Professional crop farmers are usually well-informed when it comes to keeping up with United States Department of Agriculture programs including disaster assistance, but sometimes part-time operators, hobby cattle ranchers or horse owners are less familiar with programs to which they may be entitled. Those less familiar may even be a little intimidated by all the USDA’s acronyms or terms that are not normally in their vocabulary. I often encounter individuals who simply feel they just may not qualify because they don’t consider themselves to be ‘real farmers’.

One of the purposes of today’s column is to get the word out to all farmers about a new provision in the USDA’s Food, Conservation, and Energy Act of 2008 (2008 Farm Bill), which was enacted into public law a couple of months ago. I chose today to mention this because there is a very important deadline — Tuesday — by which producers need to pay their buy-in fees at the Farm Services Agency office to be eligible to enroll in the program.

The Farm Bill created a total of five new programs, collectively referred to as Supplemental Agriculture Disaster Assistance programs, and they are certainly something even horse owners, hobby cattle farmers, or bee keepers may want to look into. It certainly may be worth one’s time to drop by the USDA’s Farm Services Agency on Sherman Avenue and see if this program will benefit you.

I am told by our local FSA director, Rob Riggin, producers are required to pay a buy-in fee of $100 per crop in order to be eligible to enroll in most of the new supplemental disaster assistance programs. I suppose another way to interpret these new rules is that if a producer fails to pay the buy-in fees, there is no chance he or she will be eligible for any USDA disaster assistance, should any become available for this year. That’s important.

Again, payment of the fees will allow the producer to be eligible to enroll for financial assistance under the Supplemental Revenue Assistance Program, Livestock Forage (including horses), Honey Bees and Aquaculture (ELAP), or Tree Assistance Program. You see what I mean about those acronyms? Those buy-in fees are not the same as crop insurance, but rather they allow the eligible  producer to enroll in the 2008 disaster programs.  

I’ll conclude today’s column by posing this question: What’s up with the raccoons in Warren County? I’ve spoken with several people about problems they were having with raccoons around their residences. Two live inside the city limits and one reported having pretty heavy raccoon damage to his muscadine crop this year. Obviously, removing food sources (i.e. pet foods) will help prevent attracting raccoons. In-town folks with persistent raccoons, however, are best advised to become familiar with a live or cage-type trap. The 10 X 12 X 32 size trap baited with canned fish-flavored cat food, sardines, fish or chicken will work well to capture the critters. Before taking any lethal control measures, however, make sure to check with one of the local wildlife conservation officers to make sure you are not breaking any laws.

John C. Coccaro is county Extension director. Write to him at 1100-C Grove St., Vicksburg, MS 39180 or call 601-636-5442. E-mail him at jcoccaro@ext.msstate.edu