Ag specialists added to expand Iowa State FARM research project

Iowa State University Research and Demonstration Farms and ISU Extension have hired two agricultural specialists to expand the ISU Farmer Assisted Research and Management, or ISU FARM, project.

Micah Smidt and Zachary Koopman will work at the Northern Research Farm near Kanawha, and the Agricultural Engineering/Agronomy Farm near Boone, respectively.

ISU FARM will extend the reach of the research farms near Kanawha and Boone. A network of cooperators in the surrounding counties will be established to conduct research on their farms.

Smidt and Koopman will assist cooperators in choosing topics related to corn or soybeans, designing and laying out the study, planting the test strips, applying the experimental treatments, and collecting and analyzing the data. Smidt also will work with farmers in northeast Iowa near the ISU Northeast Research Farm near Nashua.

Smidt of Kanawha earned a bachelor’s degree in agronomy from Iowa State in 2010, and has experience as a crop consultant and in production agriculture. Koopman of Boone earned a bachelor’s degree in agronomy from Iowa State in 2009, and has worked with custom application, crop protection and production agriculture.

ISU FARM is supported by the local associations that own the research farms: North Central Iowa Research Association, Kanawha; Northeast Iowa Agricultural Experimental Association, Nashua; and the Committee for Agricultural Development, Ames. Ag Ventures Alliance, a Mason City business development group for value-added agricultural ventures, and the Iowa Soybean Association also have invested in the program.

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