- [Announcer] "Montana Ag
Live" is made possible by
the Montana Department
of Agriculture,
the MSU Extension Service,
the MSU Ag Experiment
Stations of
the College of Agriculture,
the Montana Wheat
& Barley Committee,
Cashman Nursery and Landscaping,
the Northern Pulse
Growers Association,
and the Gallatin Gardeners Club.
(folksy music)
- Good evening and welcome
to "Montana Ag Live,"
brought to you
from the PBS studio
at Montana State University.
It's beautifully
green here right now,
and we are also
thankful for the rain,
and we know there
are parts of Montana
that haven't been quite
as blessed as we have been
in the Gallatin Valley,
so we are sincerely hoping
that everybody gets some
relief from the drought
and gets a little bit
of rain on this Sunday.
So we've got a great
show for you today.
We have an economist, ag
economist from the department
here at MSU, Diane Charlton,
and she's gonna be,
excuse me, Diane Thronson.
Her name recently changed,
so congratulations, Diane,
and she's gonna be talking
about labor relations
and that's definitely
something that's been
of major interest
throughout our economy
and especially in our
agricultural economy in Montana.
On my left here is Abi Saeed.
She's a horticulturalist
here at MSU.
We have Laurie Kerzicnik
tonight who is our entomologist,
and then on the end anchoring
for us is Mary Burrows,
who's a plant pathologist
and also director
of the research
centers here at MSU.
We have Nancy Blake in the
studio answering questions,
and we have somebody
downstairs, and I apologize
if I did not get the name of
who is downstairs answering,
giving me the
questions that will be
coming in over the computer.
So I'm Nina Zidack.
I am the director
of the Seed Potato
Certification Program here,
and this is a call-in station.
So please keep our
operators busy,
keep the questions coming in,
and we'll just start off tonight
and give Diane the opportunity
to talk a little bit
about what she does
here at MSU in terms
of agricultural labor relations.
- Great.
Thank you, Nina.
Yes, so I work in the department
of agricultural
economics in economics.
So I teach courses in
economic development
and agribusiness
management, and my research
primarily focuses around labor
markets, farm labor markets,
specifically in
the United States
and somewhat in Mexico as well.
- Okay, thank you, and
we're gonna get to some more
of those specifics
in a little bit.
Abi, can you tell us about,
what is the best
time to prune lilacs?
This is a question that
came in from Billings.
- This is a good
and timely question.
So lilacs, I would say the
best time to prune them
would be right after
they're done flowering
because in the summer they're
gonna start developing
those buds that are gonna
flower the following spring.
So get those pruned right after
they're done
flowering this spring.
- Okay, yeah, and so I
live south of Bozeman
and my lilacs are still
like at least a week
or 10 days away, so they're
very late this year,
which I think is kind of
indicative of this whole spring.
- I think so, mine too.
Mine are just starting
to, just started
to flower this past weekend.
- Yeah, that's great.
It's nice to see those.
So Laurie, a question
from Bozeman.
This person lost the leader
out of their eight foot tall
spruce tree last year, and it
looks like there's some holes
from bugs around the base
of where it turned brown.
Do you have any
idea what they are
and how they can
get rid of them?
- Yeah, I, it, that's probably
the white pine weevil,
but usually those holes
are at the top of the tree.
So maybe they were
seeing the beetles and.
- [Nina] Oh, at the
base of the brown part.
- Oh, the brown part, okay.
Yeah, that makes sense then.
Yeah, that's probably white
pine weevil and you can,
so that part that's
dead, they usually start
infesting right below that.
So you can spray with a
pyrethroid insecticide
or contact insecticide right
below that, about six inches
below that, where you're
starting to see the damage.
Right now would be a
good time to do that
or you could actually, you
don't even need to spray.
You could actually
prune that out.
If it's a younger tree,
you could prune that out
between now, actually you
wanna, they'd be in the tree
right now, but you wanna
make sure that you do it
before the end of July
when they exit the tree.
- Okay.
- So if it's a young tree, you
can still train a new leader,
but if it's an older tree,
then you probably will have
to spray because the tree
will start to look deformed.
- Yeah, yeah.
We've got a tree that
I think it's happened
three years in a row so.
- Yeah, yeah.
- It's getting to be quite
short and stubby, so.
- I know, it just keeps
moving down, yeah.
- Uh huh, for sure.
Okay, Diane, can you
tell us about the people
that work on US farms?
- Sure.
Comes as no surprise to most
people that the majority
of our farm workers
are immigrants.
It actually wasn't
always that way.
If we go back to in
1900, about 40% of
the US workforce was on farms.
Now it's less than 1%.
So the majority of our
farm workers are actually
from Mexico, and I think I
have a figure on this as well,
that shows the breakdown
of crop workers
and where they were born.
About two thirds of our crop
workers were born in Mexico.
About 25%, actually a
little bit less than 25%
were actually born in
the United States, and so
the primary data source
that we have for this
is the National
Agricultural Worker Survey.
It is nationally representative
of the crop workforce,
excluding H-2A workers.
So H-2A is a specific
guest worker visa
for seasonal farm jobs.
So it doesn't cover
permanent jobs.
It's very specific.
So yeah, the vast majority of
workers in the United States
come from Mexico, and this
is actually becoming a bit
of a problem for
the United States
because fewer and fewer
Mexicans actually want
to work in agriculture.
So just as the United States
transitioned out of agriculture
in the 20th century and less
than 1% of our population
currently works on farms,
Mexico's going through
that same transition process.
So this is a normal phase
in economic development.
As the economy grows,
fewer and fewer people
work in agriculture, so
we kind of, as a nation,
continue to produce a lot
of labor intensive crops
by importing workers from
a less developed country,
but as that country begins
to develop, we're having
to become more creative
in how we solve
this farm labor problem.
- Yes, yeah.
It certainly, it impacts the
potato industry, for sure,
and there are a fairly large
number of H-2A workers,
but one of the biggest
trends that I have seen
since I started in this
industry 14 years ago
was the increased mechanization.
