agenda Department of Soil and Crop Sciences In this issue soilcrop.tamu.edu

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1 AGGIE agenda In this issue Department Head Notes Sympathy Awards Student Internships Bennett Trust Alumni Spotlight Soil & Crop Sciences T A M U January 2014 Department of Soil and Crop Sciences We kicked off the year with our celebration of a century of the Smith- Lever act which has provided the federal support for our U.S. Extension program. It was great to see so many of our faculty members from around Texas join us for an inspirational set of meetings to chart a vision for our future. Congratulations to our cotton team (David Drake, Dan Fromme, Mark Kelley, Gaylon Morgan, Dale Mott and Jonathan H. Ramirez) and other award recipients during the conference. Special congratulations to Dr. Mark Hussey, our faculty member that moved into the role of Interim President. As part of the celebration we held a statewide SCSC faculty and staff meeting January the 9th. It was an opportunity to celebrate our award recipients for the year and review some of our opportunities. The latest hires were introduced and welcomed to the department Dr. Casey Reynolds, Dr. Muthu Bagavathiannan, Dr. Xuejun Dong, Dr. Anil Somenahally, and Dr. Jourdan Bell. Our new hires improve our discipline and capacity coverage and lay the foundation for a solid future. Welcome aboard. Tenure and promotion issues were discussed along with possible changes to departmental soilcrop.tamu.edu guidelines. Congratulations were extended to those moving through promotion and tenure this year. Important note: if you are going forward for review next year, please get started on the process. The soils judging and turf teams have been representing us well. Congratulations to all involved. It seemed like as soon as the conference was over and our representatives to Belt-Wide were back we were in a rush to prepare for the first Day of class, but several squeezed in representation at the Plant Animal Genome meetings. I took the opportunity to visit with the Howard Buffett Foundation about potential opportunities for collaboration as we move forward. I also started my year as President of Crop Science Society of America with a trip to Madison to meet with our National Headquarters staff and to kick off my first CSSA board meeting. As president of Gamma Sigma Delta we met to plan for the induction of this year s honorees and to make sure we get the word to everyone. If you have not talked with your graduate students about this opportunity please (continued next page)

2 (continued from first page) please do so. Megan Teel has the information on awards that are available through Gamma Sigma Delta as well as the initiation process. The ESSM Department Head search will be bringing three candidates to campus for interviews, which are scheduled for the 1st, 3rd, and 4th weeks in February. The three candidates are: Dr. Katy Kavanagh, Dr. John Tanaka, and Dr. John Briggs. I was able to participate in the Small grains advisory meeting in Amarillo and meet with our wheat team on Bayer grant activities. With the departmental review with administration on January 27, the staff and I were very busy preparing the supporting information. There are so many great things happening in the department including the jobs our students are getting, solid student numbers at both undergraduate and graduate levels, extension making a difference with producers success and exciting research findings. We reviewed the review with the Faculty Advisory Committee and commented on how many of our successes were the product of our strategic plan. The positions we have filled, the ones we are recruiting for and the emphasis areas we are developing. The FAC also provided an opportunity for critical evaluation of some of our internal processes that we hope will lead to improvements. I also met with the water group regarding our Grand Challenges and found it exciting that we are entering an action phase of the process. Watch for details on a conference soon. On other Grand Challenge issues we met to discuss the potential for laser technology to monitor molecules important in agriculture, from disease to stress related hormones and more. We also had the opportunity to discuss soil issues in the DRC as part of a larger grant proposal. This past week I missed the ASA Southern Branch meetings, the Texas Seed Trade Association meetings, BIG and the TX/Ok Cotton Physiology meetings and most of the Soil Survey and Land Resource Workshop with an opportunity to provide jury duty and interview the first candidate for the ESSM department head position. Dr. Miller and others report that we were well represented at all and that our faculty and students are the backbone of these efforts. The review team has completed this year s TTREE review and awards will be announced soon. I continue to be impressed with how many people our unit touches each week with the kind of information that makes a difference in their lives. Keep up the great work. I will be off to SRM this weekend. I just want to take the opportunity to thank Dr. Murray for getting this semester s seminars off to a great start. The discussion has been lively and the topics professionally presented while taking. If you have not attended you have really missed out, but more opportunities are coming every Wednesday at 4:00pm in 103 Heep. I hope you take the opportunity to participate and bring your grad students and invite our future grad students. Happy New Year!

