to house cattle row crop and horticultural research.

The Plant Science Research Center is our horticultural model here, but they also support row crop research and serve as an incubator or starting point for some of our field research.

We have EV Smith that actually comprises four distinct units.

We have the Field Crops Unit that is a small plot research on row crops and weeds and agricultural maintenance.

We have farm services that is large scale research and I believe it's the only one of its kind in the whole experiment station system.

Their research projects, or at least an acre or more.

They also support the Yara incubator farm, which is a relationship we have with private industry to generate information and research on soil health and fertility.

We have the beef unit that has 1200 acres.

We have a station herd that we use to support any type of research project that comes in.

And then we have the plant breeding unit, which is the last unit at EV Smith There's a part of that that's directed solely for plant breeding for crops such as soybeans, cotton, peanuts.

And then we have a blueberry side on the horticultural side of that unit.

So they also support blueberries, strawberries and all types of other vegetable crops.

The Piedmont Research Station is unique in that it is shared by two departments the College of Forestry, Wildlife and Environment has 400 acres in high fence that supports deer, a long term deer study.

But we're also doing some crop road crop research with deer abatement there.

The other side of that unit has a long term beef cattle project In the call for the college of Animal Sciences.

That project also supplies animals for further research across the state.

The last one we have in the units are the Turnipseed-Ikenberry Station in Union Springs, but it is currently inactive.

But in the past it has supported some hunting for veterans.

So it's it's used in that manner.

Some things that set us apart from the other regions is our accessibility within the region and from campus.

So we're use a lot for teaching and demonstration for classes as well as the research projects.

And as I mentioned, I think we're the only the only region that has large crop research.

We have the incubator farm, we have the the ability to do deer abatement studies as well as a lot of breeding projects that others do not have the ability to do.

One example of a project that we are taking care of at EV Smith at the plant breeding unit is the peanut drought study.

So Dr. Chen is our peanut breeder and he, along with Dr. Sanz, have been working on peanut varieties that will combat drought.

So we've got four high tunnels that we'll actually there are rain, shelter so that can control the amount of water that the peanuts get.

Dr. Sanz is looking at the physiological aspect of the plant, along with the breeder.

And we can do that at the plant breeding unit because we have both of those people there working on projects and we have the soil type to provide support for the peanuts, plus the peanut equipment that's needed to harvest plants and take care of the project.

So today we are here in this, uh, experiment that we have behind.

They are the rain out shelters.

And we are doing a experiment right now that is funded by a USDA NIFA, and we are investigating what are the physiological factors that influence in peanut drought tolerance.

These rain out shelters are highly equipped with, uh, a lot of equipment.

So we have these, these four structors that they are going to basically close when it rains and open when it doesn't.

To do that, we need to have motors.

We need to have a solar panel that gives energy to the motors to open and close, but also inside of the shelters.

We have a lot of other instruments to try to understand how peanuts react to to drought.

So we have a soil sensors that are telling us, uh, the moisture of the soil about every 5 minutes.

We also have, uh, root, uh, cameras or root tubes that go into the soil and allow us to put a camera and take pictures any time that we want.

So that's a very high technology equipment.

so we also have, uh, equipment that measures plant photosynthesis it measures, plant photosynthesis at the leaf level.

These are equipments that they are about, uh, $50,000 each.

We have five of these that allow us to go into the peanuts and clamp the leaves and measure the photosynthesis of the plant.

Mhm.

By the minute.

Okay.

And this is basically the main objective of our experiment, we are measuring how the photosynthesis and transpiration of the peanuts react to drought basically at a daily, almost daily basis, weekly, but almost daily basis for some cases.

the Photosynth measurements that, uh, my students take with those machines they are pretty time consuming.

Uh, each measurement can take between 3 to 5 and 5 minutes.

We are measuring every day about 150.

So that is a lot of time.

And we are measuring this every day.

The problem with these measurements is that they can be very variable depending on the on the weather and the plants, species, etc.

So you will have to stay there measuring all the time.