The mechanization is huge
in terms of, you know,
the changes that we are
seeing and the equipment
that the farmers have had to
employ to get the work done
for the hands that
they cannot hire.
- Yeah, well, and here's
a breakdown of where
H-2A workers work
within Montana.
Montana has, I would say
roughly 1,000 H-2A workers.
It was a little less
than 1,000 in 2019.
This breakdown is from
2019, but H-2A employment
has grown nationally since 2019.
So H-2A was about
10% of the full-time
equivalent workforce in 2019.
I recently went to a
conference where Daniel Costa
said it was 14% now, so
I'm gonna defer to him.
He's usually an expert on this.
So that is a substantial
part of our workforce,
which is a really
interesting phenomenon
because H-2A has been
around since 1986,
but very few farmers
used it in 1986.
It's kind of a
complicated process to
recruit workers,
bring them over here.
The employer has
to provide housing,
has to provide their
transport from the country,
from which they were born.
So, yeah, it's a
complicated process.
1986, no one really
wanted to use the program
because lots of
workers were available.
A lot of them were probably
unauthorized workers.
There was, you know,
a great big surge
in unauthorized
immigration from Mexico,
particularly in the 1990s,
but ever since 2010,
and granted, I don't, well,
even in more recent years,
our, the unauthorized
immigration has primarily been
from central America, so
since 2010 net immigration
from Mexico has actually
been zero or negative.
So fewer Mexicans are migrating
here, and on top of that,
fewer Mexicans are
working in agriculture.
So it's putting a lot
of pressure on farms.
You mentioned the mechanization.
I was just talking
to some apple growers
in Washington state.
Of course, apples
are still handpicked.
They're like, bring
us the robots.
We're ready, and the technology,
we have the technology,
we haven't quite figured
out, engineers haven't quite
figured out precisely how to
make that technology work,
but as the wages keep rising
and, and I've been talking
to these growers,
like how efficient do
these robots have to be?
How expensive can
this technology be
And then they tell
me, well, this is what
I'm paying workers, and I
can't even find enough workers.
So this is the minimum bar
and that bar keeps rising.
So I think in the next 10 years,
we're gonna see some robots
harvesting our fruits
and vegetables.
- Yeah.
So, you know, Mary, Diane
is talking a lot about labor
in the agricultural
industry in general.
What are we seeing
across the College of Ag
in terms of being able
to find employees to work
in the College of Agriculture?
- I think we're seeing
exact same trend.
I mean, student labor research
centers have a real hard time
attracting farm labor
and in keeping employees,
and it's not just wages.
It's just, nobody is applying.
- Right.
So in the potato lab, for
instance, we hire between
35 and 40 student or temporary
workers every summer,
and right now we're
sitting at about 25,
which we're, we have to
feel pretty good about that
because I think considering
the labor market,
I think we're actually
doing pretty well,
but we still need to
get more people out
to pick potato leaves and
test them in the lab so.
- [Mary] So call Nina.
- Right, exactly, exactly.
(Nina laughing)
I use every opportunity I can
to pitch jobs at
the potato labs, so.
Okay, great.
Back to Abi.
What do you do with a
thin and patchy lawn?
- That's a tough question,
and I've seen lawns
in various arrays of
thin and patchiness,
but you wanna get to the bottom
of why it's thin and patchy.
So one of the things
that I would recommend
if you haven't done this
is to get a soil test
to see what those soil
nutrients are like.
There are a lot of
things that you can do
to keep your turf healthy.
A lot of times, for those
thin and patchy lawns,
some of the issues is, you're
not getting enough moisture.
Maybe there aren't
enough soil nutrients,
you're not fertilizing enough,
which you should do about
three or four times a year,
you wanna fertilize your lawn.
So try and get to the bottom
of why, get a soil test,
and then work from there
on some of those practices
to keep a healthy lawn.
We have a really nice lawn
guy that's talking about
taking care of your
home lawns in Montana,
and so that you can find
at the MSU Extension store
and download it from there,
but that has some great tips
on how to keep your lawn
healthy and full and vibrant.
- [Mary] I think mowing height
is also pretty important.
- Mowing height yeah,
that's a good point.
I usually say two and a half
to three inches minimum.
Don't go below that,
'cause you want your lawns
to be competitive with any
other plants that are gonna
try and encroach in there, yeah.
- Yeah, and one thing we've
noticed, we usually only
fertilize one time a year,
either once in the spring
or once in the fall and
our lawn is not the first
to green up, but believe me,
it does, and we have plenty
of mowing to do so
it catches up, so.
So Laurie, a question
out of Billings.
This person's ash trees
aren't looking great.
There's been some news
about the ash borer.
Is the ash borer,
could it be affecting
their trees in Billings?
- No, we don't
actually, don't have,
we haven't confirmed that,
they're probably talking
about the Emerald ash borer
hasn't been confirmed yet
in the state, but it is,
a lot of our ash trees,
Bozeman, Billings, other areas
are being, they're very slow
to leaf out so they
don't look very good.
I think that's changed
in the last week or so,
but we are still looking
out for the borer,
but I think, just give your
trees a few weeks to just
leaf out a little bit
and look healthy again.
Usually, we think about July
first, we, this has happened
a few times in the last few
years and July first is kind of
a time where we just,
something might be going on
if by July first, you're
not getting leafing out.
Do you have anything
to add about it, Abi?
- Yeah, I mean, I was
just gonna say the same.
The ash trees in the
boulevard in front of
my house too are pretty slow.
They're look, they're pretty
slow to leaf out too this year.
So I was wondering if
people are seeing that
a lot pretty
consistently, so yeah,
I like that comment of
giving it some time.
- Yeah, be patient.
- The crops are
in the same boat.
You know, we're just behind.
- Yeah.
- So, thank you.
So Diane, this is a
question from Bozeman
and it's not specifically
labor related,
but it's definitely
something on,
that's on everybody's mind.
How have increased land
prices affected farmers
in the Gallatin Valley?
- Yeah, that's a good
question, and I think
we're all noticing the
pressure of increasing
property prices here in Bozeman.