3 Sympathy Dr. E.C. Bashaw, a former USDA-ARS Research Geneticist, passed away on January 28. He was housed in the Department of Soil & Crop Sciences for more than 35 years and worked closely with a number of the faculty members in the Crops section. He also taught a graduate course in the Department for a number of years. Please keep Girisha Ganjegunte and his family in your thoughts and prayers on the passing of his father who suffered from terminal lung cancer. Girisha is an Associate Professor in El Paso. Please keep David Drake and his family in your prayers. The Drakes lost their home in a fire earlier this month. David is our Assistant Professor and Extension Agronomist in San Angelo. Please keep Barbara Bracken and her family in your prayers on the passing of her mother. Barbara is a Business Coordinator for the department. Please keep Mark Hall and his family in your prayers on the passing of his sister. Mark is a Senior Academic Advisor for the department. Please keep Paul Schwab and his family in your thoughts and prayers. Dr. Schwab s father-inlaw passed away this weekend. In Memory of Former Students Mr. Lance E. Chase 50 Katy, TX CPT Emory E. Smith 50 Haskell, TX Mr. Eugene L. Ashley 55 McAllen, TX Mr. Robert L. Cheaney 49 Fort Myers, FL Mr. Norman N. Hinchliffe 49 Lubbock, TX Mr. Clayton H. Eichler 12 Texarkana, TX

4 Welcome to the Department The Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service has hired Jourdan Bell to be the new agronomy specialist serving the High Plains region and they didn t have to look far to find her. Bell, who will replace longtime agronomist Dr. Brent Bean, has spent much of the past 20 years working at the Conservation Production Research Laboratory near Bushland, first as a student technician with Texas A&M AgriLife Research under Bean, and then with the U.S. Department of Agriculture-Agricultural Research Service. A native of Amarillo, Bell offers strong agricultural roots in the Texas Panhandle, as well as excellent training and practical experience in agricultural research, said Dr. Travis Miller, AgriLife Extension agronomist and Texas A&M University soil and crop sciences associate department head in College Station. We are excited to have her join the AgriLife team, filling a vital position for the Texas High Plains, Miller said. Dr. Anil Somenahally, newly hired Texas A&M AgriLife Research soil scientist at the Texas A&M AgriLife Research and Extension Center at Overton, believes good land stewardship and profitable production agriculture go hand in hand. Somenahally received his bachelor s of science in agriculture from the University of Agricultural Sciences, Bangalore, India, in 2002, his master s in soil science from Tarleton State University, Stephenville, in 2006, and his doctorate in soil science and soil microbiology from Texas A&M University, College Station, in Somenahally has done research with heavy metals remediation, phosphorus runoff from dairy pasture soils and soil microbiology. He said his future research interests are mainly about using innovative and low-cost management approaches to build soil carbon and manage soil acidity. He hopes to apply his research findings to improve soil health in East Texas, help reduce production costs and avoid any adverse environmental impacts of intensive agricultural production.

