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Two University of Georgia graduate students have received grant money to pursue research into producers’ attitudes towards sustainable agriculture.

For decades, farmers who have embraced conservation production have seen increased soil health, reduced irrigation demands and lowered economic risk. For the past 17 years, Georgia farmers interested in adopting new conservation practices for their farms – including those looking to swap best practices with other conservation tillers – have gathered at Georgia’s annual Conservation Production Systems Training Conference.

Like many other young people, plant pathology graduate student Russell Ingram’s friends have an epic road trip planned for this summer. The difference is that instead of setting off for a music festival in the desert or visiting a beach, Ingram’s pals are hitting the road in search of jobs.

This time of the year gardeners get excited about their soon-to-be-planted spring vegetable gardens. They envision lush rows of perfect pods of peas, scrumptiously delicious sweet corn and big, beautiful tomatoes. University of Georgia Extension urges gardeners to wait and put some thought and vision into their garden first.

When it comes to giving young pecan trees a jump-start, Georgia growers need to focus on improving the soil over applying fertilizer, according to University of Georgia Cooperative Extension Pecan Specialist Lenny Wells.

Women own 13.6 percent of America’s active farms and their farms produce almost $13 billion worth of goods each year. Just like male farmers, they need access to business and technical information to help make their farms successful. But while many pride themselves on not needing a “women’s only” class on how to work the land or run a business, many other women simply feel more comfortable learning around other female farmers.

Claudia Dunkley’s colleagues at the University of Georgia help the state’s poultry farmers grow chickens more efficiently. Dunkley helps them handle one of the industry’s biggest, and often underappreciated, byproducts – chicken litter.

Pesticides can be helpful in controlling insects and diseases, but there are chemicals that should be handled with care. To educate pesticide users, University of Georgia Extension has planned pesticide safety and handling classes in Albany, Savannah and Perry this February and March.

Georgia residents can safely dispose of old pesticides, herbicides, fertilizers and other chemicals at the Clean Day, set for Thursday, Nov. 12, from 9 a.m. until 3 p.m. at the Brooks County Extension office in Quitman, Georgia.

Georgia will definitely be on the minds of the estimated 90,000 people that will flock to this year’s Sunbelt Ag Expo in October.