My colleague, Dan Bigelow,
is really the expert on this,
but just like anything, you
know, if there's an alternative
of what we can do with
our property, it makes it
more difficult to
stay in agriculture.
So as a farmer, if my option
is to keep farming and the cost
of inputs might be
increasing as well,
I'm going to be weighing
that option versus selling
for a very high prices.
So I think we're gonna see
more farmers moving elsewhere
in Montana where the
land prices are lower
or moving out of
agriculture together.
It's just another option,
and it's a high value
option right now.
- Absolutely.
Yeah, there's a lot
of competition for
especially in the
Gallatin Valley.
So Mary, field day
season is coming up.
Can you tell us a little
bit about the field days
that are gonna be happening
throughout Montana this summer?
- Yeah, so all of
our research centers
and the post farm here
in town have field day.
So we invite the community
in, there's usually some sort
of lunch provided, either
during, before or after.
It's a good time to
meet your neighbors
and talk to maybe your ag
lender, and look at all of
the research going on
at the research centers.
So I'll be at the
vast majority of them
and they're a fun time,
get out, and learn about
what's going on, and the one
in Bozeman here is July seventh
and the rest of them are on
our website, so Kalispell,
Havre, Sidney, I
can't remember if
Huntley, Conrad.
- [Nina] Conrad, Moccasin.
- [Mary] Yep, everybody's.
- [Nina] Corvallis.
- There's also some or other
organizations doing field days.
So there's a couple, MO is doing
a couple organic field days.
I think there's all kinds
of other tours if you just
look out in your
local community.
- Great, great.
Sounds like a good time
and maybe a free lunch.
- And sometimes a steak dinner.
- Oh, okay, okay.
That'll get the people in.
A question came in from
Great Falls for Abi.
This person's rhubarb is
putting out seed stalks.
Should they cut it
off or leave it?
- I'd say if you still wanna
harvest the more rhubarb
this season, which I would want,
'cause I haven't gotten
enough because it's been slow,
I would say cut
off that seed stalk
and keep harvesting, yeah.
- [Nina] Okay.
- [Mary] Remind me to bring
you some of my rhubarb.
- Yeah, please.
- I still have some
frozen from last year.
- I feel like I've been missing
out on rhubarb this year.
- So, so Laurie, you've
got some samples to show.
Can you, oh, give us
an idea of some of the,
do you have anything that's
creeping and crawling today or?
- It's, this one is creeping
and crawling and this kind of
relates to the ash trees we
were talking about before.
This sample's from Havre.
This is the leaf curl ash
aphid, and this causes curling
of the leaves, right when the
tree's starting to leaf out.
So some parts of the state,
our ash trees are leafing out.
So the aphid definitely
curls the leaves
and then releases honeydew,
so it gets pretty sticky,
and then after the
tree, this is nothing
to really worry about.
It looks kind of alarming,
but after the tree
finishes leafing out that
the aphids will leave
and then the tree will recover.
I actually watched
these back in Missoula,
a couple trees that had
leaf curl ash aphid,
I just followed them
through the season
and they looked pretty,
pretty bad this time of year,
and then throughout the summer
they started to look fine again.
- [Mary] So just don't park
under them for a while?
- Just don't park
under them, yeah.
That honeydew, that honey
can drip on your car
and then it could, and then
it could attract sooty mold
and just get yucky, so yeah.
- [Phone Operator]
Are you actually?
- Good point.
So Diane, from Helena, since
labor is relatively costly
in the US, should consumers
expect to be paying more
for their fruits and vegetables
at the grocery store?
- We might see some of that
transfer into higher costs
of our fruits and vegetables
and granted, there's a lot
of other inputs into
production of all of our
agricultural goods that could
cause those prices to rise.
So I mean, I think the
most obvious is just
the cost of fuel right now.
So with transport, anything
along that supply chain,
that's gonna get passed
along to consumers.
Farmers are under a lot
of pressure to try to keep
those labor costs
as low as possible.
So as labor is still a
relatively small share of
the total cost of what you're
paying for in the store,
so you're probably not gonna
see these huge jumps in prices
of produce just because the
cost of labor on the farm
is increasing, but it does put
a lot of pressure on farmers
to try to find more efficient
ways to employ workers
and to keep them busy and
try to complement workers
with mechanization, as
you mentioned earlier.
So, so even here, I remember
we talked about this
a little while ago, Nina,
a lot of the H-2A workers
in Montana actually
come from South Africa,
and I was just
thinking about that,
and we talked about Mexico.
Nationally, Mexico is a
major supplier of labor
to the United States,
but here in Montana
and in North Dakota, we see
some H-2 workers, H-2A workers
from South Africa, which is,
seems like a long ways away,
but if you're putting
those workers on a combine,
imagine all the work
that that person can do.
So we can amortize that
cost of bringing them over
from South Africa over
all that they produce,
and so when we have these
more mechanized jobs,
they can be higher paying jobs
and that won't necessarily
bring a big change
in terms of what
consumers pay for their produce.
Also have to keep in mind that
our producers are competing
with imports from other
countries as well.
So there's a lot of
pressure on producers to try
to resolve this issue.
- Absolutely, yeah.
We see, I mean, a huge amount
of our fruits and vegetables,
especially in the winter are
coming from Mexico and Chile
and you know, other
countries in South America.
It's pretty amazing when
you think of being able
to actually pick something
up in the grocery store
that has been transported
that many miles away.
- And some of the producers
that are producing down there
in Mexico are actually
US producers as well.
So there's a big
international network here.
- So do you think that
the incentive for them
to produce in Mexico is
because of labor costs?
- That is part of it.
That's what producers
have told me.
So, you know, US wages versus
a daily wage in Mexico,
United States wages are much
higher and workers are still
more available in Mexico
than in the United States,
but I think when I
started working in
shortly after I started
doing some research on Mexico
transitioning out of farm
work, there was a big story
in the "LA Times" about how
there was this two week strike
in Baja California, that
workers were not coming to work,
demanding higher
wages, more benefits,
and they actually held out
for an entire two weeks,
which is just consistent
with this story
of people moving
out of agriculture.