That's why we are collaborating with other people, like, for example, Dr. McGee, with the drone that with the thermal image, because plants, when they transpire, they are going to cool off the surface of the leaf or the surface of the canopy, and you can measure that transpiration with the machines that we use in the in the leaf.

But you can also do that with a thermal image.

So you can take a thermal image with the thermal camera that is like kind of like your phone and you go and take a picture, but that is still kind of slow and you have to do plot by plot.

So what we are doing with Dr. McGee is using drones.

with a thermal image that can take pictures super fast, like in 3 minutes, all the fields is taken in a position to maybe an hour or 2 hours.

That is a great advantage Well, I've been fortunate in my position to be able to support students and faculty in all sorts of areas.

We were already doing some drone work and multi-spectral and thermal with more traditional style drones, but we really saw the need to collect regular data on regular intervals.

And so we learned about this dock system.

And as far as we know, we were the first university in the country to install one of these.

And so I saw a problem and I thought of a potential opportunity to fix it and to be a part of the solution.

And so the department head, thankfully, was was supportive of that and we were able to get involved.

every day we fly the drone and it goes on a predetermined mission.

We're here watching it, but it does fly on a predetermined mission every day and it collects the thermal data for the peanut study in about three or 4 minutes so it can capture the entire plot instead of doing manual capture, which in the past would have taken three or 4 hours.

This one is equipped with RTK which means traditional GPS is accurate to about three or four feet.

RTK is accurate, improves the GPS accuracy to about two or three centimeters.

And so we know that the picture of each plot from day to day is the same picture throughout the throughout the season.

We know that water is one of the most difficult resources for growers to manage, and selecting cultivars that are more drought tolerant helps manage that and it applies to peanuts, it applies to to other crops I begin to serve this role in June of 2023, and my essential duties are helping researchers and faculty bring their research ideas to life.

I maintain and improve the facility here and manage day to day operations with our amazing staff.

so day to day can be really unpredictable.

Essentially, we're catering to the needs of the research, and so some days it could be that the control system has an error and I need to rewire the communication lines in that or we could be redoing the irrigation system in another greenhouse or scouting for insects, things like that.

So every day is unpredictable We host a wide variety of research here from plant pathological studies and nematological studies.

Seed increases, herbicide studies, biochar effects.

And so in order for me to decide what research happens here, I kind of figure out like the feasibility of success within our space.

So factors include, um, how long do they need the space, how big will the plants get in their space, what type of plant it is, are they working with biological agents like pathogens or fungi, and do they have the state authorization forms for those things?

what temperature do they need?

It?

So things like that help me determine if they'll be successful here.

The PSRC was especially poised to host this blueberry project.

They were looking for an alternate cropping system to showcase different ways blueberries can be produced in Alabama.

And we already had this incredible pot and pot system built, and that's where in a pot in pot system, the each plant is potted into two pots.

Essentially, the first pot is buried down into the ground to the rim, and then the second pot is where the plant is planted.

And we insert that pot into the empty pot, plant it into the field.

And so that creates an insulated environment for a containerized plant production.

So an advantage of growing blueberries in a pot and pot system is that we are able to really control a few things about the plant.

One, we can help mitigate the size, keep the plant smaller, we can control the potting media.

blueberries require an especially low ph and we can curate that with a customized growing media.

We can add drip irrigation, specialized nutrients.

And so it does create kind of a more controlled environment for virtually any type of plant production.

I think this is the over 300 blueberry plants and in a typical conventional setting These blueberries would be spaced, you know, bigger apart, the plants would get bigger.

So this does allow for a tighter growing system which could help in the future when we have limited growing spaces and farming being moved into more urban areas.

We also have another project here, the Strawberry Greenhouse Project, and that aims to demonstrate the viability of Green House strawberry production in Alabama.

the greenhouses have a lot of really cool technology.

We love our Wadsworth Invirus step system.

It is a smart control system that is connected to a weather station on the top of the greenhouse here.