5 Congratulations! 2013 Department Annual Meeting Award Winners Special Achievement Award for Administrative Support: Donna Harger and Frances Mutscher B.B. Singh Award for Outstanding Achievement by Non-Academic Support Staff: Carol J. Rhodes B.B. Singh Award for Outstanding Thesis Research in Crop Sciences: Adam Mahan Special Achievement Award for Research: Jackie Rudd Special Achievement Award for Research Support Lab: Linda Dykes Special Achievement Award for Research Support Field: Valerie Morgan Special Achievement Award for Technical Support Staff Lab: Nina Stanley Special Achievement Award for Technical Support Staff Field: Steve Labar Special Achievement Award for Teaching: Russell Jessup Special Achievement Award for Graduate Teaching: Jason Ackerson Special Achievement Award for Graduate Research: Adam Mahan Special Achievement Award for Extension: Archie Abrameit Special Service/Recognition Award for Support of Department Extension, Research and Teaching Programs: Tom Isakeit Special Achievement Award for Collaborating County Extension Agent: Kara Matheney Special Achievement Award for Undergraduate Student Support: Ethan Diver The 2013 Service Pin Receivers are listed below: AgriLife 10 years Ray Kamps 30 years David Stelly 40 years Dennis Pietsch TAMU 25 years Kevin McInnes 30 years Harry Cralle, David Stelly

6 Congratulations! Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Superior Service Awards Replicated Agronomic Cotton Evaluation (RACE) David Drake Dan Fromme Mark Kelley Gaylon Morgan Dale Mott Jonathan H. Ramirez Vice Chancellor s Awards in Exellence Jason Baker - Tech Jory Moore - Admin Faculty Advisory Committee Members Mark McFarland Chair Jamie Foster Vanessa Corriher-Olson Cristine Morgan Hongbin Zhang Scott Finlayson Terry Gentry Travis Miller Wayne Smith David Baltensperger If you have any information that you would like in the newsletter, please forward to dsutherland@ag.tamu.edu

7 Congratulations! Congratulations to our Aggie Turf students who placed 16th out of 75 teams at the John Deere Collegiate Turf Bowl Challenge in Orlando, FL! Dianna Bagnall and Jason Ackerson tied for 1st the Soil survey land resources Workshop Student Competition. Dianna s talk was on A Two- Domain Mesopore and Matrix Model for Cracking Soils. Jason s was A Universal Transformation to Remove the Effect of Water Content from VisNIR Spectra?

8 Soils Judging This fall the Collegiate TAMU Soil Judging team won 2nd place in the Regional Soil Judging Contest hosted by Univ. of Arkansas in Fayetteville. Michael Massey and Alex Garcia placed 2nd and 3rd individually. TAMU has been invited to participate in the National Soil Judging Contest in Pennsylvania in April. The top individuals to place at nationals will be invited to represent The Soil Science Society of America at the first International Soils contest at the World Congress of Soil Science this June in Jeju, Korea. The coach of the TAMU team, Cristine Morgan is co-organizing this first International Soil Judging Contest, with Prof. Stephen Cattle at The University of Sydney, AUS.

9 Student Internships Soil and Crop Sciences Students Advance Their Careers with Summer Internships Ian Sprouse 15 and Andrew Keeler 15 will both travel to different states to work for companies who may hire them in the future. Ian Sprouse is a double-major in Agricultural Education and Agronomy with a crop emphasis. He keeps busy as an undergrad research scholar, and in November he won first place in the Students of Agronomy Soils and Environmental Sciences undergraduate research poster symposium at the ASA, CSSA and SSSA national meeting in Tampa, FL. In addition to his academic research Sprouse works for Texas A&M s cotton improvement laboratory under Steve Hague. Sprouse will be interning with Monsanto, a sustainable agriculture company which delivers agricultural products that support farmers all over the world. He will be based in Winterville, MS and will assist the company as a Trait Field Solutions Field Testing Intern. I will be responsible for activities concerning the field testing of Monsanto s experimental cotton varieties, as well as participating in corn pollen research project, Sprouse said. I will also be responsible for conducting a research project and presenting the findings of the project to other Monsanto researchers. Sprouse credits Steve Hague for helping him secure his internship with Monsanto. Andrew Keeler is in his second semester at Texas A&M after graduating with a degree in English from the University of Texas. Keeler worked at a golf course in Austin while applying to Texas A&M and decided to pursue a career working on athletic fields. He will graduate with a degree in Turfgrass Science in May 2015, and hopes to one day work on professional baseball fields. Keeler will intern with the Washington Nationals ground crew in Washington, DC this summer. I will be working with the crew to maintain the field at Nationals Park which includes working each home game and any other events held at the stadium, Keeler said. I was one of six interns chosen and I ll get to learn directly from the head groundskeeper and experience everything involved with working on a Major League field, he said. Keeler would like to thank Casey Reynolds for helping him land his internship with the Nationals CALENDAR Jan. 7 Water Initiatives Team/Working Groups Meeting - College Station (location TBD) Jan Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Centennial Conference Jan. 15 Extension Snapshot Templates due Feb. 4-5 B.I.G. Conference - Waco Feb. 6-7 Texas Pest Management Association Meeting - San Angelo March SPRING BREAK--April 4-6 Texas & Southwestern Cattle Raisers Association Convention - San Antonio June 9-13 Texas 4-H Roundup - College Station Texas A&M University - Department of Soil & Crop Sciences - TAMU 2474, College Station, TX 77843