Usually other
people would move in
if somebody tried
to hold a strike.
So that labor supply in both
Mexico and the United States
is getting tighter where,
we are feeling that,
but some producers
are moving into Mexico
if they're able to.
- Yeah, that's very interesting.
So Mary, this is a
question that just came in
today from Bridger Canyon.
This person has tulip leaves
that have really scorched tips,
and also the flowers are
kind of burning back.
Is this from the frost?
- Well, it could be,
but we did get a sample
in diagnostic lab this week
of a Botrytis, so a gray mold
that was causing
some leaf scorching
and it's called
tulip fire disease,
and they could Google
some images of that
and they can always
submit a sample
to their county agent
to get it diagnosed.
- Okay, yeah.
Well, and yeah, if
it's a Botrytis, it's
- The sclerotia and been
in the soil a long time.
So just some sanitation
to get rid of those leaves
so they don't reinfect,
you know, throw 'em away.
Don't just compost them.
- Yeah, yeah, it's interesting.
It's something that I
have never seen before
at the diagnostic lab.
- We've had enough
moisture lately, then.
There actually is.
- Yeah exactly.
You get a moist year,
you get diseases exactly.
Years that are good for
producing crops and flowers
and vegetables can
also be very good
for producing diseases so.
So Abi, from Polson, this
person has, is wanting
to plant a pear tree
and they're wondering,
how far does it need to be
from another or how close
does it need to be to another
tree to get crosspollination?
- Yeah, so for
crosspollination, I've read,
usually you wanna be within,
between 50 to 100 feet
away from each other,
definitely less than 100 feet.
You don't wanna go beyond that.
That's the best for like
optimal, pollen transfer
for your fruit set.
So, between 50 to 100 feet
from the original tree
for your different variety.
- Okay, great.
Thank you, and
finally for Laurie,
getting her back on her
favorite home ground,
a question from Kalispell.
Do we have brown recluse
spiders in this state
and how are they similar
to the hobo spider?
- Oh yeah.
I haven't had a question
about the spider in a while.
Yeah, we do not have
the brown recluse here.
It is not, we say it's
not established here.
We've never had a brown
recluse identified here
and it is, it could show
up here if someone brings
a shipment in from
Mississippi or Kansas,
where they're native
and a very large part
of the United States
where they're native,
but we haven't found it
here, and the hobo spider
we do have, and Kalispell, you
have a lot of hobo spiders.
They've dropped off a little
bit in the last couple years,
but the hobo spider is
a funnel web spider,
and it doesn't cause any
necrosis in the skin.
It doesn't have any
compounds in its venom
to cause necrosis in the skin.
So we call the hobo
spider a harmless spider,
a spider that is not of
medical importance to humans.
- But it still gets
a lot of bad press.
- It gets a lot of bad press,
but we're working on that.
- Good.
You, yeah, love your spiders.
- [Laurie] I do love my spiders.
- Okay, to Diane.
Back to labor.
This is a question that
came in from Stevensville,
and I know there's been just,
you know, a lot of rhetoric
in the public about seasonal
farm workers and crime.
Is there any evidence
be, or of a relationship
between seasonal crime
workers and crime rates,
or seasonal farm
workers and crime rates?
- Yeah, actually my
colleague, Brock Smith and I,
along with another colleague
from University of Alaska,
Alex James, we looked
at the association
between seasonal variation
in fruit, vegetable,
and horticultural employment
within US counties
and crime rates, and
we actually found
a negative impact
within a county year.
We looked from 1990 to 2016.
So we honestly, we
looked at this thinking
we might find zero impact.
We were kind of
surprised to find
a statistically significant
negative association.
So, you know, we, you know,
can't really tell what
the causal story is, but
our best guess at this
is that we think that the
additional economic activity
during harvest and maybe
labor intensive seasons
leading up to harvest
provides so many opportunities
for people that crime
rates actually decrease.
So when you see stories
of people trying to resist
seasonal workers from
living in their communities,
crime rate, we, isn't really
a, there isn't evidence
to support that they would
increase crime rates.
Actually, evidence would suggest
that crime rates decrease
during those seasonally
labor-intensive periods.
- That's good to know.
So Mary, question
from Manhattan,
do you need to worry about
Aphanomyces in peas this year?
- I think with increasing
temperatures and moisture,
Aphanomyces might be a concern,
but we have not
found Aphanomyces
to my knowledge in that area.
So I wouldn't be super
concerned about it.
It's more in the northeast
corner and then down
into the Triangle where
pea production has been
very intensive for
many, many years.
In the Gallatin Valley, we
did have a canning industry
for fresh peas, right
around World War II,
and it did decline because
of a root rat disease
called fusarium wilt, but
that is a different disease,
but as we get more
intensive pulse production,
we will get Aphanomyces.
- Of course.
Okay, so this is from
Helena and this is
a shout out to Laurie.
- [Laurie] All right.
- Please thank her for
connecting her with, to a group
of certified arborists
who came to help with
her elm leaf beetle problems
in which are now solved
because Laurie's wonderful
help, so thank you.
- That's great to hear.
- Yeah.
- Very happy.
- That's good to know
that you're actually
- Yeah, it's very nice.
- So Abi, a question.
This is kind of an
interesting question,
and we're gonna throw this
out to the whole panel
because I don't think any
of us are a specialist,
but their flower garden
has garter snakes.
Is there a way to get
rid of them and are they
creating any damage to plants?
This is a unique one.
- Yeah.
I have never heard
of garter snakes
doing any damage to
plants personally.
I think it would be a
beneficial sign of a healthy
flower garden if you
have garter snakes.
They're probably eating some
small insects in there too
that could potentially
be pests, but I would say
having garter snakes
would be a badge of honor
that you have a really nice
hospitable environment.
(panel laughing)
- Is it possible they might
have some rodent infestation.
- It could be, it could be.
- I don't know, do garter
snakes eat insects too?
They probably do.
- They, yeah.
I think that they eat
a variety of things.
Yeah, whatever they
can find probably.
- Pretty small and
harmless, so I don't think
that they would be hurting
anything, yeah, so.
