News

MISSISSIPPI STATE – Child-care directors may feel alone as they try to manage teachers, families and children, but help is just a phone call away with a toll-free number provided by Mississippi State University.

The Mississippi Child Care Resource & Referral Network supports the unique needs of child-care center directors through a statewide network that offers free educational items and professional development courses through MSU’s Extension Service. The MSCCR&R Network provides a wide variety of services for child-care providers, parents and children.

If limited time or garden space challenges you to decide between an ornamental landscape and a vegetable or fruit garden, you may want to look at both of these areas from a new perspective.

The concept of incorporating edible plants into an ornamental garden is not new. Many of us are already doing it. Adding a pot of rosemary or parsley to your patio certainly qualifies. Most perennial or annual herbs or vegetables are great for containers or borders and can be beautiful as well as tasty.

MISSISSIPPI STATE – Seven states with the country’s highest obesity rates are in the South, but this issue that causes health problems such as diabetes and heart conditions cannot be blamed simply on Southern roots.

A study by the Southern Rural Development Center headquartered at Mississippi State University found that simply living in a region does not lead to obesity. In “The South Does Not Make You Fat: A study of nutrition, food security and obesity,” researchers found that minorities and lower-income groups have higher obesity rates.

By Patti Drapala
MSU Ag Communications

WEST POINT – More than 60 years have passed since Clay County 4-H agent Elizabeth Miller chose young Norman Armstrong to lead Rally Day, and his participation in the organization that helps young people develop their potential is not yet over.

MISSISSIPPI STATE -- Parents should rely on dietitians’ and medical experts’ recommendations before attempting to alter formula that they prepare for their infant.

Brent Fountain, nutrition specialist with the Mississippi State University Extension Service, said newborn babies may need time for their bodies to adjust to nutrients consumed outside the womb. Most babies enter the world with natural abilities to know when they are hungry and to stop eating when they are full.

By Rebekah Ray
Delta Research and Extension Center

STONEVILLE -- Mississippi produces more than 60 percent of the nation’s pond-raised catfish, and Mississippi State University researchers in the Delta are working to keep the fish flavorful and safe to eat.

MSU’s College of Veterinary Medicine oversees the Aquatic Research and Diagnostic Laboratory at the Thad Cochran National Warmwater Aquaculture Center. The center is located at MSU’s Delta Research and Extension Center in Stoneville.

By Karen Templeton
MSU Ag Communications

MISSISSIPPI STATE – A Mississippi State University researcher has found that biology and computer science make the perfect combination for tracking animal flu viruses.

I don’t want to alarm anyone too badly, but there are multiple volcanoes forming in our Mississippi communities as you read this column.

When you hear the word “volcano,” you might think of active volcanoes in Hawaii or other places around the globe. Some might envision the big volcanoes in the solar system, such as the one on Mars that is as big as Arizona. Still others remember bad Hollywood movies like Volcano, about a volcano forming under Los Angeles.

MISSISSIPPI STATE – Cotton production costs continue to climb in most categories with one exception – boll weevil control.

When the boll weevil eradication program first entered Mississippi’s eastern counties in 1997, cotton growers were assessed $20 per acre. As the program progressed westward, first-year assessments ranged from $20 to $24 per acre. Initially, weevils were also in the fields robbing growers of yields.

MISSISSIPPI STATE -- Those with a love for the outdoors have four conservation camps to take advantage of this summer offered through Mississippi State University’s College of Forest Resources.

Three of the camps are intergenerational and are geared for anyone interested in the outdoors. Designed for students 10 or older, the camps are useful for those who participate in the Envirothon or on Wildlife Habitat Evaluation Program teams. Students may attend individually or with parents and grandparents. 

MISSISSIPPI STATE – Mississippi State University will help contractors wanting to continue their access to projects on certain buildings built before 1978 as an April training deadline approaches.

Contractors are required to be lead-certified by the Environmental Protection Agency by April 22 to perform projects that disturb lead-based paint in homes, apartments, child-care facilities and schools built before 1978.

This time of year can be hard on gardeners. The weather is nasty and we’re all closed up inside the house getting more irritable by the minute.  It’s time to liven the mood with a blooming houseplant.

Check out your local garden centers or even the grocery store’s florist department for a cheery blooming azalea, Reiger begonia, cineraria or kalanchoe. Once you bring yours home, there are a few things you can do to get the longest cheery impact.

By Rebekah Ray
Delta Research and Extension Center

STONEVILLE -- Black root rot, a fungal disease that infects cotton and soybeans, may be affecting more soybean acres across the Delta, and Mississippi State University researchers are working to prevent its impact.

MISSISSIPPI STATE – The plant disease diagnostic lab at Mississippi State University handled 726 samples in 2009, and nearly 100 of these were digital images rather than actual samples of diseased plants.

Clarissa Balbalian, diagnostician and lab manager with the MSU Extension Service, said the lab made reasonably confident diagnoses of 75 percent of these digital samples without requiring physical samples.

“That success rate is primarily due to the excellent quality of the photographs and the detailed descriptions that accompanied them,” Balbalian said.

MISSISSIPPI STATE – Many furniture manufacturers have indicated their desire for formal manager education and training within their organizations, and Mississippi State University has responded to this need by designing specialized training.

In the furniture industry, first-line supervisors are responsible for managing workers and coordinating all of the activities to make, ship, sell and deliver thousands of pieces of furniture, but there is little formal education and training available to them.

JACKSON -- The Dixie National Sale of Junior Champions is more than a place to highlight the state’s top market animals; it is a place to meet the next generation of champion youth.

Parents Connie and Allen Keene of Hattiesburg took part in livestock projects when they were teen-agers. Now, they are watching their children -- Alexandra Pittman, 12, and Carson Keene, 5 -- follow in their footsteps and beyond.

By Patti Drapala
MSU Ag Communications

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

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

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

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

By Patti Drapala
MSU Ag Communications

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

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

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