March 3, 2026

Meeting Place: Gilbert High School Classroom – 7 p.m.

Welcome \ Introductions: Don kicked off our meeting.

Guest and family additions: none

Treasurer Report: $1,903.01

Old Business: We need presenters for 2026. Pay your dues.
New Business:
• Garden city, IA, June 27, 2026, tractor ride with an entry fee of $20.00. You must have a slow-moving
vehicle sign. Top speed will be 13mph and the length of ride was unknown. There will be food available
during the ride (breakfast and noon meal).
• Palm Sunday, March 29, Boone Iowa, 9-3, toy show. Don will have items for sale at this show.

Discussion Items: Need presenters. See summer show schedule on back of agenda.
Auction or Threshing events: Bob Leeper has Facebook page with an auction in Hubbard on 5/30/2026.
Auctioneer is Jerry Vander Vorde. Sale is for the Arland Leeper collection and museum items, including toys,
manuals, paper emporia, various tractors and implements. There is a 1926 Special tractor, 51 Ferguson,
Internationals, John Deere planter, all parade ready. AC Combine, lots of brochures, protype disc, and more.

The auction is online and live. www.auctionzip.com for more information and sale bill.
For Sale or Wish List: Tractor with loader and 2 row cultivators

Presentation: Nate Meyer – ISU Farm Manager. He started out graduating with an Ag degree in 2009 and
started the farm in 2011. The farm at Ames is 1 of 13 across Iowa. They have different places in the state for
studying various soils and climates with a variety of different seeds and plants.
Some locations include west of Ames, East of Gilbert, by Boone, Madrid, Ia., Chariton, etc. They start by testing
the soils in each area. They have partnerships with farmers in some areas. The biggest farm is around Ames.
Chariton has a cattle farm operation. Another large farm is the one for Ag engineering and farming. ISU has
about 1,600 acres that they don’t use. The county line farm of 24 acres is for water quality research (run off). Also
in this area there is a tile spacing research farm. Years opposite the farm progress show they host field days by
Boone.
Agronomy research moved in 1964 and is around 1400 acres. They have 50 facility members, 7 full-time staff
members, with 96 projects, and have over 400 visitors annually.
Active farms include:
1) Feel lab with hands on work.
2) Bio Century farm
3) They rent 600 acres from a non-profit
4) They raise non-GMO soybeans
a. Beans are grown and sold out by United School between Boone and Ames
5) Corn which is taken to Kent feed mill ground and used at ISU animal farm and mixed into chicken feed.
Interesting fact was they grind marigolds into chicken feed to make yellow yolks.
6) Grains, etc.
7) Cattle, which includes a dairy herd.
They spend a lot of time doing research for soil, plant breeding, temperatures, materials for energy, crop
growth, alternative crops, various systems and electronics, tire pressures, even organic crops.
Crops raised included:
• Corn • Soybeans • Oats
• Wheat • Cover Crops • Cotton, one year
• Small grains • miscanthus •
The year they had cotton they did hand pick it and used it for training for those who haven’t seen cotton before.
They have around 100 acres for soybeans, which they plant to grow, roast and sell.
Technology research:
Auto steer Application control Planter control
Computers (new aps, updated aps) Logistics (manage people &
equipment, dispatch trucks to fields)
Yield per crop
Tracking of forge & row corps GPS for plant layout Seed experiments
Plots have alley ways to separate each test plot. Manual markers have been replaced using GPS. Plots can be 5
½, special planters are used. Large plots can be on 103 acres. They do use commercial equipment one of
which is an International Harvester, part of International nice program. They check weather, soil and log planting
and harvesting information. Reports are generated which can tell if they need more nitrogen, water, etc. and
make comparisons to prior years.
Strip tilling or No till
Phosphorous and Potassium are put down. After harvest they put down cover crops which could include rye. In
the spring the rye may have corn planted.
Equipment modifications included a 9450 JD in which they redirected grain, computer readouts in cab so they
could monitor weight, moisture, output, etc. They can hold 56 lbs. before needing to dump. They have separate
data collection points for different seeds\plants.
They also took a sprayer and made it into an air seeder which can have 2 types of seed, each with its own
controls and data collection for research. The 2 systems can even have different products. E.g. One corn, one
soybean.
They did research on miscanthus for nitrogen impact and found it had no benefits. Miscanthus is in the grain
family, can grow 10-12 ft tall, is used in power plants and at ISU it’s used for poultry bedding after chopping.
They send some to the southern Iowa farms and it can be bailed in 2 ft bales.