News Filed Under Natural Resources

Do you have ash trees or white fringe trees in your home landscape? If you do and you love them, you should be on the lookout for the emerald ash borer.

Two simple, daily steps can protect Mississippi’s youngest citizens from lead poisoning. Jason Barrett, an assistant Extension professor in the Mississippi Water Resources Research Institute, said lead in drinking water can harm children’s health. But flushing faucets each morning and using cold water for cooking and preparing baby bottles can greatly reduce exposure.

As we ease into summer, if you listen closely during dusk and early nighttime hours, you may hear the distinctive sounds of goatsuckers.

Yes, you read that correctly: goatsuckers. Despite the unusual name, these are not fictional creatures.

Oh, deer! White-tailed deer can be quite the nuisance in the garden. It’s disheartening to see deer ate the flowers in your back yard for a snack. 

STARKVILLE, Miss. -- The beginning of May brought a welcome sight for Mississippi producers: sunny skies and drying fields.

For the second straight year, precipitation levels well above normal in the winter and early spring have slowed planting significantly across much of Mississippi. Gaps of days between rains have not been long enough until now for many fields to sufficiently dry. Some fields have been under water for more than a year. 

Easter Sunday’s severe weather and tornadoes left landowners in eight south Mississippi counties with battered timber stands. According to estimates by the Mississippi Forestry Commission, around 13,000 total acres of timber in Covington, Jasper, Jefferson Davis, Jones, Lawrence, Marion, Smith and Walthall counties suffered about $14.9 million in damages.

STARKVILLE, Miss. -- One of Kim Hancock’s routine jobs is assisting 4-H’ers in Jones County with their livestock projects. On Easter Sunday, she was helping some of those same young people and their families sort through the rubble of what was once their homes.

Thirty-two counties in Mississippi reported damage from a tornado outbreak April 12 that resulted in 12 fatalities, many injuries and catastrophic destruction to residential, commercial and agricultural property.

STARKVILLE, Miss. -- Social distancing guidelines already urged by federal and state health agencies should be followed closely to prevent exposure to COVID-19 during post-storm cleanup.

A severe weather outbreak April 12 caused widespread damage across the Southeast, but south Mississippi was hit particularly hard after a series of tornadoes left 11 deaths, several injuries and property destruction in its wake.

Hummingbirds are now out in full force. The arrival of these tiny acrobats marks the beginning of spring, and people love to put out feeders for them.

STARKVILLE, Miss. -- Necessary restrictions on travel and gatherings are affecting how the Mississippi State University Extension Service operates, but its ability to respond to the needs of its clients, the public and state agencies during the COVID-19 pandemic continues uninterrupted.

Extension’s roles during crises are many: emergency management, local level assistance, support for the state’s agricultural industry, and dissemination of public information and education.

BILOXI, Miss.-- At Mississippi State University’s Coastal Research and Extension Center, we recently aged one of the largest tripletail fish ever caught.

STARKVILLE, Miss. -- Farmers in Monroe and Tunica counties can dispose of unused hazardous agricultural products at two separate events.

The Waste Pesticide Disposal events, organized by the Mississippi State University Extension Service, will accept insecticides, herbicides and fungicides. Household chemicals, rinsates, and empty and bulk containers will not be accepted.

STARKVILLE, Miss. -- The Mississippi State University Extension Service will offer multiple opportunities March 3-5 for Delta row-crop producers to get help with an important irrigation planning tool.

As some of the top predators in the ocean, sharks fill vital roles by regulating food web dynamics and maintaining balance in their ecosystems.

Encounters with wildlife are becoming more common in towns and neighborhoods.

Habitat loss to fragmentation, urbanization, and expanding agricultural production means urban and suburban areas will increasingly become options for wildlife searching for homes. Song birds, snakes, lizards, coyotes, foxes, raccoons, deer and even bears are not uncommon visitors to urban and suburban backyards.

Video by Jonathan Parrish

You may not know that our “set” for The Food Factor is a real kitchen in the home of one of our team members. Her husband loves to hunt and share food, so while we are working on the show we often get to sample a variety of venison dishes.

We found this flavorful recipe for Spicy Venison Burgers in a venison recipe booklet from Cornell University Cooperative Extension and thought it would be perfect for The Food Factor!

Renee Collini began her role with the Mississippi State University Extension Service as a climate science educator Jan. 1.

Video by Michaela Parker

At the beginning of a new year, everyone makes goals and resolutions to keep throughout the coming months. If you want to make more eco-friendly decisions, here are a few tips to help you become intentional with recycling. 

When most people think about tarpon, they probably picture a giant, shimmering, 6-foot fish leaping up towards the sky from the crystal-clear waters of southern Florida. What many people don’t know is that tarpon are also found just off our beaches in the northern Gulf of Mexico.

Although tarpon are not considered table fare in the United States, they are prized by recreational anglers because of their large size and acrobatic behavior. Tarpon generally swim in schools and make long coastal migrations from the southern Gulf of Mexico to the north in the late spring before migrating back south in the fall.

Mississippi’s timber industry remained its second highest producing agricultural commodity again in 2019.

Coming in with an estimated production value of $1.15 billion, timber followed the state’s poultry industry, which generated an estimated value of $2.78 billion in 2019. Timber’s value of production is estimated by monthly severance taxes collected by the Mississippi Department of Revenue.