- I've never heard of
anything like that.
Very interesting.
- Yeah, kind of like spiders.
(panel laughing)
So for Laurie,
out of Livingston,
a lot of their pine
trees have brown tips
at the tops of the trees.
Will this kill the tree?
- Well, we started seeing
brown tips in pines,
maybe even starting around
the pandemic in 2020,
just a lot of Austrian
pines with brown tips,
and mostly that
was environmental.
So we had, a lot of
that was winter kill.
So we saw a lot of
die back in the top.
We did see some, had
some samples come into
the diagnostic lab that
some had bark beetles,
some twig beetles, and
another type of bark beetle,
but that was in Great
Falls and just kind of,
one was in Stillwater so, but
mostly that was environmental,
and I've been kind of
watching an Austrian pine
across the street from me,
which is still doing fine.
I would just keep an
eye on it that, I mean,
that the top part of
that is still brown
and kind of died back,
but then just make sure
that doesn't progress
down the tree,
but if you're working
with a certified arborist
or you could reach
that top of the tree,
and it's not gonna
disfigure any part of that,
then you could
maybe prune that out
if it's, you know, just
for aesthetic reasons,
but most of the time it's hard
to get up there to
your tree to see it.
- Well, and that's one of the
things that always, I mean,
confused me in the very
beginning is because, you know,
the problem that happens at
the tips of our spruce trees
is the white pine weevil.
- [Laurie] Yeah, right.
- And I don't ever
recall when I worked
in the diagnostic lab
getting like a white pine
that came in with pine
weevil damage and it,
so does it kind of look
similar to what you might see
on a spruce tree except
where it's just taking
the leader of the tree out?
- Yeah, I'm glad you brought
that up because it doesn't,
it's, you would think that
it would hit that pine
would be a host for
that, but it's, it is
a little bit different just
because it's, it doesn't,
you don't see any of this
big holes in the tree,
and then you still
see the needles.
The needles are still on
there, and so basically
it just looks brown
instead of bare,
like the white pine weevil.
I mean, you'll, the white
pine weevil just looks
stripped of all its needles.
So, but different pests and
different situations, yeah.
- Okay, yeah.
Very interesting.
So, Diane, here's a
question from Lewistown.
During the pandemic,
they heard a lot about
the extreme labor disruptions
in the meat processing,
and I know we saw that they
were horrible centers for COVID
and a lot of plants
got shut down.
Has this particular labor
issue resolved itself
or is it still ongoing?
- Yeah, this is, to
my understanding,
it's still an ongoing issue.
So, the last I heard was,
it was a few months ago,
but workers have not returned
to the meat processing plants
in the same numbers
that were working there
prior to the pandemic,
much like other industries
are experiencing those
difficulties right now.
So a lot of those plants are
operating at reduced capacity,
and many of them are
looking into increasing use
of robots in those processes.
So a lot of demand for
engineers right now,
as fewer and fewer workers
are willing to do those jobs,
and I think as most
people are probably aware,
like it's a lot of
those refrigerated areas
during peak COVID times
was just conducive
to spreading viruses, so
particularly difficult place
to work during the
pandemic and people
have not returned
in the same numbers.
- It's also has to put a lot
of pressure on breeders too,
to make like, a more
homogenous crop so that
they can be harvested
uniformly by robots.
- Oh, in terms of like
plant production as well?
- Yeah, and livestock.
- Yeah, livestock.
Yeah, they have a uniform.
- Size and.
- Yeah, and I think I just
saw something in the news,
a plant in South Dakota,
a huge plant that I think
is going to be employing
a very significant amount
of robotics for meat cutting.
So it probably is gonna be.
- Changing the industry.
- Wave of the future.
- Yeah, definitely.
- So Mary, and this
is something that Abi
might be able to comment on too.
This is a question that
came in from Billings.
They have an old, very
sick looking arbor vitae.
The neighbor's arbor
vitaes are green,
but hers have gone
from green to brown.
It appears to be frostbite.
If not, what could it be, and
do you have tips to help this?
- I'll let Abi take that one.
- Yeah, so we're
seeing a lot of,
our Schutter Diagnostic Lab
is seeing a lot of samples
of winter injury in a
lot of our evergreens
just across the state.
We're seeing so much
of this right now.
So I would say, give it
time, take a look at it,
give it some TLC,
make sure it's getting
enough moisture right now,
but a lot of our evergreens
are showing a lot of that
winter injury and are,
have that browning in there.
- [Mary] Arbor vitae in
particular seems to age.
- They're, yes.
I've seen very few
really excellent looking
arbor vitae around, so
yeah, I think they're pretty
susceptible to some of these
environmental conditions.
- And I would say too, that,
you know, she's comparing,
or they're comparing
theirs to their neighbors
and their neighbors might
be in a little bit more
protected location, might
not have as intensive
a southern exposure, you know?
'Cause I know some people
will actually put burlap
on the southern side of the
arbor vitae in the winter
to kind of give it a
little bit of a sunscreen.
So yeah, probably definitely
a winter desiccation issue.
- Yeah, that's what I would say.
- Also, what does boll damage
look like on arbor vitae?
Is there a specific
pattern that you see?
- I think in general, if you
get significant boll damage,
the whole plant or the
whole tree will die,
because it'll girdle them.
- [Laurie] Okay.
Okay.
- That's what,
yeah, I would say.
I don't know if there's a
pattern other than seeing the.
- [Mary] The teeth marks.
- Yeah, yeah.
- Okay.
- Okay, Laurie, from Billings,
all of their plants this year
are late and they've
noticed very few bumblebees.
Should he be concerned
about the lack of bees?
- Gosh, I think that might
be a better question for Abi.
Sorry to pass this over.
- Oh, what am I thinking?
Abi really is kind
of a bee specialist.
- Bee specialist here.
- So I would say,
yeah, it's hard to say.
There is a concern because
the bumblebees, the queen bees
right now are working on
starting their new nests,
starting their new colonies
and with the seasons
being so slow, there aren't
that many flowering plants.
