science

2013 is the International Year of Statistics. As part of this global event, every month this year USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service will profile careers of individuals who are making significant contributions to improve agricultural statistics in the United States.

Growing up on a small general crop and livestock farm in central Minnesota cultivated my enthusiasm for agriculture. Even then I knew I wanted to do something related to agriculture but I also knew the value of getting a good education. I attended the University of Minnesota to earn my undergraduate degree, after which I earned a Master of Science degree at North Dakota State University.

College provided me with skills in mathematics and agriculture but like most college graduates, no job. This is where the National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS) came into the picture. I joined the agency’s North Dakota field office as an agricultural statistician, allowing me to keep in touch with agriculture. Next I worked in the Idaho field office and then on to Washington, D.C. where I worked in both crops and livestock areas, finally settling into my current position as Chief of the Livestock Branch in 2001.

To recognize the contribution that research in agriculture makes in our daily lives, we’re focusing this month’s Science Tuesday blogs on the successes that USDA science agencies have achieved for us all.

How do we know where we’re going unless we know where we’re starting from? That question is the starting point for the world of ag statistics. The numbers point that way, and it takes hundreds of surveys every year, filled out by people working in and depending upon U.S. agriculture, to get those numbers. You may not have considered that collecting statistics was a key part of developing the products you use on a daily basis.  So, today we’re highlighting some of our greatest research stories about statistics because “Ag Research Counts” every day, for every American. Tomorrow is the beginning of our trivia contest on Facebook from ‘Science Tuesday’ blogs we’re featuring this month. You can also learn more cool facts in our conversation on Twitter using the hashtag #AgResearchCounts. Here are this week’s blogs featuring NASS research that impacts each of us every day:

As a kid, I didn’t quite grasp the science behind a game of hopscotch or ball and jacks.  It was later in life that I learned the scientific principles behind my childhood fun. Today, in an era of high-definition video games and 3-dimensional TV’s, it’s more challenging than ever to keep kids motivated to have fun through exploration and discovery.  But Monday’s 3^rd Annual White House Science Fair made me very hopeful once again.

This post is part of the Science Tuesday feature series on the USDA blog. Check back each week as we showcase stories and news from USDA's rich science and research portfolio.

We’ve all heard the old saying, “You can catch more flies with honey than with vinegar.”  But that’s part of the problem where these germ-spreading pests are concerned:  House fly larvae can protect themselves against our most effective pesticides by burrowing deep into gooey substances like food, and adult house flies are very adept at developing resistance to pesticides.

Cross posted from The Huffington Post:

In the United States, we haven't worried about food security since the Dust Bowl days of the 1930's. In fact, our farmers have become so productive we have a thriving food export sector that has returned a positive effect on our economy for over 40 years. Unfortunately, many other countries can not make that same claim.

Over 870 million people are malnourished or hungry according to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization. As the world grows more interconnected every day, it is imperative that we reach across borders to help other countries solve issues as fundamental as the ability to feed their people.

The first week of March found a team of plant biologists down on their knees in a highway right-of-way in the Florida Panhandle searching for Harper’s beauty, one of Florida’s rarest native plants.

For a decade, USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service and community-based organizations (CBOs) have placed a high priority on improving the cover­age and response of minority and hard-to-reach farm and ranch operators in the Census of Agriculture. CBOs partner with NASS to help reach these underserved agricultural producers and encourage them to participate in the Census. As the CBOs educate and motivate the producers they serve to complete their Census forms, these producers become part of the data that represent the accurate picture of agriculture across the nation. The partnerships are serving both the CBOs’ mission of providing service to every producer and NASS’s goal of counting every farmer and rancher in the Census of Agriculture. In the following blog, one of NASS’s longstanding CBO partners, Ralph Paige, shares his thoughts on the importance of the ongoing 2012 Census of Agriculture.

March is Women's History Month, a time to pay tribute to the contributions of women and the significant role they’ve played in agriculture and beyond. This year’s celebration focuses on “Women Inspiring Innovation through Imagination: Celebrating Women in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics.”

This post is part of the Science Tuesday feature series on the USDA blog. Check back each week as we showcase stories and news from USDA's rich science and research profile.

2013 is the International Year of Statistics. As part of this global event, every month this year USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service will profile careers of individuals who are making significant contributions to improve agricultural statistics in the United States.

March is National Women’s History Month, celebrating women’s many accomplishments throughout history. And 2013 is the International Year of Statistics, in which countries and organizations around the world mark the power and impact of statistics. Together, these two celebrations touch me on a personal level.   After all, only several decades ago, there were virtually no female statisticians, while today, more than half the staff at the National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS), where I work, is female.

This post is part of the Science Tuesday feature series on the USDA blog. Check back each week as we showcase stories and news from USDA's rich science and research profile.

2013 is the International Year of Statistics. As part of this global event, every month this year USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service will profile careers of individuals who are making significant contributions to improve agricultural statistics in the United States.

Although the first Census of Agriculture dates back to 1840, the way the data is collected is most assuredly not stuck in the past.  Historically, the main mode of data collection for the ag census has been by mail. There is one reason for this – it has always been cheaper!  With advancements in technology, USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service has tapped into more cost-efficient ways to collect information.