By Memorial Day weekend, only half of Arkansas’ cotton acreage for 2019 had been planted, but as cotton extension agronomist Bill Robertson tells us, figures obtained by the Arkansas Boll Weevil Eradication Program show planted cotton acres now exceed 580,000. That means this is the fourth year of increased cotton acreage and the highest planted acreage since 2012. Learn more in this edition of Arkansas AgCast.

Damage to property caused by wild or feral hogs in Arkansas is getting worse. Efforts to trap and kill the destructive swine the past 10 years has had modest success, but they continue to reproduce and move across the state. Fourth District Congressman Bruce Westerman led a roundtable discussion July 1 in Ashley County involving representatives of state agencies and Arkansas Farm Bureau to receive a briefing on the problem and how $75 million USDA is offering to fund pilot projects included in the 2018 Farm Bureau may be utilized to enhance the eradication and control efforts in Arkansas and other states. In this edition of Arkansas Agcast, Caleb Plyler, chair of Arkansas Farm Bureau’s Feral Hog Committee and Mike Sullivan, State Conservationist with NRCS, discuss the severity of the problem and how the pilot eradication and control projects will be implemented in Arkansas.

Listen as Joe Fox, Arkansas’s State Forester, and Seward Hamilton, a training specialist for the U.S. Forest Service, talk about the annual Wildands Fire Academy to train wildlands firefighters. The Arkansas Forestry Commission and U.S. Forest Service team up each year with other state and federal agencies to host this multi-state effort to provide continuing education and training to wildlands firefighters.

Leslee Tell teaches Advanced Nutrition & Dietetics at the Conway Area Career Center in Conway High School. She spoke to us about attending the American Farm Bureau Foundation for Agriculture’s "On The Farm STEM Experience" in May and how it taught her about beef production and provided ideas to share with her students.

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Kenny Holt grows corn and soybeans in the Snow Lake community of southern Phillips County along the Mississippi River. The river has been near flood stage for several months and "seep water" coming up from underground has flooded thousands of acres of cropland and pasture throughout the region and has helped make this one of the most difficult seasons in Holt's memory.

Guard llamas? Really? You bet! Top AI Angus breeder Shirley Williams of Fair Oaks Farm near Van Buren, uses llamas to protect her registered seed-stock Angus. Llamas have an instinctive dislike for canids, like wild dogs and coyotes. Shirley loves her llamas and hasn't lost a single calf since they began guarding her herd 10 years ago.

Arkansas was a “Natural” location to host the 2019 National Agriculture in the Classroom Conference, which attracted more than 500 educators from across the nation and featured numerous workshops and nationally recognized speakers, such as animal welfare expert and author Temple Grandin. See highlights from the conference and hear from ArFB Ag in the Classroom Outstanding Teacher of the Year Celia Wortham.

The eight district winners in the 72nd annual Arkansas Farm Family of the Year Program have been selected, representing the diversity of Arkansas agriculture, the state’s largest industry.

Renisha Ward, coordinator the M*A*S*H camp at Jefferson Regional Medical Center in Pine Bluff, talks about how their “MASH Crash” simulated automobile accident involving local first responders demonstrates the dangers of distracted driving in a very real way.