10 Bennett Trust Bennett endowment to provide ongoing AgriLife Extension land stewardship programming Contact: Dr. Larry Redmon, , Dr. Rick Machen, , A first-of-its-kind endowment made by Eskell and Ruth Bennett will make land stewardship in the Edwards Plateau a part of the Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service programming for years to come. The first educational efforts to be made through the Bennett endowment will be the Protecting the Legacy of the Edwards Plateau conference, to be held April in the Inn of the Hills Resort and Conference Center at Kerrville. The preliminary agenda for the first day includes discussions on recognition and management of encroaching plants, native tree health and care, water as wealth, and managing competition between wild and domestic herbivores. Also on April 23, a workshop entitled Retaining Your Piece of Texas Creating/Sustaining a Heritage will address issues related to estate planning and elder law. Day two of the conference will provide attendees a chance to take one of three behind the scenes tours, Machen said. Tour A, centered on natural resource stewardship, includes a visit to the historic Hillingdon Ranch in Kendall County, which has been in the same family for over 125 years. This tour features a pasture walk with Robin and Carol Giles and a demonstration of various types of equipment in brush management and how live oak wilt is combated. Tour B visits sustainable vineyards, orchards and gardens in Fredericksburg and Gillespie County to provide a glimpse of essential elements for stewardship success. Tour C will highlight wildlife management and the hunting industry in the Edwards Plateau, featuring landowners with a reputation for being good stewards of their wildlife resources, he said. The final day of the event will feature insight on keeping a legacy alive by focusing on legacy threats such as water quantity, quality and emerging regulatory issues, Redmon said. Mr. Bennett loved the Edwards Plateau and left a legacy that will afford landowners and resource managers ongoing opportunities to acquire knowledge and sharpen their skills as responsible stewards of this unique and storied part of Texas, he said. The proceeds from the invested endowment will provide unparalleled private sector support for AgriLife Extension educational efforts in the region.

11 Alumni Spotlight Soil and Crop Sciences Department Honors Alumni Texas A&M Soil and Crop Sciences has a tradition of recognizing alumni who have celebrated the 25th, 50th, and 75th anniversary of their graduation from the department. This year graduates of classes 1939, 1964, and 1989 will be honored and will receive a congratulatory letter and special anniversary pin from department head Dr. David Baltensperger. In 2012, the department honored two of its oldest living gradates through this program. Leo Witkowski of Hereford, Texas and John Ayers of McKinney, Texas both graduated from Texas A&M in 1937 and were recognized by the department. Baltensperger said the soil and crop sciences department recently started this recognition program for its alumni, and Ayers, along with Leo Witkowski, were the first to be recognized for their lifetime accomplishments and reaching the 75th anniversary of graduation, Kay Ledbetter reported. The Soil and Crop Sciences Department would like to thank all of our alumni for their hard work and contributions to the university, and for helping to advance agriculture and build outstanding citizens. John Ayers Leo Witkowski (photo courtesy of Kay Ledbetter)