So I would say it's hard
to say it, how this is
gonna affect bees, but it
is something I was thinking
about too, this season,
wondering about food sources
for bees right now, 'cause
we were talking about
hummingbirds earlier as well.
People were seeing some
hummingbirds and wondering
if there's enough nectar out
there for them to consume.
So it's hard to say.
- My crab apple was just
buzzing the other day.
So there was at least
some in my yard.
- That's fantastic.
- So probably, honeybees
more on a crab apple or?
- I would say it,
it all kinds of bees
will visit crab apples.
- All kinds of bees.
- Yeah.
- Wonderful, wonderful.
Well, I am excited
because a question
came in from Anaconda
about potatoes.
(Diane laughing)
So they have heard that
the, that potato plants
stop growing after they bloom.
Does this mean that only the
aboveground plant does or,
does quit growing or does
it affect the tuber as well?
Well, actually, after they
bloom is when they really
start bulking up and putting
energy into the tubers.
So usually if you're just
going to be picking some,
or digging some new
potatoes for your garden,
you'll start digging
probably a week or two
after the potatoes are
blooming, but then as
the summer progresses
and later in the season,
that's, you know, the vines
will even start to kind of
lay down and go
down a little bit,
but that's when the
tubers are really,
or the plants are really putting
all of those carbohydrates
down into the tubers.
So they're absolutely
still growing.
So, just a lot more is
going on underground
than what you see above ground.
So, back to Laurie.
Wasps, are they
active right now?
This is a question that
came in from Three Forks.
- Oh yes, they are active.
So I've seen a European
paper wasp and then actually
I put my Western yellowjacket
traps out about a week ago
and, maybe a week and a
half ago, and June third was
when I caught my first queen,
Western yellowjacket queen,
in Bozeman, so I figure
that most other areas
probably have queens
active already.
I haven't seen any
bald faced hornets yet,
but I think most people
are concerned about
the Western
yellowjackets and not
having those nests established.
So yes, they're out.
- Okay.
- So putting out traps,
would now still be a
good time to do that, or?
- If you haven't put 'em out,
you can still put 'em out now,
and they'll still trap workers.
So it'll cut down
the population,
but you really wanna try
to get them out there.
There's, the Queens are
active, still active right now.
So you will prevent them
from starting new nests,
but yeah, you could
still put them out,
but think about Memorial
Day or a little bit sooner
next year if you haven't
put your traps out yet.
- Okay, so this is just a
comment, again for Laurie,
that came in from Missoula.
Their Austrian pine
started with brown tip
three years ago and
now it's nearly dead.
- [Laurie] Oh really?
Okay.
- Yeah, so.
- Yeah, it's good if you're
really worried about your tree,
if you can get a sample from
the top, we're more than happy
to look at it at the
Schutter Diagnostic Lab.
So it's just been a
case by case basis,
and if it is a bark beetle,
that will kill your tree,
but it's just been
all across the board
as far as environmental
conditions, but yeah,
if you're worried about your
tree, please send it in.
- Okay.
Okay, very good.
For Diane, from Bozeman, there
have been a lot of stories
again in the news about
unemployment and then also
about labor force participation.
Can you tell us what
the difference is
between unemployment and
labor force participation?
- Yeah, it is a little bit
confusing because the way
we measure the
unemployment rate,
it's based on workers who
are actually actively looking
for a job, but not employed.
So if someone has left
the labor force entirely,
they would not be counted
in the unemployment rate.
So if they quit
looking for a job,
they just leave the labor force.
So we could have a very
low unemployment rate
as we do right now have
a low unemployment rate,
but labor force participation
rate is also low.
So there are many people
who dropped out of
the workforce entirely
during the pandemic.
Some of these were, you
know, people who were close
to retirement age and decided
to retire a little bit earlier
than they planned, and some
of them are people, you know,
a lot of people have termed
it the Great Reassessment,
so quitting their jobs, thinking
about what they want to do
with their future, more
career path oriented, perhaps,
and then there's another term
that I heard some economists
talking about recently, a
Great Reshuffle, in which
they noticed that there
are a lot of people
who quit their jobs, but
other people who are joining
and just a high turnover rate.
So if you think about in
terms of productivity,
if people are staying in a
job for just a few months,
it's about how long
it takes to train them
and then they might
be leaving again.
So we have, you know,
early retirement,
we have people just
reassessing their futures
and maybe not back
in the workforce yet,
and then we have this
reshuffling and all of these
are reducing total
economic output.
So there is some concern
and in terms of how much
we're actually producing,
it's gonna be challenging
to get these supply
chains straightened out.
- Yeah, exactly.
- [Diane] While
we have this lower
labor force participation rate.
- Yeah, because where are the
workers going to come from?
Yeah, it's definitely
a big question.
From Hardin, this
grower has spots
on the leaves of their barley.
Should they spray a fungicide?
- Fungicide recommendations
generally depend on
what your potential yield is.
So assess what the cost
of the application is,
what your potential
yield is, and then see if
it's gonna pencil,
and what you expect
your yield savings to
be from application.
Early in the growing season,
sometimes it doesn't pay
directly, but that flag leaf
is what you wanna protect.
That said, if it's really
severe, you probably wanna put
a fungicide on
it, probably when,
with your herbicide application.
- Okay.
Okay, a question about
hostas from Fort Benton.
They have three
hostas on the west,
southwest side of their house.
Can you tell them why their
hostas are not doing well
on the south or the west
side of their house?
- It would, I'd say
it's hard to say.
If they've been
healthy for a while
and they're just
starting to decline now,
it could be a few things.
Usually my hostas do better
in the shady environment.
So if they're facing that
west, southwest side, you know,
maybe they're drying
out a little bit more.
Maybe they need a
little bit more moisture
or maybe they're just slow,
like a lot of our plants.
My hosts just started
to spring back up
right now this past weekend.
So I would say maybe reach out
to your local extension agent
and see if you can work with
them to get to the bottom
of what might be going on there.
- Right, and just probably try
a shadier aspect
of the house too.
- Yeah, yeah.
- Yeah, I think that would
be a good recommendation.
So from Great Falls, Laurie,
what would you use as
an attractant in your was traps?
