"as ready as money can make me" -roommate, Lucy

My boots are on order and my suit cases

came in today. I have a place to live, a truck, gas card. Thanks to God (seriously!), everything has fallen into place this week. I am ready for South Dakota.

Its time to stop shopping, emailing, setting up meetings--I have done plenty of that!

From no

w until my internship starts I have only three goals:

1. Run

2. Ace my classes

3. Learn as much about farming in South Dakota and Minnesota as humanly possible

Armed with the internet, a few Agronomy guides and a pink-striped notebook--I am ready to learn about aphids, nitrogen levels and seed sizes--a big change from Justin boots, western shirt design origins and Nudie, "The Cowboy Tailor."

Soybean growth stages.....

Interesting things I have learned about aphids in the past two days:

Its native to eastern asia (China, Indonesia and Japan) where it is an INfrequent soy bean pest. It was first introduced to North American in 2000, in Wisconsin. Probably by accident from an international flight. To me, this is interesting, because it just show the delicacy of our ecosystem. I have not taken biology since sophomore year of high school, but I have the common sense to connect the dots here.

In 2003, aphids were especially bad in Iowa--2.9 million acres were sprayed with insecticides (kills bugs) to reduce aphid populations. The total yield loss: 57.7 million bushels. Aphids are a big deal. check!

Soybean Aphids (aphis glycies) have infested this soybean plant. There are two kinds, wingless males and females, in the late season. And winged females. These things can reproduce like crazy, I don't fully understand this process yet, but its not sexual. I figure that out eventually, but for the time being, I know that there can be 15-18 generations of aphids on one plant.

I think I'll watch some corn videos on youtube now, I have had enough aphids for one day :)