And based on the parameters that we set for each of our 12 zones and the weather data that the weather station provides, this will automatically open and close louvers turn on fans, turn on heaters, turn on the cooling system.

If it's raining, it will immediately start closing the vents to prevent rain from entering the facility.

It's really smart and very cool.

In the southern region, we have five research stations, four of them are currently active, the one that's in Active's in Monroeville, and we have it's 80 acres.

We have a planted pine stand on it and we're only harvesting the pine straw there for income.

The other four stations in our region are Gulf Coast Research and Extension Center, which is 800 acres, and it's located in Fairhope, Alabama.

And here we have cattle, we have row crops and we have horticultural research on this site.

We have the Ornamental Horticulture Research Center located over in Mobile.

It's 17 acres on that station.

It's primarily there to support the whole container horticulture industry.

In Mobile County we have the Brewton AG and Research Unit located in Brewton, Alabama.

It is a station that's 80 acres and it primarily supports row crop research as well as some horticulture research.

Located in Headland, Alabama, we have the Wiregrass Research and Extension Center.

It's about 650 acres and it's also like the Gulf Coast supports agriculture, agrinomic research, horticulture, research, as well as cattle research.

So we have about three different positions on the research stations that the starting position will be a research technician.

That position doesn't require a degree.

Uh, it's a high school education position.

Then we have research assistants as well as the associate directors on the stations.

Those positions require at least a bachelor's, a master's is preferred for those positions, but bachelors with the relevant experience can get you into those positions.

The regional director position is a master's required position and ten plus years of experience A lot of our projects in this region tend to be focused on disease and insect pests, and that's really because we live along the Gulf Coast.

We have rainfall of on average of 67 inches a year.

We have high humidity and that environment is inducive of of diseases and insects for a longer growing season.

We have a growing season that's longer than anywhere in the state and so it allows us to do that kind of research here along the Gulf Coast.

this farm is currently at 800 acres.

We are have around 50 to 75 projects on this farm.

We've got a team of seven people and we all work together on the projects.

We're all like to be hands on.

We do everything from layout of the plots to planting the plots, maintaining the plots and as far as applying fertilizer and pesticides, according to the outline.

And then we'll haul some someone harvest them usually I or another gentleman will harvest his plots, collect data and get the data back to the researcher currently we're doing research on diseases, fertility variety trials.

They're very good for our climate because of all the wet weather.

We have mild winters, a lot of diseases over winter here, And same thing with weeds.

weeds may not freeze out until December and they start germinating in early March and you have long time for plants to germinate, produce seeds.

And that's a lot of weed pressure.

And as far as varieties, it's good to look at the how varieties are affected by our climate.

So we're pretty unique in the environment.

So while we're the smallest station out of the outlying units, we're the only ornamental outlying unit, which makes us a little different from doing row crops, cattle and other traditional agriculture.

Instead, we focus on the ornamental nursery industry in Sims, Alabama.

We have about 70 nurseries in that area, so it's one of the largest concentrations of ornamental nurseries in the state.

So we're here to cater to them in any needs they might have.

So we're in a unique spot.

We're in one of the most expensive zip codes in Mobile.

With that being said, we still have 16 acres.

We also grow on sand, which is difficult.

And that's kind of what makes this area special, is we have solid sand for our soil substrates so for us, for the container production it's going to be either in the field, on nursery pads or in greenhouses.

We do both.

We have three different styles of greenhouses.

We have Quonset plastic high tunnels and glass greenhouses.

Luckily, we should be looking to replace our glass greenhouses with more modern plastic houses.

Due to technology changing, it's not widely used anymore in the industry.

Down here we are hurricane prone and hurricanes love glass things, so we're trying to get away from that because they're just not used widely in the industry anymore.

So we're trying to switch more to plastic high tunnels.

So with what we do, we're, we're geared to help the ornamental industry.

And when I say that, I mean we do anything from fertilizer trials, pesticide trials, anything to make a better transplant or a better plant, or just give them a faster turnaround with that.