- Oh, if you buy the wasp
trap, it's a yellow trap
and the attractant comes
with the trap and it's,
the chemical's called
heptyl butyrate and that's,
it's, that's it just, you,
I think you just squeeze it
onto a cotton ball and
that'll attract the wasp.
It doesn't attract bees
or any other species.
It does do another
Vespula species and,
but it's not something
that's common in Montana, so.
It comes with the trap.
- Okay.
Okay, Diane, so we hear
a lot of talk about how
supply chain issues are
affecting us as consumers.
How are supply chain
issues affecting producers?
- Sure, I think one of the
classic examples right now
has been the fertilizer supply.
We just don't have as
much fertilizer this year,
so it's been more expensive.
So as things are less available,
the price goes up,
but also equipment.
A lot of equipment we
might import from abroad
or the supply chains
just might be kind of
in disorder right now.
So for producers, this
can be very frustrating.
Sometimes if it's
essential input,
we might see less,
less production.
So we're definitely
hoping for the best here,
but this is definitely
a huge difficulty
in all industries,
including agriculture.
- For sure.
This could be a question
for Mary or Abi.
This is a question
for, from Wolf Point.
They have a Ponderosa pine
that is starting to leak
a lot of clear sap along
the bottom half of the tree,
but they don't see any
signs of in insect damage.
Do you have any
idea why this tree
would be losing a lot of sap?
- I would, usually when
they're losing sap,
there's some sort of a
physical injury, whether that's
through insects or some
other mechanical damage.
- [Mary] High winds,
like, sand, soil blowing.
- Yeah, that's possible.
Yeah, high winds.
- Especially if it's the
lower part of the tree.
- Yeah, so it's, it
would be hard to say.
- They could check
if it was more on
the western side of the tree.
- Yeah, yeah.
It is interesting that
they're not really seeing
any signs of injury, I mean,
and this is the time of year
where the sap is kind of
like rising in the tree, so.
- At least they got
enough water to get sap.
- Yeah, I guess, I guess
that's a good thing.
So Laurie, a
question from Denton.
Can you talk about the outlook
for grasshoppers this year?
- Whew, yeah.
I'm not a very good
grasshopper predictor at all.
So I'll just throw
that out there,
but we have had a really
wet spring and when we have
a consistently wet spring,
that will often create a lot
of natural fungi
that will, that are,
that will attack
the grasshoppers.
So I think it looks
better that we had
an extended rain season in
most areas in Montana for the,
it just depends on what
you're talking about.
Oh, Denton, I don't know
how much rain Denton's had,
but if it's, if they've had
a wet spring, like we've had,
then it it'll look
a little bit better
for the grasshopper
situation, but we also had
so many grasshoppers
over wintering that.
- [Nina] Right.
- We're still gonna have some
grasshopper pressure, but.
- From watching
the weather maps,
my family is from
central Montana.
It seems like they're
kind of on the edge
of getting this rain.
They're, they've been
getting a little bit.
- Okay.
- But not, not in, not a lot.
They haven't been
really nice and wet.
- Yeah, it'll probably
be, there will probably be
some grasshopper pressure
there, unfortunately.
- So, okay.
Okay, so Abi, let's see.
Yes, oh, how to
preserve honeybees.
They are getting
into their basement.
This is from Butte, probably
because it's cool and wet.
How they, how can
they save them safely,
but also get them
out of their home?
- That's a good question.
I would say contact
a local beekeeper.
A lot of local beekeepers
will come and take
those honey bees and rehome
them, or you can reach out
to like a local beekeeping
club if you know one.
There are a few beekeeping
clubs across the state
that are pretty active,
but in, from what I know,
beekeepers would be happy
to take those bees off
someone's hands and just
take them and put them
in a new hive and try to get
them established over there.
- Okay.
This is a question for Diane
that came in from Great Falls,
like, relative to inflation,
how much do you see
wage and salary increases in,
changing for agriculture
workers over time?
Do you think that
they're going to be able
to keep pace with
inflation or are they
gonna be a little
bit disconnected?
- Yeah, so I think that
the past couple decades
we've seen
agricultural wages rise
more quickly than inflation.
However, obviously inflation
is going at a much more
rapid pace right now than it
has the past couple decades.
So the, for H-2A workers,
those workers have to be paid
what's called the
adverse effect wage rate,
which is set by the
Department of Labor,
and it's based on the
agricultural worker
and so that will probably
rise similar to inflation
and increasing wage
rates in similar jobs.
So we, I think we can expect
farm wages to rise similar
with the wages of all the other
similar jobs of, you know,
being similar jobs,
probably construction
and service industries,
jobs that don't require
high levels of education.
- Okay.
Mary, also coming in
from central Montana,
what is the wheat streak
mosaic outlook for this year?
- We've had a couple of
samples come into the clinic,
but mostly from situations
where they had grazed it
and they knew they
had a problem,
and then the crop this
spring showed symptoms.
We've had three
years of drought,
so we don't have
much of the vector.
So unless you've kind of created
a green bridge situation,
I don't see much wheat streak.
- Okay.
There's a fairly recent
publication that's been put out
by Extension, and Abi's got
a copy of it here right now,
and I actually have a copy
of this on my coffee table,
and it's really, really
a wonderful resource
for pest problems
on ornamentals.
- Yeah, so this is
put together by Laurie
and the other ladies at the
Schutter Diagnostic Lab,
and it's really, really
nice publication that goes
through pest problems
and just identifying
plants here in Montana.
This is available at
the MSU Extension store.
So this is not available at
those local Extension offices.
So if you want a
copy, they're free.
you go to the MSU Extension
bookstore and you can just
order it there and
then pay for shipping
and it'll come to you,
or you can pick it up
in person as well from Bozeman.
- [Mary] And there's a
PDF available as well.
- There is the PDF available
online as well, if you want,
if you don't want, but
I have one in my car,
I have one in my house
and one in my office, and.
- Yeah, it's an
amazing resource,
especially when you
consider the price, so.
- Absolutely.
- It's the best deal in town.
So, Laurie, I think you
have another show and tell.
- I do, yeah.
I, this came in from Gallatin
Gateway and this is actually,
I, the phone call came
in and he was saying that
he had a bunch of beetles
and some frass and things
of that sort, insect
excrement coming in,
and he's has an 1890s
home in Gallatin Gateway,
and I'm trying to
get this even here.
So the spider beetle on
this, the cause from this,
this spider beetle,
which you see in this,
in the white container
here, these spider beetles
were burrowing into
the wood and creating
all this insect excrement, and
this home had been abandoned
for quite a while and
not really doing too much
structural damage to the
wood, but he said the beetles
were pretty much everywhere
and the insect excrement
and the sawdust was
everywhere too, and then also
in addition to this, there
were a bunch of another beetle
called the carpet beetle,
and so not something
that we typically
see in our, as for,
it's not really considered
that much of a wood borer,
but it does, it is kind
of excavating in the wood
and for a home that's
abandoned like that,
the spider beetles just
completely took over.
- So I did not think
of this until now,
but I knew somebody
that in their basement,
the people that had built
the basement had actually put
carpeting like, up the
walls and onto the ceiling,
and I think they might
have gotten those like,
into the studs and everything,
I mean, and created,
like they got hundreds of
pounds of like, frass and wood
and chips and things like
that that came out of it.
- Yeah.
- I'm wondering if
that's the same thing.
- Yeah, this,
they're scavengers.
So they feed on lint, carpet,
pet fur, other insects,
and yeah, they can really.
- [Nina] Yeah.
- They can really build up.
That's the first time I've
seen a sample like that,
where they've been that
heavy and then the whole
insect world comes in
and they decompose.
- Right, exactly.
Yeah, it was a huge,
huge issue and yeah,
it was yeah, pretty almost
terrifying to hear about
an infestation like that, that
could happen in your home.
- Yeah, yeah, and I think
this person will be okay
because they're doing a remodel.
So it's getting rid of the
source and putting new wood in
will be very helpful
in this situation,
and I think they will call
a pest control professional
to kind of really
target those areas
to get rid of the
beetles and make sure
they're not gonna
have a problem,
but they're not
boring into the woods.
So they're not causing any
structural damage but they will
be around if they're not
taken care of properly.
- Wow, yeah.
Interesting.
From Ronan, for Diane, can
you think of any other time
in history where agriculture
has had a labor shortage
like this and how it has
been creatively handled?
Is there any precedent for what
we're going through right now?
- Well, I think these
times seem somewhat unique,
particularly as in our,
the country that supplies
our farm labor is
transitioning out of farm work.
So I think kind of taking a
more global context, you said,
like the United States
imports workers from Mexico.
If we go to Europe, the
UK brings in farm workers
from Poland and eastern Europe,
and New Zealand brings
workers from other
south Pacific islands,
so this is sort of
a normal phenomenon, but now
we're reaching this new phase
where our source country's
transitioning out of farm work,
and then we have the
pandemic on top of that,
which makes things
pretty complicated.
Back in the 1960s, in 1964, the
Bracero guest worker program
between Mexico and the United
States was actually terminated
kind of abruptly, and so farm
employers were very, you know,
stressed about this,
of what would they do
to actually harvest their
crops if they couldn't bring in
workers through the Bracero
program, and there were
a couple outcomes from this.
One of them was the creation
of the tomato harvester.
So, all of our processing
tomatoes used to be
picked by hand, but
with work from some
agricultural
engineers at UC Davis,
and along with plant breeders,
you were talking about
breeding more uniform crops.
- We learned about
this in school.
(panel chuckling)
- Yeah, yeah, it's
a classic one.
So yeah, they created
a tomato harvester,
much more efficient,
really changed the way
that we do tomato
processing now,
harvesting and processing,
really expanded that industry.
So one of the major
outcomes of the end of
the Bracero program
was this mechanization,
tomato harvester being a
really classic example.
Also created a lot of jobs
in the processing industry.
So I think there's kind
of this overall assumption
that when we talk about
mechanization and robots
that it's taking away jobs,
it can also create jobs
maybe further down
the supply chain
or someone who has to
operate that machinery.
So we're changing maybe
the skills that are needed.
So I think that's a really
classic example and sort of
a helpful example for
how innovation can
some of these issues.
- Great.
Thank you, Diane, and
probably just time
for one more question, and
this is a follow up since
we've been talking quite a
bit about hornets and wasps.
From Lockwood, referring to
the previous conversation
about hornet traps with
pheromones in them,
if you've not seen a
lot of hornets yet,
is it not something that you
should put out at this time
or should you be
proactive and put it out
before you start
seeing the problem?
- Yeah, I'd put 'em out now.
Yeah, so, and again,
it's just gonna trap
the Western yellow jacket.
So it's not gonna trap
bald faced hornets.
It's not gonna trap the
European paper wasp.
Those are the two other
really common ones, but yeah.
Get it out now and that'll
keep any nest from forming
around your property
and probably
your neighbor's property too.
So it's not too late.
Don't wait and you
just might not,
they might not be attracted
to anything on your yard,
but then if you put the
trap out, it'll get 'em, so.
- That's great.
That's good to know.
So we just have a
tiny bit of time left.
Diane, anything that you can
add in just a few seconds
about what we haven't
talked about today.
- Oh, we've covered
some good topics.
No, I love thinking
about farm labor markets.
You know, agriculture
is really unique,
particularly in the
sense that there's
a lot of uncertainty and risk.
I think everybody here
can agree with that,
and then it does create
some interesting challenges
with labor as well, because
farmer doesn't necessarily know
exactly how many workers
they will need and when
they will need them, and from
the workers' perspective,
that also creates
some uncertainty.
So interesting challenges and
interesting and challenges,
challenges with
agriculture overall
with all of their inputs.
- Okay, thank you
so much, Diane.
Please tune in
with us next week.
Our show is gonna be on the
beef industry in Montana
and Chaley Harney, who
is the executive director
of the Montana Beef Council
will be the special guest.
Thank you.
- [Narrator] Visit
MontanaPBS.org/AgLive.
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