We also work with extension private industry and the main campus as well.

And so when we're doing things people like to see that different geographical area, the different soil types.

And so when we do in-ground production, we're able to focus heavily on our soil type here and we also do a variety trials to gear out which plants will grow better in this area, ornamentals are purchased off of the esthetic value.

And so with some plants you can have disease.

You can have some damage to it and you can write that off.

But with Ornamentals, they have to be disease and pest free for the end user.

And so it's esthetics are esthetic death.

If the plant looks a little sick, nobody's going to buy it because it's not esthetically pleasing.

And that's what we're aiming for with Ornamentals.

So there is a large amount of Christmas tree growers from Louisiana over to Georgia and up into the Carolinas and, since the 1980s there's not been any research done on fertility requirements for Christmas trees.

There are growers that are getting eight foot Christmas trees in four years and growers getting eight foot Christmas trees in two years.

And so what we are trying to do is eliminate that variability and figure out what is the correct amount of fertilizer to put out to get that Christmas tree while also not wasting your money by putting too much out.

So four years ago we started an... or we started on a homeowner hops trial where it was to show homeowners how to grow hops used for beer making at home in South Alabama Last year, we received additional funding to make a commercial hops yard where we've been lucky enough to do collaborations with breweries down here to have local beer made with local ingredients.

What we were trying to focus on was four different varieties of hops that could be grown down here in in south Alabama due to our high humidity and high rainfall.

We had three grow successfully and one that did not another study that we have going on right now is fertilizer, longevity and ornamental plants.

So we have private industry come in and work with us about how long should this fertilizer last in this area and how does it affect the plants that are planted in it.

So we grow these plants out using a fertilizer mix has been provided us from the researcher and we grow it out and analyze the plants throughout the year to make sure that everything is matching up with the protocol.

They have assigned to us.

And if not, we relay those results to them so they can tweak and change their fertilizer rates or their fertilizer composition later on down the road.

so we want to to share the information that we gather with all of our stakeholders, whether it be households who are just looking at food quality and they want to be assured that the food that they're eating is safe and and nutritious.

We want to share that information that we have.

We also share that in professional societies with increasing the knowledge base scientifically, we'll share that information with industry stakeholders as well, and our producers that are trying to grow the crops and animals that we have in the state.

So in terms of thinking about the experiment station, I think it's important for the public to remember that agricultural research touches their life on a daily basis.

So through agricultural research, we are working to make food more, more plentiful, more nutritious and safer.

And these are important and affect everybody's lives.

We're also trying to adopt production methods that are better for the environment and conserve our natural resources.

So it's important.

The other thing that I really want to emphasize is that in my opinion, food security is a national security issue.

And so that's very important for us to keep in mind as we we look to the future.

And if there's one cautionary word I would make is that as a nation, I feel that we are underinvesting in agricultural research while our state legislature does a very commendable job in supporting agriculture, research in the United States and Alabama.

Unfortunately, if we look at investments across all the states and by the federal government, we're seeing a decline and of investments in agricultural research which is affecting our competitive position as a national or international leader in agricultural technology.

So today we see China outspending the United States, we see the European outspending the United States on on agricultural research.

And Brazil and India are fast catching up.

So, again, I think it's important for the for the public to recognize agriculture affects their daily lives.

And it's important for our national economy.

And we need to make sure and maintain our competitive position internationally in agricultural research.

So moving forward, as everything in life, is it farming and agriculture changes and it continues to grow and expand at a rate that's very difficult for us to keep up with.

It's important to have the research to maintain the the foundations of what is what we're doing in life, whether it's food or fiber or even building materials.

Those kind of things.

Everything in our life continues to change and we have to be vigilant to stay ahead of some of those things.

We want to be on the forefront of the technology that are available to our stakeholders and be able to help them to effectively and efficiently use that technology as it comes forward.

So we have to continue to grow and expand our operations and they change over time.

The focus elements change depending on the need of the day as we have more people to feed and clothe and house, this will get greater and greater importance as we go along.